Newbie Cheese Press

[jimk]

Made from scraps in my garage. No idea how to tell how much weight it will apply but it looks like it will work.

[smolt1]

If you move the hanger almost to the end of the lever it looks like your MA is about 4. So a 10 lb weight will give you a 40 lb pressing weight. Then if you add the weight of the lever which looks to be about 8 lbs you have 40 + 8 or 48 lbs pressing your cheese. Your in business!!

[Andrew Marshallsay]

Nice work. That should do most of what you need. If you want more you can always add a pulley or two.
A cheese for your construction efforts.

[awakephd]

Well done! Though I hate to disagree with Smolt, I estimated your maximum MA at 5 . But only you can tell us for sure what the exact number is!

A couple of things to think about: If you are pressing at maximum MA and weight, you'll probably need to think about how to keep the press from tipping. If you set the press at less than maximum MA, and if you are planning on hanging the weight, you're going to have a very limited range of motion before the weight bumps up against the frame (and/or the table/cabinet on which the press sits). Neither of these issues are defects of your well-executed design; they are simply inevitable issues that come with the dutch-type press.

One other thought -- are you planning on draining through the slatted base, or putting a tray with a drain over the side? You've no doubt already thought about this, but if the former, give some thought to how the whey will escape and make its way to a suitable resting place (sink, bucket, etc.).

[jimk]

Thanks for the input folks. Is there a formula for calculating the MA?
Andy, I bought a polypropelene cutting board with a groove around the edge and drilled a drainage hole in it so I can set a bowl under the tray to catch the whey. I will use a mat made from bamboo skewers under the mold.

[awakephd]

Sounds good. The calculation for MA = (distance from fulcrum to ram) / (distance from fulcrum to weight)

It looks like your ram attaches to the lever around 8" from the fulcrum (the pivot point, just to be clear), and the total length looks to me to be around 40". Thus, with the weight at the very end, you have MA = 8/40 = 5. (Or maybe 4 if Smolt's eyes are better than mine!)

[jimk]

Wow - good eye. The distance from fulcrum to ram is 7 3/4" and the furthest position of hook is 31" from fulcrum. Mold is 8" dia.

[awakephd]

Hmm ... good eye as far as estimating the 7-3/4" distance, but terrible as far as estimating the total length. I should have known that Smolt would have it right -- bang on MA=4.

Again, well done! Now you need to press some cheese!

[Al Lewis]

Very nice job!

[Kern]

Nice job on the press.  The swivel on the head of the pusher bothers me.  I suspect it may make it more difficult to level the top of a cheese.  It is not uncommon to see an incline in the top of a cheese when unwrapped for the first flip.  This usually gets pressed out on the bottom because the head of the pusher is fixed parallel to the base of the press.  It works because the pressure is distributed uniformly across the top of the follower plate.  This causes the cheese on the high side of the incline to flow across the bottom and level things out.  Obviously, the pressure on the high part of the incline is going to put a corresponding higher pressure on the follower plate above the high part of the incline.  This may cause the swiveled head to tilt and put uneven pressure on the follower plate.  If you have trouble leveling your pressings this is the likely reason for it.     

[jimk]

Thank you so much for the feedback everyone! The swivel on the bottom of the push rod was something I copied from someone else's press. I intend to make a guide to keep the push rod vertical so hopefully that will help. If there is a problem, I can always eliminate that part. I am starting a Gouda right now to try it out.

[jimk]

Gouda is in the brine.

[Kern]

Good job on this cheese with your press.  You'll get better results when brining if your brine to cheese volume ratio is higher than you show in the photo.  I'm guessing you are likely less than 1 part of brine to 1 part of cheese by volume.  Ideally, you should be about 5:1.  During brining the cheese gives up water and picks up salt.  The rate is dependent upon the salt concentration of the brine.  As the brine picks up water the concentration goes down thus pulling the rate down.  The danger is that you end up with less salt in the cheese than you should have.  Brine can be reused many times.  I keep a couple of gallons on hand and use a container large enough to hold a large cheese and almost two gallons of brine.  When finished I filter the brine through a funnel lined with a paper towel back into the bottles and add enough salt to leave some on the bottom (saturated solution).  Good cheese has three variables in good balance:  salt, moisture content and pH.  Having your cheese swimming in a good amount of saturated brine will help with salt and moisture content.   

[awakephd]

Kern, where do you store your brine -- in the fridge, in the cheese cave, or just at room temperature? I have been storing a gallon of brine in my cheese cave, but a) my cheeses are getting bigger, so a gallon really isn't optimal (as you point out above), and b) I would love to have the room in the cheese cave to expand my cheese collection.

Problem is, if it needs to be stored cold, and I move to two gallons, and don't used the cheese cave ... I'll have to have a negotiation with the upper management (aka my wife) about refrigerator space ... already at a premium because of the camemberts that are finishing there ...

[Al Lewis]

If you use a smaller container for brining than 1 gallon of brine should be sufficient for anything up to 10 pounds.