Afternoon Meeting with Robert Begin of Criveller

In the afternoon, we met with Robert Begin of Criveller to look at their destemmer/crusher from Milani called the Estasi. In the photo at the bottom is a side view of the Estasi on the left, and a top view showing the conveyer with fingers, on the right. We don't intend to crush any of the grapes and only want the destemmer portion of the Estasi. Robert said that it is possible for the Estasi to come without the crusher and if we decide to get the crusher, it can be field installed at a later date.

The way that the Estasi works is that the conveyer transports a metered amount of grape bunches into a slot which then goes over a metal grate which pulls intact grapes off of the rachis. The photo below shows the view of the Estasi from the bottom on the left and a view of the fingers and metal grate that does the grape removal on the right. On the photo at the right, you can just see where the conveyor fingers meet the metal grate.

Robert was kind enough to make an arrangement for us to see an Estasi at Colaneri Estate Winery and meet with Andrzej Lipinski, the winemaker. Next stop, Colaneri!