Anybody built an olive mill?

[Gwil]

I know it's a long shot, but given the multifarious talents of people on this forum I thought it was worth a whirl!

The locals in my village haven't collected their olives regularly for a long while. In order to have their own olives pressed they need to take a minimum of 500kg to a commercial mill. So, with the aid of our rescue donkey, which they love dearly since the village hasn't had a donkey for over 30 years, we are now again collecting as a village.

The mill wants 10kg for every litre- half the oil they keep and sell commercially- so you have to collect a lot to get back enough oil to last the year. Some of the people here are on 220 euros per month pension, so it's a significant part of their cost of living.

My winter project therefore, is to build a community olive press, ready for this time next year! I'd like to build something that will last, and hopefully stay in the village and be used long after I've been planted.
So, decent materials and easily replaced wearing parts would help. I don't mind if it costs a few bob, the generous welcome we had when we moved here 11 years ago still hasn't been repaid.

Any ideas welcome.

 

[Wendelspanswick]

I've built cider presses in the past, never seen an olive press but I imagine the principle is the same?

 

[The_Yellow_Ardvark]

I've built cider presses in the past, never seen an olive press but I imagine the principle is the same?

Cider press puts pressure onto cakes of apples in a downward direction.

Olive press is a stone roller going round in a circular direction.

I never built one, but helped clean one up. It was sadly sold on by the owner.

 

[eSCHEn]

This came to mind, watched it a while back:

Forum strips out the time indent - 2:25 in the pressing starts.

 

[500e]

https://ohhshop.com/blog/greenies/our-own-olive-oil-and-the-cost-breakdown/#axzz4vhnkiWAr
The initial crushing is the big problem, maybe a pair of steel rollers geared for the donkey
Some of the ideas from above link could be up scaled say a dough mixer instead of home food mixer, (second hand), centrifugal extraction of the oil from the paste is a non starter I would think. A press is relatively easy to construct either screw or Hydraulic

 

[Wendelspanswick]

Cider press puts pressure onto cakes of apples in a downward direction.

Olive press is a stone roller going round in a circular direction.

I never built one, but helped clean one up. It was sadly sold on by the owner.

The stone roller in a ring is how they used to press apples before the invention of the screw press, I guess modern Olive mills use hydraulic presses.

 

[GW8IZR]

@Gwil why not go and have a look at the one they use now and see if you can build/copy/improve on the one that seems to work?

Stick a few pictures here and there will be plenty scope to pick from the comments.

 

[frank horton]

Where I plan to move to "Crete" u can find stone wheels quite often laying around.....
where r u ?..........
I'd say it'd be easy enough to build a mill but ur problem will be the tray the wheels roll in......in the old days this tray was actually a circular stone trough....that would be a very heavy lump of stone.....is there nothing around ur village from the old days.....
it'd be easy to reinstate the old metal parts......the metal frame etc is the easy bit........
spose u could make the whole thing out of st/steel.......but that would be a massive commitment .......
u might find it a good idea to visit a museum or better yet visit a working mill for ur ideas...............there are a few places to look at in Crete......
happy to help..........Frank

 

[gaz1]

the reference im aware of is cement mixer milstone sort like a pan mixer but crushes lime mortar mix for reuse at colleges by use of steel wheels rolling around the pan mixer

from 2.16 on this video

 

[dannyp]

your oil recovery will be lower than a commercial press but.

by the looks f it the olives need to be stone ground if you can find some stones and trough as said the steel work is easy, id motorise it tho rather than donkey.

the press is ether going to be a big screw or hydalic press im not sure of the pressures involved but id be tempted to go down the route of screw press as it cant leack hv46

 

[Gwil]

Some great stuff here- no time to reply now because the panniers are on the donkey and we're off to collect- 180kg yesterday so not too bad. Excellent idea to go round the mill with a camera and see if I can replicate the equipment on a smaller scale.

