Cleaning a wooden ratchett basket press
 

This past year, I managed to ruin my wooden basket press. I'm not
sure what I used on it (sulfite?, one-step?, chlorox?, ammonia?), but
all of the screws and metal rusted. How do you all clean the wooden
parts of your ratchett presses?

Cleaning a wooden ratchett basket press
 

On Apr 4, 3:23 pm, Lee > wrote:
> This past year, I managed to ruin my wooden basket press. I'm not
> sure what I used on it (sulfite?, one-step?, chlorox?, ammonia?), but
> all of the screws and metal rusted. How do you all clean the wooden
> parts of your ratchett presses?

I just hose mine off and let it dry in full sun. The ultra-violet will
kill most bacteria plus dry storage until next year.

Cleaning a wooden ratchett basket press
 

I tend to agree with Wayne - less is more in this case.

After a thorough water rinse (with plenty of pressure), I also rinse
the basket with a 5% solution of KMS, which takes off most of the red
wine staining.

Then let completely dry in the sun - do not store it moist.

What I would never do is use any hypochlorite for fear of TCA
contamination in the wood. I also learned the hard way not to use soda
ash as a cleaning compound - it makes the wood turn grey - probably not
a problem, but unattractive.


On 2008-04-04 13:23:33 -0700, Lee > said:

> This past year, I managed to ruin my wooden basket press. I'm not
> sure what I used on it (sulfite?, one-step?, chlorox?, ammonia?), but
> all of the screws and metal rusted. How do you all clean the wooden
> parts of your ratchett presses?