Removing water quickly is very important because the longer a harvested plant or compound retains water, the higher the chance it has of spoiling, losing nutrition, and losing potency.
Congratulations! You are now the owner of a new freeze-dryer; or you are ready to make the purchase! While the freeze dryer itself is a major investment in food preservation equipment, you will want to make certain you are prepared with a few other items
Reattached hose and ran another full system test (results, 750 mTorr lowest steady reading - looking through the oil level window, some bubbling seen in oil even after an hour of pumpdown - some "air" noises from pump)
The best places to buy a commercial freeze dryers in person are either directly from the physical stores of the manufacturers, or in person at various appliance stores, which are usually authorized resellers of freeze dryers.
There are three things that cause organic material to lose its freshness and begin to degrade – Water, Heat, and Oxygen. Harvest Right has a solution to these problems.
So I corrected the oversight - I drilled and tapped the elbow to add the port. Here is a picture. It worked great today when I flushed the pump to clear out the gunk.
I'll be looking forward to hearing about the weird and wonderful items you produce. Should be an interesting learning curve.
What tastes best? Some foods may taste better to you using traditional preservation methods, others may taste better to you preserved by freeze-drying.
14 Posted December 16, 2015 (edited) On 7/31/2015 at 11:12 PM, TonyC said: Somehow this post got posted twice so I'll edit the second one with some more useful information. I remember reading somewhere in this thread where Shop Now somebody was asking how long you run the freeze cycle with pre-frozen food. I have my chest freezer set to -12F, and I usually let the freeze dryer cool for an hour before I put the frozen food in. After I load the food in I wait another half hour to start the drying process. I've had a lot of cycles that the Completa time between pulling one batch out and starting the drying cycle on the next is around 2 hours. I'm running mine in a cold garage, so it cools down pretty quickly. If you have yours in a warm room it would probably take a little longer.
AN8 male fittings are 3/4 X 16tpi. Should be able to get one that will work in this application. Also, there filters that use metric threads, might be easier to deal with.
Many online stores (taking Harvest Right as an example) have sections of their websites devoted to all the different benefits of using freeze dryers, explaining how to freeze dry, how it affects nutrition, and all other additional info you may need.
One idea I that I had was to freeze-dry sorbet. Sort of a twist on astronaut ice cream. I've had freeze dried strawberries, and those have a nice crunchy texture.
It would also be best to avoid pawn shops. Although they can be a goldmine for trinkets, they’re usually not a great place to shop for advanced machinery.
A couple of other points: There are obvious and easy improvements that could be made, such as using a container with a dispensing faucet (think of a lemonade jar, for example). Also, for the technically savvy, auto-mechanic-type person who may be wondering about it, there is an anti-backflow seal that has to be removed from the oil filter, but that can be removed by cutting through it and pulling it out with needle nose pliers, which is easily done.