Great news!
I completed my cracker/winnower (v 2.0) during the weekend based on Ben's suggestions.
My model varies a little bit from what Ben has. Here are my notes:
1. The winnower is exactly a small Aether Sprite DIY model from John. This is the smaller model with 2" tubing.
2. The winnower structure is attached to a stainless steel table with two clamps.
3. The champion juicer and hopper, a great suggestion from this thread are laid out as shown by Ben.
4. The hopper is not held by a stand but using steel strings or light rope (for now). This allows mobility of the hopper by hand while keeping it in place. It also allowed me to use existing holes and avoid drilling or constructing the hopper stand.
5. The champion is used without a screen and I just clipped the plastic grid to avoid clogging.
6. The champion to the winnower connection is connected with some parchment paper or plastic. Not very fancy and I'd like to improve it.
7. The husk bucket is held in the air with some bungee chords. This is actually great and much better than keeping it on the ground. It allows you to check the husk/nib content by just unhooking a cord, and then the bucket opens, displays the inside and it is then hooked again.
8. The nibs go down the main tube and into a transparent plastic bowl (not shown from the picture).
Results from my tests:
500 g of roasted beans put in
330 g of nibs came out from the main tube
150 g of husk in the bucket
30 g (?) were missing (probably stuck inside the champion or the winnower)
Of the 330g of nibs, the amount of husk I could get out by hand was less than 1 g. This means < 1% of husk.
In the 150g of husk, I couldn't get more than 5g of nibs to come out. Very little wasted nibs, but a good amount of dust.
This means a
66% nib extraction rate from a single pass.
The system runs mostly unattended and only got stuck once. Using the champion plug is useful to force the beans to start going through again.
All in all this is a very happy day for me. Special thanks to Ben and the forum for helping me turn a failed motorized cracker project into a brand new and much improved Cracker/Winnower 2.0.
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