How to make a do-it-yourself cotton candy machine. Making cotton candy at home: step by step instructions

Not a single holiday: a trip with parents to the park and just a weekend walk could not do without this treat. Cotton candy has been loved by everyone since childhood. It is already a pleasure just to watch how it is wound on a stick in the device with jewelry.

In fact, devices began to be used much later than the sweetness was invented. Of course, not all housewives know how to make cotton candy at home.

You need to eat a treat right away, everyone knows how quickly it melts and turns into a hard lump.

Sweetness will be obtained only from bulk sugar, lumpy or substitutes will not work.

Cooking cotton wool is a sticky business, it is better to cover the kitchen in advance from splashes and sweet drops.

You will have to work with hot syrup, it is easy for them to burn themselves, so care should be taken.

In fact, the basis for cotton candy is a blank for making cockerels or candies. Therefore, sweets can be made from the remnants of the syrup.

Cotton candy without apparatus

A step-by-step recipe for how to make cotton candy at home is not at all complicated. All we need is a saucepan and a few forks. Extremely simple and composition:

• Sugar - 300 g
• Water - 100 g
• Acetic acid - drop

How to make cotton candy

We combine all these ingredients in a saucepan, heat and cook the syrup. Syrup is being prepared over low heat, sugar tends to burn.

If it's boring to eat snow-white cotton wool, add a natural dye. It can be beet juice or berry jam.

Bring the sweet liquid to a boil several times and remove from the stove. After several visits, the mass will begin to darken, become a beautiful golden hue, thicken and reach for a fork. It is very important to cook the mass, otherwise the cotton ball will not be airy and will stick together.

The most difficult thing is to wind the threads into a ball without a device. We put the forks opposite each other, we fix. With another cutlery, we pull the thread out of the pan, wrap it around the forks. The process is laborious, but if you follow all the tips, cotton candy at home should turn out no worse than in the store.

Professional cotton candy maker

The special apparatus is expensive enough that everyone can afford to have one at home. Those who still have it can very quickly make cotton candy at home. There is no need to do anything manually. Pour one and a half tablespoons of sugar into the bowl of the device and turn it on.

Ten heats up, sweet sand melts. From rotation, after about a minute, white cobwebs form. We take any stick, for example, for rolls, and try to catch the threads in a horizontal position so that the skein does not fall.

The culinary attraction is designed for one serving. To get more skeins, just add the main product. After each rotation it is necessary to wash the device.

An interesting cotton wool is obtained on the basis of jam syrup. We act in the same way, but do not pour granulated sugar, but pour a thick-sweet solution onto the heating element. By the way, it can be painted, for example, with raspberry jam, which will delight children. The balloons are pink and berry flavored.

If you want a whole palette of colors, buy food-grade natural dyes. Then the balls will be quite festive - yellow, blue, green. And all this without harm to health. True, each additional ingredient complicates the process, but if you carefully follow the instructions, everything will work out successfully.

When using the device, sticky excesses remain on the walls of the container. Don't rush to throw it away. Shape with your hands and let dry. Homemade lollipops will surprise guests no less than store-bought ones.

The syrup from heating also turns into threads and is distributed along the walls of the container. It remains only to collect the sweetness.

DIYers have learned how to make an electrical device with their own hands. It takes a few simple items to make. Of course, a home-made analogue is completely free, but this does not affect the quality in the least. We get an airy cotton treat. Assembly instructions are on the Internet and have long been tested by hostesses.

Of course, the electric method is much more convenient, many times faster and the amount of goodies can be prepared for a crowd of children. An unexpected surprise at a birthday party - a minimum of money is spent, and a treat to everyone's taste.

Today we will tell you how to make a machine for making cotton candy with your own hands.

Now we'll talk like cotton candy. The first thing to do is to make a cotton candy machine.

To make a homemade cotton candy machine, we need:

• bottle with a volume of 5 liters;
• engine from any;
• scissors;
• jar lid;
• power unit;
• box.

Power should be from 6-12V, any of them can fit. We insert the engine to the bottle cap, fixing it with screws.


The main thing is that the engine holds tight, for this you can add a couple of drops of glue. From above, we attach the lid from the can to the rotor.


We connect the power supply, its wire must pass through the bottle and connect to the engine. Now he is ready.

It remains to prepare the desired mixture.

