Sulphiter/Vinator Help

Well, this post falls into both the equipment and sanitation categories. I just got a Ferrari brand "Avvinatore" in the mail. The unit came disassembled and the instructions are somewhat lacking. There is an exploded diagram on flap of the box, but it doesn't really provide much detail on assembly instructions. I put it together as intuition would state, but I have one piece left over and it's currently not working the way it is (nothing sprays out of the nozzle). I'm hoping someone with the same or similar vinator can help me out.

The piece i have left over is a small plastic screen about 0.5" in diameter.

I assembled in this order:

1. Clear plastic bowl
2. Orange insert into bowl lining up the three tabs with the three notches on the bowl.
3. Skinny white piece (the nozzle that pushes down) into hole of fatter white piece with threads on the bottom.
4. Stuck spring inside thin white piece (it protrudes from the bottom of the fat white piece).
5. Compressed spring centered on orange insert and screwed fat white piece into orange insert.

I filled it about half way up with water and there doesn't seem to be any suction/spray action going on at all when I push down on the nozzle.

Thanks in advance for the help!

Well, I had it drying out in the dishwasher and I see where the leftover piece goes. It looks like there's a hole with the same diameter as the plastic screen on the bottom of the orange insert. Maybe that will help somehow...attempt #2 in progress.

Krrazy said:

Well, I had it drying out in the dishwasher and I see where the leftover piece goes. It looks like there's a hole with the same diameter as the plastic screen on the bottom of the orange insert. Maybe that will help somehow...attempt #2 in progress.

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Hey Krrazy, I'm having the same problems as you. I know this thread is pretty old, but I was wondering if you or anyone else has had this problem and knows what to do.

I've got one of those, but on mine, in the center of the large red piece with the three tabs, there is a white plastic piece with a metal ball trapped inside it (the ball is a check valve to allow flow in only one direction) - but nothing that looks like a screen. Maybe they changed the design? There has to be some kind of check valve to stop flow back into the reservoir under the large red piece when you press down, otherwise you'll just be pumping liquid into and out of the large white piece with no pressure to force anything up through the nozzle. Note also that you have to pump it a few times to fill the large white piece before it begins to squirt.

DeafSmith said:

I've got one of those, but on mine, in the center of the large red piece with the three tabs, there is a white plastic piece with a metal ball trapped inside it (the ball is a check valve to allow flow in only one direction) - but nothing that looks like a screen. Maybe they changed the design? There has to be some kind of check valve to stop flow back into the reservoir under the large red piece when you press down, otherwise you'll just be pumping liquid into and out of the large white piece with no pressure to force anything up through the nozzle. Note also that you have to pump it a few times to fill the large white piece before it begins to squirt.

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I remember the white piece starting to fill up on mine, but I thought that wasn't supposed to happen so I got frustrated and took it apart, haha, so I will have to give it another shot. But, did yours come with two of your ball valve things? I know where to put one of them, and I'm not sure if the 2nd is a replacement, or if that needs to be put elsewhere as well.

LarsonLE said:

I remember the white piece starting to fill up on mine, but I thought that wasn't supposed to happen so I got frustrated and took it apart, haha, so I will have to give it another shot. But, did yours come with two of your ball valve things? I know where to put one of them, and I'm not sure if the 2nd is a replacement, or if that needs to be put elsewhere as well.

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No, only one ball valve - was already installed into the big red piece.

EDIT: I was wrong - there are two ball valves - one in the base, and the other up in the white nozzle which was jammed in place and I didn't realize it was there.

DeafSmith said:

No, only one ball valve - was already installed into the big red piece.

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I am able to get the sulphiter going for 1 or 2 pumps, but then it kind of just fails, so I'm not sure what's going on :\. My spring is kind of bent out of shape from all of the times that I tried to get that piece screwed onto the base without the spring coming off of that ball valve.

I had that problem with the spring, too - you have to really shove it up into the small white piece - twisting the spring counterclockwise as you shove it in helps. You should end up with no more than 3 inches of spring sticking out from the base of the white nozzle before you try to screw the large white piece onto the red piece. Also helps to assemble the two white pieces, the large red piece and the spring before snapping the large red piece into the bowl. I never tried to use mine when the spring was slipped off to the side, so I don't know if that is your problem or not. I think that even with the spring slipped off to the side, if you have enough spring force to return the nozzle to its full up position, it should still work.