Getting quite fired up by this project! There are a few old stone wheels about, be much nicer to dress them and use them for their proper purpose than have them stuck in flowerbeds.

 

[MCKDAVID]

excellent idea, great way to integrate into the community especially if it helps everyone.

no idea how they press it, but good luck with the project.

 

[fixerupper]

Where I plan to move to "Crete" u can find stone wheels quite often laying around.....
where r u ?..........
I'd say it'd be easy enough to build a mill but ur problem will be the tray the wheels roll in......in the old days this tray was actually a circular stone trough....that would be a very heavy lump of stone.....is there nothing around ur village from the old days.....
it'd be easy to reinstate the old metal parts......the metal frame etc is the easy bit........
spose u could make the whole thing out of st/steel.......but that would be a massive commitment .......
u might find it a good idea to visit a museum or better yet visit a working mill for ur ideas...............there are a few places to look at in Crete......
happy to help..........Frank

Where abouts in Crete are you moving to Frank ....

 

[gaz1]

found the ones i was talking about handy as has a sluce gate

small but large wheels

larger but big wheels 0.23 for this version

big wheels for this type

baby size pan mixer

now for these depending on your size use car wheels and there hubs

the alternative is a pellet mill

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=viK7y7pD_dQ

 

[Gwil]

Right, watched it all and looked at various small hobby type presses.

There are obviously 2 processes. The first is to crush/break up the olives, the second to press them. The first people have done using millstones, paint stirrers(!), and electric under the sink waste disposal units. The pan mixer looks interesting from a building point of view.

The press possibility I quite like is a hydraulic press driving a piston in a slotted cylinder mounted inside an open topped container. Inside the cylinder is a nylon mesh bag which squashes as the piston drops. I'd envisage using thick walled stainless tube with a stainless piston, a 'con-rod' also stainless driven by a bottle jack- contained in a tray to prevent any possible contamination of the parts which do the pressing.

The whole thing in a simple garage type press frame.

Final filtering I'm still thinking about...

 

[Wendelspanswick]

My combined cider press/log splitter uses the hydraulic ram to lift the table against a static platen or splitting wedge depending on what I'm doing at the time.
By having the ram underneath there is no possibility of contamination from leaking hydraulic oil.

 

[dannyp]

that sounds like an optimal option, i know from when they are pressing appels a pressing takes place over many hours ( and rams can weep over that sort of time scale ) if you had a large bore ram and a nitrogen accumalator of reasonable capacity you chould pump the press upto pressure and lock it off with an electric check valve so there would no need to keep the pump running. if the ram is under the tabel all is good there.

for longevity / cost balance. a larger bore ram at lower pressure will last longer, if you work out how much force you need and the piston area of such a ram @ max pressure, double the piston area and half the pressure you'll never have a seal issue.

 

[Cobbler]

I was watching TV last night, a repeat of Tony Robinson's Coast to Coast on C5 & he visited an orchard where they were pressing apple juice. The press used was a cylinder with a bladder inside down the middle, the pulp was packed around the outside & the water connected to the bladder. I though what a good idea if you've got good water pressure & simple to rig up.

 

[GW8IZR]

My last improvised apple press used a 12v electric actuator and it was very successful. No danger of leaking etc.

 

[Gwil]

Olives need much more pressure than fruit I've discovered- they are pressed with the kernel, which yields some of the oil as well. Companies that make both use a much smaller piston/cylinder for the same sized frame and operating screw.

I have thought of using a screw, electrically driven and very low geared via a worm drive. It could also be driven in steps- brought up to a certain pressure and left there for a bit.

An interesting footnote is that some companies (oil producers) have experimented with removing the kernels in the interests of a purer oil needing less filtering. They've abandoned it on the basis of loss of distinctive flavour.

My last improvised apple press used a 12v electric actuator and it was very successful. No danger of leaking etc.

I'd be fascinated to see a photo and/or some details of the actuator. I'm thinking already of a multi purpose machine! We have loads of pomegranates, quinces etc. growing locally....