Noobie question. Can I use apple juice from my juicer?

My thought was to just buy a ton of apples and juice them in my Jack Lelaine power juicer. I figure I might be able to press out the remaining juice from the leftover pulp and let that sit for about an hour to settle, then further strain it.

Any thoughts? I dont want to buy a press.

I think you will end up buying another juicer unless you are doing very small batches.

about 8 or so pounds of apples per gallon.

Thats a lot of apples going through that machine!

I think bargainfittings is right, it would be a little hard on the machine. But other than that I don't see any reason why it wouldn't work. Maybe if your juicer is still under warranty

the juicer is a beast, I might try for a 3 gallon batch this weekend, thanks for the help!

That seems like it would be a heck of a little apples even for 3 gallons....

You do realize now, you must take pictures....

Yes, you can use a juicer. As noted above, be careful not to overstress your juicer. I broke one that way, but I did a batch of 300 lbs of apples on a $120 Breville juicer for the latest 20-ish gallons of cider. The key is this: make sure the juicer is spinning before putting in fruit; put in fruit one at a time; give it a minute break when you clean out the pulp. I let it rest for one hour between every three gallon batch.

once again, thank you. I will take pics when I get a working camera.

sweet. My parents have apple trees in the backyard and a Jack Lalane juicer; I'd like to try this sometime. Let us know how it works.

You might find this info i posted on an old thread helpful.



Make a cider press and press the sediment....heck for small batches you could even use a french press coffee pot (like Chris Colby has mentioned in BYO for pressing hops)




How to Build a Cider Press

You can also make one out of an old Maytag washer evidently. (this article is awesome, especially if you are going to consistantly be doing large batches...)

THE MAYTAG CIDER PRESS

Here's another design....ReadyMade: CIDER PRESS


I can't show you, you have to be a Craft Subscriber to view the online edition, but they recommend a 30 dollar home depot garbage disposal mounted on a frame and emptying into a bucket to shred the apples prior to juicing and pressing, for those of you who don't have a free juicer...
like this...

[ame=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tGSHZwwME-c]YouTube - Garbage Disposal Apple Grinder (Crusher)[/ame]

[ame=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=csaoeNtAptI&NR=1]YouTube - Seneca Falls Apple Grinders batch 5[/ame]

its possible, i did my first batch ever with our juicer. It was a PAIN, but i suppose that with one of those better, badder juicer it would be much easier. I've seen a juicer that was gulping whole apples! Ours was a old, worn out juicer and i will never do this again. We've found a little traditional press like Revvy's in a store full of old stuff. We'll try our hand at ice cider with it.


the setup






and also i would strongly suggest filtering what come from your juicer, as you can see inthe following picture there's a lot of apple gunk floating in the juice. It turned out ok but could have been better i think without fermenting with all that apple paste. Also the apple seed taste was too present, probably because of that.



...SWMBO helps...with a smile!!!!

I do plan on filtering the gunk out before putting it in the carboy. Unfortunately all my fermenters are in use right now, as soon as my wildflower wheat is bottled in 5 days I will start on the cider. I still have 4 weeks on my T' ej, ethiopian honey wine, I just added the gesho this morning, cant wait!!!

i did my 1st and only cider that way too, using a juiceman junior from the 80's, just a few months ago. yes, you should be careful to clean it out every few lbs and keep it spinning at high speeds one apple at a time...

i had about 30lbs of apples and topped off what came out with about 2 gallons of fresh juice. there was a lot of juice leftover in the pulp, and i semi-cored them (just cut the seeds section out)... i think one of those simple presses using two flat boards and 2 "D "clamps would have been great to squeze the residue through for another gallon.

anyway, the cider is coming along nicely, and as for a lot of work, thats relative... we had 2 sets of hands and a few beers so time flew in my recollection