The tricky part of the whole job was in threading the hole. Also,not having the nut shrink up and bind the screw. You'd NEVER get the giant screw out of the hole if it became stuck.
I needed a log that was gnarly looking,like the original in the photographs,which I do not have to show you. I also needed a log that was much drier than the green wooded screw. In a country sawmill,I found my log. It was about 40" in diameter,and old and gray. The bark had all fallen off,it was so old. Sure enough,later on I discovered it had barbed wire in it,which is why the lumber mill had never sawn it up!!
It was sold to me as oak,but without the bark it was hard to identify. It turned out to be half dry hickory,and as tough as nails to cut.
You can see me slabbing one side of the log down with a chainsaw,which was very hard on my back,as I've had severe back trouble since I hurt it at age 21. The log was just too large to get into a saw mill that had been found to cut the other 2 sides. The front side was left un cut,looking very crude and gnarly,much like the original press in the pictures.
After I had slabbed the log's side,we took it to a sawmill where the other 2 sides were squared up with a very large circular saw blade with inserted teeth. Most sawmills use bandsaws these days.
After the nut was complete,I went over the 3 surfaces with an adze and got rid of the saw cuts on the surfaces.
We took off the cross slide on the old lathe,and got the log up onto the lathe with a forklift. The log must have weighed a ton,even trimmed down.
We chained the log down tightly. You can see a 4" drill making the initial cut. Then,the hole was bored out to 8" diameter. It was JUST possible to pass a router at a 45º angle through that hole(while making the first threading cut 1" deep). I got lucky on that one!
A jig was welded up to hold the router at the angle,and it had a slide with set screws so that we could make successively deeper cuts. What about the cord? The router's jig was welded onto the end of a 4" pipe about 2 feet or more in length. I had the router on an extension cord,and just let it wrap around the pipe,keeping it clear of the 4 jaw chuck. The lathe was going about 6 RPM the whole time,so it wasn't dangerous keeping the line free if the chuck.
After these 2 things were done,I hauled them back to Williamsburg. The housewrights and I made the big frame and assembled the cider press.
The cider press can be seen in the FAQ section. It is about 8 feet wide and 10 feet tall.
I also had to make an apple grinder to go with it,but that is another subject to be added another time.
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