Super Agata Bench Capper

Regarding the Agata bench capper: it worked well, when it worked.

I had the same problem as Gene, however. The black plastic piston broke where it was attached to the capping bell. This appears to be a design flaw. The manufacturer should find a studier way to connect the piston to the bell or redesign the whole piston to reduce stress when the bell does not seat properly on the crown cap. At the very least, they should supply replacement parts.

I also was able to repair it with some metal parts from a hardware store. Primarily, I used a 1/4" x 2 1/2" brass "nipple" (basically, a 2 1/2 " piece of brass tubing with "pipe" threads (NPT) at each end (18 threads per inch). The tubing is conventionally called 1/4 inch, because this is its approximate inside diameter. I used a tapered tap to cut threads up into the center hole of the plastic piston and down into the remaining plastic in the capping bell. The bell threads were extended through the hole in the center of the bell. Screwing the brass tubing into both ends connects the piston and bell more securely. I drilled perpendicular holes into the tubing to accommodate a cotter pin to keep the heavy piston spring from pushing the piston up ,too far into the red plastic housing. A flat washer above the pin finished the job. This salvages a pretty good, inexpensive bench capper.

Most important part of the mechanism is made of plastic and broke where the bell housing attaches after bottling a few batches of beer. I was able to re-engineer with a 5/8' X 3" fine thread bolt and a couple of 5/8" x 3/4" bronze sleeves for a cost of about $14. Unit is better than new now & should be good for thousands of capping cycles. Or at least until something else on it fails.

I like the adjustability as I have different size bottles. The directions that came with it, however, are a little sketchy and did not tell you about removing the "button" from the shaft to allow the capper to move along the shaft.

My 4 star review is a reflection of the manufacturer, not AIH. AIH would get 6 stars if I could. They went above and beyond in my transaction of this purchase. The instructions are nearly useless. No big deal, but don't expect to refer to them. There is a small red stopper on the riser (see pic 3 in item) that is SUPPOSED to stop the mechanism. Mine went past after 2 bottles. Had a blast getting it back down and broke an empty beer bottle by bumping it. Finally tried with out that thing, and it worked like a charm. By the time I got that little piece out, it was pretty mangled, so I discarded it. Ran through the rest of my batch great. Going from 12oz to 22oz with the slide of the handle all the way up.