I'm still sorry I traded in my Poruguese for a Ferrari. I got it because I
wanted the ability to handle Champagne corks, but never did pursue that line
of winemaking. These days, I'm more inclined to keg a sparkler and serve it
on tap.

Anyway, it's a royal PITA. I've also had problems with creasing, and we've
done the whole terrifying take apart and check the guides thing. You're
right, never again. Mine also loses that little bit of compression at the
end, and I'm sure that contributes to the problem I have with the faster
rebounding SupremeCorqs jamming on the lip. The only way I can make this
corker work with the synths is to chill them well so they don't rebound as
fast, and only use bottles with a larger neck diameter (my index finger
knuckle is the determining factor whether I can use a bottle or not). And,
only the flanged bottlenecks really set well under the hole. The rest slide
around and don't really lock well in direct alignment so I also have to use
my other hand to kind of hold the bottle in position for the downstroke.

All things considered, the Portuguese is a way better corker for most people
and its cheaper.

Brian

"Joe Sallustio" > wrote in message
om...
> Hi Joe
> Mine is a Ferrari, it had a bad habit of cocking one of the jaws on
> 'overstroke'. As you watch it move you will see 1 jaw is fixed and 3
> slide. I watched carefully and noticed two things.
>
> One, it compressed almost all of the way into the stroke then on the
> last few inches of arm motion it relaxes the compression just a bit.
> Maybe that is intentional, I don't know.
>
> Two, during that part of the stroke I could see one jaw start to pull
> away from the other three if you looked very closely at the
> circumference of the hole it forms.
>
> (An easier way to see what you are into is just put a cork it and look
> for the area where it gets creased.)
>
> I marked all 4 jaws so I knew how it was originally put together and
> then marked the corker body too.
>
> At that point I just took it apart and laid each part on a flat
> surface to figure out which ones were a little rounded off. It's made
> of hollow brass so it's easier to screw it up than fix it, so be very
> deliberate in any adjustments, maybe even move things around first
> before filing any imperfections.
>
> It's under a large amount of force so be careful taking it apart, it's
> not something I want to do again... The cure is as bad as the
> disease...
>
> While its apart, lube everything. I also drilled a drain hole in the
> 'bottle neck locator dimple' to get any cork drainage out faster. I
> made mine 1/8".
>
> Hope that helps. For what it's worth, that cheaper portuguese corker
> does not do this, I've never taken one of those apart and we have
> several in use among a few people. I have both corkers now.
>
> My neighbor and I modified my Ferrari to do sparkling wine corks too.
> All we really changed was added a foot bar to the bottom of the bottle
> stand. I can push the stand down with it after I get the cork in part
> way. It's not the easist way to do that type of cork, but it's only
> $100 and a good one is at least 10 times that.
> Regards,
> Joe
>
> > Sorry to go off topic but the jaws on my floor corker are getting out of
> > line. They make a click sound when I'm inserting a cork. You can see
the
> > brass jaws slightly cutting into each other.
> > Could you provide more detail on how you adjust them?

I started using Altec corks. I had no problem inserting them with my bench
corker. They look good, but I can't tell you how they age yet. They are
available at www.undergrounddigital.com (Underground Brewing Supply). They
have the Nomacork also.

Ed


"Ned" > wrote in message
om...
> I went to bottle some wine yesterday and noticed something odd about a
> lot of the corks I have. THey were a very good quality cork bought
> some tome ago from St. Pats, natural ones, and since opneing have been
> storing them in a mini humidor type thing as many people here seem to
> do (a little water with SO2 in a small container placed inside a
> larger one).
>
> THere corks had various size bluish green spontches inside them, I
> even cut some open. Sort of like a bruised fruit. What is it and can
> I use them? I never noticed this before, though I am fairly new to
> the bottling.
>
> ALso, where's the best online mail order place anywhere in the U.S. to
> buy corks. I wouldn;t mind somehting of a disccussion of natural vs.
> synthetic etc. but let's not make it a war in this thread. Let's
> suppose I want to really try to use natural ones, all natural, for
> tradition's sake. Other opinions welcome though. Presque and Grape
> and Granary I often buy form, but G&G corks seem cheap looking, and PI
> has almost no details on their site... more techinical, so I don;t
> know what I'm buying.
>
> Thanks,
>
> NNed