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Motorized French Fry Cutter
Since Bill Storms made his first motorized french fry cutter a decade ago, thousands of pounds of potatoes have been cut and sold at local antique tractor shows. The "Potato Master" is so impressive that Storms, 75 years old, was encouraged to start building and selling them.
  The Greencastle, Penn., entrepreneur says there is great profit to be made selling french fries made from fresh potatoes. But making fries with a manual cutter is a lot of work.
  "Having built a log splitter, I thought I could use the same concept to push potatoes through a cutting head. He gathered a motor, gearbox and materials he had in his shop and purchased a cutting head at a restaurant supply store.
  It's simple to operate: drop in one potato at a time, and move the potato pusher head by stepping on a foot pedal. The Potato Master is powered by a 1/4 hp motor and gearbox that will cut 300 to 800 lbs. of potatoes an hour.
  "The quality and size of the potato dictates how much it cuts in an hour," Storms says. "It will keep up with 8 to 10 fryers with two baskets each."
  To clean the machine, remove a couple of wing nuts and pins to free the cutter, and rinse it out in the sink.
  Customers enjoy watching the fries being made almost as much as they enjoy eating them, Storm says. After numerous requests, Storms started making them for sale at $1,950. When another organization said they needed a model to cut at least 900 lbs. per hour, Storms designed a double-headed model for $2,400. Both come with a 3-year warranty on the motor and a 1-year warranty on the cutter, as well as a video explaining how to operate and maintain it.
  To learn more check out the video on Storm's website, which shows the Potato Master in operation.
  Contact: FARM SHOW Followup, Bill Storms, 213 S. Allison St., Greencastle, Penn. 17225 (ph 717 597-8364; www.potatomaster.com).


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2010 - Volume #34, Issue #3