other fruit because of its precise fit. This machine can be found primarily in households for private use and larger scaled machines would be used in the commercial wine industry.
Project Proposal
Automatic Grape Crusher
Carlo Porco
|
|
| In the
early 1800's wine enthusiasts would use their feet to crush grapes in order
to create wine. As health concerns grew, so did the method of crushing grapes,
the first manual crushing mechanism came to light in the late 1800's. This
method stayed intact for several decades but was soon to be outdated when
the 1950's blitz of technology hit the market. Wine makers were now introduced
to automatic grape crushers. This would revolutionize the wine industry
and house hold wine making. With more power and 3 times the speed, the automatic
grape crusher would dominate! The model chosen for this report is also a
used for de-stemming of vines and unlike most grape crushers is only grape
accommodating, which means the main crushers would not be able to crush
any other fruit because of its precise fit. This machine can be found primarily in households for private use and larger scaled machines would be used in the commercial wine industry. |
| The grape crusher consists of 25 parts (not including the engines separate pieces), the two main driving components are: the primary driver which is belt driven, and the secondary driver which is chain driven. Its overall dimensions are approximately 46in.X23in.X20in. The grape holder is made of sheet metal and all gears are made of white plastic. The rest of the parts excluding the engine, nuts, bolts and chain are made of A36 steel. The boxed crushing house is painted red along with the belt driven large pulley and the engine mounting is painted gold. The moving parts for this machine begin at the engine where the attached pulley will drive a larger pulley by an intact V-belt. This power will then be translated to the sub crusher axel, which in turn rotates the fixed driving sprocket, and this will rotate the larger sprocket by chain. The larger sprocket is fixed to the first main crushers axel, so it is not only transforming power to one crusher but also the second main crusher by use of a fixed plastic gear on the first main crushers axel. This plastic gear is linked two more plastic gears, one is fixed to the second main crusher's axel and the other is fixed to the upper single crusher's axel on a 9.5-degree angle (See Pic.A & Pic.B for orientation). Grapes are simply put in the grape holder and then fed through the two main crushers by the upper single crusher (press) and de-stemmed while going through the sub crusher. What you have is a primary stage of wine called "grape juice", and then the "juice" is put through a fomenting stage to a desired level of taste and strength of alcohol. |
|
|
|
|
|
|