Nut Milk Press Concept

I was recently asked for a proposal on how to increase the amount of nut milk expelled from a mix of the remaining nut pulp after the free liquid had drained off.

Nut milk press concept

Here’s my first go at a design formulation.  The key here is to apply pressure to the pulp to force out the remaining liquid.  There’s a couple of ways to go about that but a lever is probably the easiest and most sanitary with out special provisions.  There are alternatives though – you could for example use a car jack for greater pressure – but I’d tend to want to strip off the regular grease and then grease the screw up with a food grade product.

First I’d start with the press basket – a tall stainless steel container.  Tall containers offer the same volume as wider shallower ones but because the press disk will be smaller in size the pressure applied to the disk will be greater.  Think Pounds Per Square Inch (PSI) – bigger disk more square inches therefore less pressure for the same force.  There could be some tall mixing bowls or maybe one of those stainless steel kitchen cutlery containers.

Now the press basket needs holes in it to allow the expressed liquid to leave the vessel.  Holes can be a pain to drill on a round surface –  a much faster route is to use a dremel type tool with the small abrasive disks to cut slots along the side of the basket – I used settled on this technique when building the electric countertop brewing system after struggling with drilling.

A press disk – preferably some good hardwood – oak or maple would be my choices.  Cut the disk so it fits into the press basket – shouldn’t be a tight fit.

Then the frame for the press – probably 2x4s – two frames held appart with other pieces of 2×4.  A press pin in the back – probably 3/4″ steel pipe.  A lever – preferably hardwood but for a start go with another chunk of 2×4.  have the lever press on a block – probably  a 4×4 (or two pieces of 2×4 screwed together) that sits on the press disk.  You may need a couple of lengths of these depending upon how much you get your material to compress and the travel of the lever.

The press basket should sit in a pan or pot to catch the expelled milk – maybe on a wooden riser, and that pot should probably be supported with some pieces of 2×4 between the press frames.

The only question here would be if the unit would move too much with the pressure from the lever – I don’t know how much effort would need to be applied.  If the lever didn’t work I’d move to a car jack from the junk yard cleaned up.

Good luck.