Easing the crush at harvest time

This month Blair Hanel looks at two different wineries, one in New Zealand and the other in South Australia, to see how each has implemented new crushing/de-stemming and pressing initiatives into processing.
The first interview is Blenheims VinLink Winery, in the heart of the Marlborough region on the South Island where Dave Pearce and his team built a greenfields site and evaluated Vineyard their crushing and pressing requirements. machinery The second interview visits Shaw and Smith, a premium wine producer in the Adelaide Hills, South Australia. In vintage 2013 this business installed a new de-stemmer and sorting line to handle ultra-premium fruit.
Dave, can you give us a bit of the history, how did you get involved with the VinLink project and how did VinLink itself come about?

Dave Pearce General Manager Winery: VinLink Marlborough Location: Blenheim, South Island, New Zealand Project: New winery/contract processing plant for Vintage 2013

DP: VinLink is the result of a partnership between two North Island businesses already involved in the contract winemaking space. They worked on the idea for several years and felt there was an opportunity to start a Marlborough company 100% committed to processing for its customers. In other words there was no stake in fruit, juice, wine or broking, just working for the client. I came onto the project in July 2012 at the point we were starting the construction phase and have overseen the building of the winery, staffing, systems and now the successful 2013 vintage.
This was a massive project to undertake how did you decide to use Della Toffola as your main provider for the fruit processing equipment for the new VinLink Winery?

DP: Ive come from a winemaking background having used the traditional mix of French, German and Italian crushers and presses, but not Della Toffola. Our North Island owners have both had experience with DT and more than anything it was the combination of price, simplicity, speed and effectiveness that convinced them DT was the best option.
Please give us an overview of the equipment purchased.

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DP: We have three grape receival lanes coming off one large ramp split into 3 x 25 tonne tipping bins. Each tipping bin tips into a DT 100 tonne per hour de-stemmer- crusher then must pump. The must is fed to 6 x DT central membrane presses linked to each de-stemmer. Juice is transferred via DT heat exchanges and is warmed for batch flotation. The fridge and heating plant is also DT. Our other major investment is the DT CFKN 130m2 ceramic membrane cross-flow filter.
How many tonnes were actually put through the new facility for 2013?

DP: We put through 11,000 tonne which was less than our goal but apparently still making it the biggest first vintage in a New Zealand winery.
BH: With regards to the de-stemming/crushing: What units were installed?

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DP: 3 x NDC 100 Della Toffola de-stemmer crushers.

How was the overall performance in regards to tonnage throughputs?

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DP: We set ourselves an optimum processing rate of 25 tonnes per hour per lane, if necessary continuously. It took us a few days to achieve that but once we got familiar with the gear and fruit interactions we did it easily.
September 2013 Issue 596

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Grapegrower & Winemaker

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grapegrowing

HIGH SPEED TRIMMING

As industrial a setting as you can find at any modern winery, the Della Toffola at VinLink has achieved an optimum processing rate of 25 tonnes per hour per lane and can do it continuously if necessary.

High Speed Pruning

De-stemming performance what was the separation of the Rachis like?

DP: The de-stemmers have no problems producing clean fruit.

Have the de-stemmers been easy to clean?

DP: Very easy to clean indeed.

With regards to the Della Toffola central membrane presses: What were the sizes of the membrane press installed?

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DP: 3 x 200HL PEC and 3 x 240HL PEC Della Toffola Presses.

How did you assess the overall performance of the central membrane presses in relation to the points below: PLC ease of use?

DP: Extremely easy to use our operators loved the touch screens.
Overall Yields?

Weeding Systems

DP: Very good and considering the low pressures and short press times quite remarkable.
Juice quality?

DP: Very good.

Theres always a cloud over the cleaning aspects of the central membrane presses how did you rate the cleaning process?

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DP: Yes, its difficult to clean well, particularly in our case as they are suspended high over the marc bay, but Ive found all membrane presses hard to clean.
What important factors have you learnt from the whole experience and what simple significant steps could you share with our readers in evaluating their crushing and de-stemming requirements?
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DP: I do have a few thoughts from seeing the odd mistake over the years: Fruit receival should be designed like a cone; the truck on the ramp is at the smallest point and should be the limiting factor. Every step thereafter should be of larger and larger capacity in order to keep to the optimum processing rate you set. Any hold-ups get caught up by the next step in the process or youre going to be stopping harvesters when you have the slightest problem. Its very easy to limit intake capacity to the bare minimum and justify it on the short period we use it for. This year we had a very tight vintage in Marlborough and as a result VinLink took in fruit in a condensed timeframe. The design criteria for our intake was all in in two weeks. Many folks would have laughed at that six months ago but its probably paid for a few of those presses already. Remember where your money comes from. In our case its very obvious because if we dont bring in our clients fruit we obviously dont make a processing fee. It is no different though in any winery, more so if that winery owns the fruit. Always make sure you can get the vintage in in a comfortable timeframe, no matter what. It is complete lunacy that most wineries skimp on receival when risk management dictates its one of the most critical parts of the business. I recall the story of a local contract winemaker having to forklift a clients Range Rover (holding his space) off his receival ramp during a particularly trying vintage. Adequate and effective fruit receival set-ups may take some of the fun out of vintage but theyre worth it.
September 2013 Issue 596