Centrifuge For Home Use, Purchasing Question.

[Anonymous Modernist 9638]

Hello, I am very interested in two products right now, a Rotary Evaporator, and a Centrifuge. Although any Rotary evaporator is far out of my current budget, after researching some Centrifuge's, I have noticed their price ranges vary significantly. I understand that the Rpm's work in direct correlation with time, as someone had mentions in a previous post, however after viewing this one on Amazon.com, I was wondering if anyone had used this product before, or one similar, with successful results. If not can someone recommend one of better quality, preferably under 500 Dollars. Thank you, and I'm sorry for the Naive questions.

Here is the link to the one on Amazon....

http://www.amazon.com/Ample-Scientific-E-33-Bench-Top-Centrifuge/dp/B003WOKPF6

[Judy Wilson]

Lenny,

A Rotavap may be out of your price range, but you could build your own. MC co-author Chris Young explained how to do it a few months ago. You can find the post here:

http://modernistcuisine.com/2011/11/vacuum-concentrating-part-2/

[Anonymous Modernist 310]

Chris Young' vacuum concentrating setup is good if that's what you want to do but if it's the volatile part that you want to condense you'll need to add a condenser and probably a second pump for it's coolant. The setup become much more complex but probably still cheaper and easier than a rotary evaporator.

As for the centrifuge. The centrifuge that you're looking at seem interesting according to Dave Arnolds:

http://www.cookingissues.com/2012/08/19/spin-cycle-homestyle-centrifuge/

But it seem to me that having a maximum of 15ml per flask which seem very unpractical and the g force is limited. If you're ready to take the risk of buying used. I got a Beckman TJ-6 for arround the same price and it's about perfect for most of the usages of MC. It's limited to 3-4000g but you have 3 liters capacity in four swigging buckets which is usually more than enough. (Except for pea butter where the yield is so low that you make about half a cup at a time!)

Good luck

Louis-Frederic Michaud