DeafSmith said:

I had that problem with the spring, too - you have to really shove it up into the small white piece - twisting the spring counterclockwise as you shove it in helps. You should end up with no more than 3 inches of spring sticking out from the base of the white nozzle before you try to screw the large white piece onto the red piece. Also helps to assemble the two white pieces, the large red piece and the spring before snapping the large red piece into the bowl. I never tried to use mine when the spring was slipped off to the side, so I don't know if that is your problem or not. I think that even with the spring slipped off to the side, if you have enough spring force to return the nozzle to its full up position, it should still work.

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Thanks for the help. I'll give this a shot.

Resurrecting an old thread in case anyone is having the same trouble I was. I believe a combination of wrong parts and poor quality control is causing some problems.

- For starters, I believe my spring was slightly larger in diameter than it should be. This kept it from inserting into the spray tube, and as a result it was way too long. The spring would bend over and prevent the tube from being pressed all the way down. To fix this, I inserted the spring as far as it would go, and used a pair of wire cutters to trim it off where it would just touch the red base when assembled (or slightly longer.) In other words, put the two white pieces together, fully extended, and trim the spring so it sticks out the bottom of the bigger tube just a little bit. Obviously, this will void any warranty and make your Vinator unreturnable to the store.

- Somewhere in my troubleshooting I ran into an online post that said the Vinator came with "an extra check valve" (that's the little thing with the ball bearing in it.) So I had removed the check valve from my spray tube, and only had the one in the red base. With this setup, I was able to get some anemic drops of sanitizer up into my bottle, but I had to push so vigorously that sanitizer would also spill out of the reservoir. I got about a quarter cup of sanitizer on my counter per drop of sanitizer in my bottle. After trimming the spring, I decided to put the check valve back into the spray tube, and then I got a nice strong jet of sanitizer into my bottle, without having to pump the bottle up and down at all (just a single firm press.) They key with the check valves is to make sure the simple round end is down, and the end with the bumps inside is up. If you hold it in your hand and picture sanitizer flowing through it, you'll see that the sanitizer can always flow up but can never flow down. Having the second check valve in the spray tube helps keep the device primed.

- The filter screen on the bottom is not the best design, but it should not effect the operation of the pump at all. I'll probably leave mine out, since it falls out anyway.

Bottom line is, if you put together your Vinator according to the instructions, and it doesn't work, you may have some parts that are slightly wrong, starting with the spring. Double check the direction of the check valves, then consider trimming the spring.

Bonus troubleshooting or cleaning tip: If you want to remove the red base from the reservoir, leave the white spray assembly in place and use is as a handle to tip the base up and out. Otherwise you have no leverage and no place to grab it.

DeafSmith said:

I had that problem with the spring, too - you have to really shove it up into the small white piece - twisting the spring counterclockwise as you shove it in helps. You should end up with no more than 3 inches of spring sticking out from the base of the white nozzle before you try to screw the large white piece onto the red piece.

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Bingo!
Thanks for this tip. That fixed up mine.

Do not cut the spring! Really force and twist it up with a screwing motion into the white tip. It will then connect to the red base without kinking the spring and work as it should.

I cut my spring and it works great. It always flipped to the side and wouldn't work very well. With it cut, it sits nice on the pedestal it supposed to rest in and haven't had a problem with it since. GRANTED, I haven't done a TON of bottling since I cut it, but enough to be happy with it.

this thread maybe kinda old but when i screwed the fat white part into the base i held the spray nozzle to prevent it from rotating. this helped to keep the spring on the pedestal.

Sure I could see that working

I am going to resurrect this old thread. I just purchased a Vinator bottle washer and could not get it to work. I ended up reversing the check valve in the spray pump and now it works as I am guessing it should.

I am not sure if someone at the factory is playing a joke on the customers but out of the box it did not work at all.

1bottlerocket said:

I am going to resurrect this old thread. I just purchased a Vinator bottle washer and could not get it to work. I ended up reversing the check valve in the spray pump and now it works as I am guessing it should.

I am not sure if someone at the factory is playing a joke on the customers but out of the box it did not work at all.

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Same thing happened to me tonight. The upper check valve was installed backwards. It was infuriating.

I sent an email to the place I bought it from, Lovebrewing UK, and informed them. I am not sure where it has gone since then but the Vinator units are coming out of the factory improperly assembled.