Probably not the right time of year for this, but as I've mentioned before I've only just worked out how to get my photos onto pootah

Ok, so last autumn we had a huge amount of apples, our own and donated. My OH, being a West Country boy, decided the best thing to do would be to make zydol (cider...) with them, but we had no equipment except basic buckets, barrels & demi-johns. We looked everywhere for cheap presses, but even on e-bay the prices were ridiculous. So we tried a juicer (then a friends super-juicer), but the pulp was still coming out soggy - what a waste of juice!

So then OH found some plans on t'internet for a press made with a car-jack and a light-bulb flicked on above his head...he headed for the garage and dragged out...A WORKMATE!
This is how we now get juice from our apples;

1. Chop the apples
2. Put them through mincer on Kenwood, using coarse disc.
3. Half fill 'jelly bags'* with resulting pulp
4. Put half full jelly bag, with top twisted round and down, between 2 thick (earthenware?) plates.
5. Put plates carefully in Workmate, and tighten gradually til juice stops dripping into sterilised bucket.
6. Loosen Workmate carefully, remove plates, empty dry pulp for composting, start again.

This may seem very long-winded but if 2 of you are doing it, it soon gets into a steady flow, and as most apples are ready Autumnish it's nice to do on an evening when the sprogs have disappeared for the night!

Hope this all makes sense!

Neccessity is the mother of invention! I'm surprised the plates didn't crack though!

There's a bit of give in the wood on the workmate, so if the plates are thick enuff and you go slow... We didn't have any breakages anyway.

very clever idea.

You could always swap the plates for either timber or thick plastic. What a simple but effective idea.

It could be quite torturous if bodily part were substituted for apples!

Hope LJ hasn't seen this, she may abandon the Sunday evening pea stick for more creative discipline!

My father would put the pulp into an old stocking(ladder free) & squeeze.
Could be a bit slow but it worked!

Wow! A fantastic breakthrough for hobby cidermaking. Have you patented this idea Sarah?

Best of luck, Mark

fantastic idea, I am going to try it.

What is a Jelly Bag? Could you use muslin?

Could you do Grapes in the same way???

Does he mean us?

You can get a jelly bag from Lakeland.

Originally Posted by WiZeR

fantastic idea, I am going to try it.

What is a Jelly Bag? Could you use muslin?

You could try using muslin, we just happened to have the jelly bag handy. It's like a bag made with net curtain material, with an elastic top. Like Flum said, we got them from Lakeland.

Originally Posted by Headfry

Could you do Grapes in the same way???

I can't see why not? Give it a go and let us know

we used old but clean tights, we did it by hand, very slow and messy, definatly going to get a press this year.