Response to cream separators

if you have ever had a chance to see a crean separator in use,as well as to see all the parts that go together to make it work, You'd have a good idea that it probably isn't within the grasp of most of us to build one. The new separators that sell for around $200.00 work very well and have only been available for a few years, to my knowledge. Up until these came out a new one was several hundred dollars. If you live in an area that had a lot of small dairy farms a few years ago you may find a used one, but you really need to know what you're looking at when you purchase a used one as there are several parts and if anything is missing it won't work and the chance of getting parts for an old machine is slim. Before we got a cream separator we had some success skimming cream off the top of the milk by putting it in wide shallow pans(like a cake pan) let it set for 24 hours and then could skim the thin layer of cream that collected with a slotted spoon. sometimes we would let it set even up to 48 hours but all in all it was a lot of work for the results.(you have to cover the milk or it picks up a "refridge" taste and then some times letting it set for 48 hours would leave it with a goat flavor). Having a cream separator is nice, I got mine as a gift and we take advantage of having it, but I don't think I would spend 200.00 to replace it...ron

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