To prepare the mixture we need:

• metallic;
• sugar;
• plate.

First you need to lubricate the lid from under the jar with oil. This is necessary so that the mixture does not stick to the lid. Next, pour one tablespoon of sugar into a metal scoop and add water.

There should not be much water, it is enough that the sugar is only soaked. We put it on the fire and stir constantly. It is necessary that the water evaporates, and only thick caramel remains. As soon as the water stops boiling and starts to turn brown, the mixture is ready. After preparing the mixture, it is necessary to do everything quickly so that the mixture does not have time to harden. We start the miracle unit and with a small stream, drip the mixture onto the lid of the jar. Caramel will scatter in different directions and start cobwebs.
The author of the article “Do it yourself: a device for making cotton candy with your own hands” Dima

From unnecessary rubbish, the necessary "trash".

Somehow ornately it turned out with the introduction, but, sorry.

In this article we will talk about the apparatus for making cotton candy.

I have long wanted to make such an apparatus, but ... then my hands did not reach, then it was just laziness.

A couple of months ago, my grandchildren simply overpowered me with requests to try to make such an apparatus. (Painfully, they “fell in love” with this cotton candy, which they occasionally buy and bring as a gift from Nizhny Novgorod, because they don’t sell it in our village). (Do not be surprised, this is how we live - we rarely travel to “foreign countries” and very big cities).

As V.S. Vysotsky said: “There is nothing to do, he challenged the port wine, laid it down and leaked “miracle Yuda” ...”, in general, they persuaded me, and I started manufacturing this Apparatus:

And now, apart from jokes, I will briefly tell everyone who is interested in how to make the same (or similar) device myself from improvised materials at home.

In the end, this is what happened:

I must say right away that there are no my “inventions” in this homemade product, but I’m sure that it will definitely pull on “innovation”.

And yet, this Homemade Sweet Mist Tool, as I called it (abbreviated and further SADIST), I have already made and use for its intended purpose (grandchildren are happy), so I will describe in great detail only the nodes that are important for the work of this SADIST. Some parameters are very important for repetition (unless, of course, you want to repeat this homemade work). Read carefully, I will explain all the difficulties in manufacturing that I encountered and repeatedly reworked to get a better result than the same devices made in the Middle Kingdom and those offered by DIYers on youtube.

• Let's start with the main node:

After reviewing a lot of publications on this topic on the Internet, I realized that there is no need to " reinvent the wheel" because. the simplest and cheapest option for manufacturing the main assembly, a container for the formation and spraying of sugar caramel, will be two upper gear covers for a 50 liter (large) gas cylinder.

It is not difficult to find such gearboxes, especially since for our homemade products they may be faulty for their intended purpose. (Fortunately, three years ago, natural gas was supplied to apartment buildings in our village, in connection with which people abandoned bottled gas, so that these reducers are “at least a dime a dozen”).

So, we take two upper covers from these gearboxes, cut off one of them from the upper (conical) side to form holes 35 – 40 mm(we will pour sugar into this hole),

in the second, we drill a hole for mounting the Head on the rotation shaft (I have it 8 mm).

Then we grind the ends of the covers (which have the maximum size) on the sandpaper (on the table) until a flat surface is formed (remove the shoulders), and connect them with M5 bolts into a single assembly through the already prepared holes (there are 8 of them, we take four bolts longer for fastening the fan blades ) through washers - gaskets thick no more 0.2 mm. I used 0.1 mm thick stainless steel foil, putting 2 washers under each mounting hole between the covers.

For washers - gaskets, you can take aluminum, brass or bronze foil in several layers, but it is very important (use a micrometer) that the total thickness of the washer between the covers is no more than 0.2 - 0.22 mm (I tried to increase the thickness of the gasket to 0.3 mm, it would seem nonsense - 1 tenth of a millimeter, but the result is negative).

Can not use for washers - gaskets combustible material type of paper, plastic, etc., such as for making sugar caramel The head will be heated to 400-500°C.

The shape of the fan blades and the material from which they are made (it can be galvanized iron, aluminum with a thickness of 1 mm or more, tin and other elastic, heat-resistant and plastic material) does not matter much, the main thing is that their (blades) bend should be created during the rotation of the Head ( we will call it so) of the apparatus, the air flow is parallel to the Head, i.e. so that the airflow when the head is rotated rushed to the center.

Everything with the main node.

