Yes, thats how we do it. Crusher positioned next to the tailgate of the truck. One person loads the hopper from the back of the truck, the other cranks the handle and offloads the buckets of crushed grapes into the primary fermenter (or press if you're pressing out immediately for making whites). If you can get a third person to do the offloading you can pretty much run continuously.
I’ve never tried one but that motor sounds perfect. Since it was a treadmill, it will start up slowly, have lots of torque and is designed for long duty cycles. Keep us informed!
That's exactly how my C/D was rigged up. Found a basically like new treadmill at the dump and scavenged the motor and controls off of it.
That’s exactly what I want to do, but I can’t find a pulley that size that takes a flat belt. Where did you get the pulley?
So a retired (mechanical engineer) friend of mine rigged this up for me. This motor used a serpentine belt and he had a custom made serpentine pulley machined to fit. The electronics package slides into place and is held with a pin and cotter key. When you are done and ready to cleanup the C/D you just pull the pin out and the whole motor and control board can be removed for high pressure washing without worry of getting anything (electronics wise) wet.
Measure the shaft diameter and call morewinemaking and see if they are the same, I bet they are.
This is pretty awesome. The only thing that bothers me is the flat pulley. I feel better working around rapidly spinning metal when they are held in by v-grooves.
