Whole Hog Rotisserie Turns Very Slow

Whole Hog Rotisserie Turns Very Slow FARM HOME Food Richard Berry built a rotisserie that is heavy duty enough to turn a whole hog It took a lot of trial and error but with the help of 2 gearboxes along with 6 sprockets and pulleys the 1 725-rpm shaft on the electric motor turns the hog just once every 4 1/2 min “Two of my friends liked to roast whole hogs but they would have to turn the spit by hand for 6 to 8 hrs ” says Berry “They had to deal with smoke wind and rain from 3 or 4 a m when they started the fire until the hog was done ” Determined to make life easier on his friends he knew gear reduction was the big challenge He checked with suppliers like Granger before turning to his “resource” pile “New gearboxes ran $300 to $400 ” says Berry “I had a big cast iron 36:1 gear reduction out of an ice crusher I also had a gear reduction motor from a pizza crust rolling machine ” The pizza crust gear reducer was mounted with an electric motor to a heavy-duty base After stripping them off he remounted them to the base along with the ice crusher reduction gear motor using galvanized steel pipe for the turning rods “I spent about a week working on it ” says Berry “At first I tried figuring out ratios mathematically and then I went to trial and error ” After trying different pulleys on the electric motor and the 2 gear reducers he ended up alternating 1 1/2 to 2-in pulleys with 10-in pulleys When he had everything right he calculated that the shaft on the electric motor turned 7 762 1/2 times for each turn of the spit “I rigged up 2 homemade jack stands for the pipe with the pig on it Everything came out of my ‘resource’ pile I don’t think I spent more than $10 total “It has worked great for many years ” says Berry “The pigs come out beautifully with the constant and consistent turning The pig skin is crisp like a potato chip ” Contact: FARM SHOW Followup Richard W Berry P O Box 6082 Los Osos Calif 93412 ph 805 748-4501

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