F Murtz wrote
Rod Speed wrote
robgraham wrote
wrote
Rod Speed wrote
The Natural Philosopher wrote
Adrian C wrote
robgraham wrote

I know it's not strictly DIY, but I'm tasked with getting them apart !

Two bowls on the same diameter and are well wedged together
slightly at an angle. I wonder if they been taken out of the
dishwasher hot by one of the members of the family and have
effectively 'shrunk' together, but they certainly won't come apart.

Any ideas - I've tried hot water and then the deep freeze
without success - maybe significant oven heat ?

Fill water in the gap, then place in the deep freeze?

AAA+. TNP's award for the most creative and practical idea to date.

Nope, the most practical is to try another cycle thru the dishwasher first.

It remains to be seen if the gap can actually be filled with water.

As an aside my wife bottles loads of fruit - and can never open the lids!

I have discovered that a blunt knife inserted op top of the rubber seal, from the side, can be used to compress
it enough to break the seal..

I have a different problem. I reuse commercial marmalade jars for my own marmalade, basically because they stopped
making the lemon and
lime marmalade that I prefer. I put the marmalade in the jars
when its very hot indeed, after its been boiling to make it set.
The lids are metal, but have a plastic liner where the inside the
lid meets the rim of the glass jar. Can be a real bugger to get
those off.

The only thing that works very well is those strap wrench things
that are designed for getting lids off but even those can be a
real gut busting exercise.

The other lid 'wrenches' that are metal that go across the lid
diameter rather than around the circumference do work but ruin the
lid, it cant be reused.

Guess I could change over to the sort of jars you use, but I get
the box of limes from the packing shed thats the only one in the
area that does limes, for peanuts and need 100 600g jars. I do
have 150 of those and your type of jar is much too big for marmalade with the jars that you can get at times in
garage/yard sales, so I would have to buy some
of the smaller ones you dont see in garage/yard sales at all, so
that approach isnt very practical in my case.

I also use commercial marmalade jars, I find if I cut a piece of
Greaseproof paper to slightly larger than the lid then fix the lid
on top the vacuum cause by the hot marmalade cooling seals the jars
fine. I have kept my marmalade for well over a year this way, and
it is fine when I come to use it. Of course if you are feeling flush you can buy jam jars and lids from Lakeland,
not cheap though.

--
Residing on low ground in North Staffordshire

I've enjoyed the deviations form the true path of this topic
in to marmalade making, etc. We'll try the dishwasher
approach followed by the outside/inside cold idea. Angle
grinders, WD40 and duct tape are not kitchen items !! :)

They are here |-)

Back to the marmalade, we're fortunate enough to have gathered
over the years a number of the 7 lb porcelain jars (for those that
at are imperially challenged that's around 3kg) - I now normally
make the marmalade and I just seal the top with cling film while
still hot. The vacuum of the cooling pulls that down tight and a
cover with brown grease proof paper then protects that.

Yeah, I am aware of that approach, and using wax
too, but prefer the lids because its much easier.

If you can find real celophane (not the laminate that says it is
celophane) dip it in vinegar and while it is wet cover jar while jam
is still hot and put a rubber band around it,it then forms a part
vacuum as it cools and will seal for a year or two.

The lids are a lot easier, particularly if its just a matter of letting
the marmalade cool a bit before putting the lids on to ensure that
you dont end up with a hernia when taking the lids off.

I completely automate the timing stuff so it would be completely
trivial to just get an alarm when its time to put the lids on.

I will likely be doing a batch when the new season's harvest of
limes happens, so there wouldnt even be a room temp variation
to bugger up the timing.

Its so easy to have the dishwasher do the jars and lids.

The only real nuisance is that you do have stir the marmalade
continuously when doing the final fast boil so that it sets properly.
If you dont, you get burnt marmalade on the bottom of the massive
stock pot with heavy base that I make it in and its a bugger to get
that off, quite apart from not being good for the marmalade. It comes
off pretty easily when you boil peroxide in it, but thats impossible to
find in decent volume cheap here, so its much better all round to just
stir it continuously in the last fast boil setting phase.

I try to minimise effort required and canned tomatoes to make the tomato
and chilli relish for the same reason. They're dirt cheap from the EU.
We do have large area tomato growers here, and that does end up
much cheaper again, because plenty of the locals make tomato sauce
in big volume at the end of the summer, but its a lot more work than
using canned tomatoes and I dont have jars for a full box of tomatoes
anyway, and relish doesnt last anything like as long as marmalade.
It would take me years to eat a box of tomatoes worth of relish.

The cheapest less than a box at a time fresh tomatoes are the same
price as the canned EU tomatoes.