I am looking at a few options for pumping, between fermentation to aging, racking and then though some sort of a filter to a bottle filler. Currently I can siphon from elevated carboys, I am looking to the future, when its barrels.
The Vacuum systems shown by valleyvintner seem a good way to go, with benefits of reducing oxidation by evacuating the receiving vessel, but I am not sure about the ability to suck at < 10psig through a filter vs push.
Any comments?
well it really depends on how big you plan to be and how much money you are willing to throw down on a pump.
I love our pump its a peristaltic which in my mind is the best about limiting o2 induction. however it costs like 15 grand. how big is your operation?
Another way to go is air diaphragm they are about 5 grand but the bummer is you need an air compressor (preferably a large one) to operate it.
A few of the wineries around here have small 6 station fillers made by GAI. It has a large reservoir and you either gravity or pump into it and it fills via a gravity. You just sparge the bowl with nitrogen and make sure to sparge all the bottles you are going to fill prior to filling.
I bought a diaphragm pump last February and love it. It is the 1040 FDA sanitary pump made by Graco. It has a “quick knock down” design which is really awesome for cleaning- it basically comes apart completely in about 2 minutes via a simple sanitary fitting design. This model has 1.5 inch tri-clamp for the in and out and can pum between 0 and 41 gpm. It is constructed from 304 stainless and has teflon diaphragms and teflon balls. To power it I use a 20 gal air compressor, but a larger one would run less frequently and be really nice to have. We installed air lines through out the ceiling and put the compressor outside, then pick air from whichever room we are working in. The pump came w/o a cart, so for now we are just pushing it around on a furniture dolly while we are fabricating a cart. It has no pulsation dampener/surge supressor, which seems to be fine. We limit the output via a smaller hose or valve and create a nice bit of back pressure which creates a nice steady flow. The pump doesn’t recognize the difference between fluid and air, so it is “self priming” - meaning it can start empty and just go! We begin by filling the entire line and pump with nitrogen as to keep out the oxygen. It feels like this pump will be around for a really long time and is able to transfer juice and wine from tank to barrels and whatever else we need. Our dealer says “it could pump honey 29 feet in elevation.” So far we have pumped about 5,000 gallons of wine through it…so it’s young.
The link is below, if you are interested.
http://www.graco.com/Internet/T_PDB.nsf/SearchView/1040FDA-CompliantSanitaryPump" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;
Thanks for the suggestions, we are moving from Carboys and funnels to barrels scale this year, next year hope have about 20 barrels, hence the question.
I would expect maximum size to be about 60 -100 barrels at this site, and am willing to buy new tools before that.
S