I'll tell you honestly, if you did it right, you can be sure that this SADIST will definitely work for you. You can change the heating element, engine, fasteners, etc., the main thing is that you have a Head (a container for the formation and spraying of sugar caramel), everything else is a matter of technique.

• Move on:

It is not difficult to understand that as a basis for my homemade product (I really want to call it a SADIST, because I made and remade it for more than 2 months), I took a fiberglass circle with a diameter of 250 mm and a thickness of 20 mm, which had long been lying in the barn, In general, what I found, I took it.

There is nothing to describe here, you can take any suitable base(not necessarily round), the main thing is that it be weighty for stability, and to it (according to anyone) you need to attach legs (just kidding) legs, better rubber,

so that they do not slip on the surface when working. This (in any case) is necessary, because. Your design will vibrate as the engine rotates, and crawl away from your chosen place (guaranteed).

• Now the engine:

In principle, the engine, forgive me our main "Commenters" of this site for not calling it "electric motor", you can take any, starting from an old washing machine and the like, from old "hefty" tape recorders like "Timbre" etc. The main thing is that he asynchronous, i.e. brushless(so that it runs through the capacitor) and that it revolutions of rotation were between 1000 and 1350 rpm. A brushed motor cannot be used in this design. it usually has very high rotational speeds and short-term operation.

To be honest, on no site, believe me, I studied them quite a lot, when describing such a homemade product, more than one author did not indicate the parameters of the engine he used.

During the manufacturing process, there were many engine options that could be used in my device, such as:

but I stopped there

Based on the dimensions of the structure, it was the best fit for the above parameters and fasteners. I won’t lie, I don’t remember where it came from, but it seems to me from some kind of big reel “mafon”.

• We mount the engine right in the center our grounds(I think there is no need to explain in detail here), do not forget - it is very important.

When attaching the engine, I put on the mounting bolts between the base and the engine silicone bushings

(they can be taken in old bad CD or DVD drives of the PC,

By the way, a good thing, if you take it apart, do not throw it away).

This allowed me to partially reduce vibration transmitted to the base when the engine rotates and provide vertical adjustment of the shaft engine (by tightening or loosening one of the four bolts securing the engine to the base, I got the opportunity to change the vertical position of the engine shaft relative to the center of the base).

• The basis for a shaft of the engine with the Head (the top framework).

As a base for the head shaft and connection to the motor shaft, I used old aluminum frame 25 watt dynamics(there are a lot of such speakers in old wooden speakers like S90, etc.).

I dismantled it to the skeleton, and fastened the lower part to the base of the structure with three ø 6 mm studs. I connected the upper part of the speaker frame, which already had four holes for mounting, to the base with ø 5 mm studs for greater structural rigidity. I used these studs to fasten the cladding of the finished structure and making it more rigid my SADIST. This is very important, because all further devices will be attached to this one, let's call it "upper", frame.

• Unit for connecting the motor shaft to the Head.

On the Internet there are many (yes, to hell, full, over the roof, etc.) options for making this node. The bottom line is to find a suitable mount that has a bearing in which you can insert a shaft that can be connected to the motor shaft and on which our Head (a container for forming and spraying sugar caramel) can be securely fixed. The “dead” stepper motor is best suited - two halves of the body of which with two bearings are connected together and attached to the base through ready-made holes, and a shaft is inserted into the bearing holes, on which the Head is fixed - a container for the formation and spraying of sugar caramel (by the way, this the simplest and best option, because shaft runout is reduced to zero due to the very high quality (as a rule) manufacture of such engines. Therefore, I strongly advise you, if you can find at least a stepper motor case, use it.

I did it like this:

At our dilapidated enterprise, out of old friendship, I was machined on a lathe with a T-shaped sleeve for the installation of two bearings (which I could find in my bins) with an internal ø 8 mm and a shaft ø 8 mm for these bearings and a soft sleeve, on the end of which was cut with an M8 thread for attaching the Head. They screwed up, of course, but "for lack of ...".

Nevertheless, after attaching the bushing to the upper frame and installing the shaft with the Head fixed on it, it turned out well (the runout was minimal), it only remained to connect the motor shaft and the shaft with the Head fixed on it.

To connect these two shafts coaxially with minimal runout, I used soft sleeve,

which was ordered for Alexpress. I had a motor shaft diameter of 7 mm, and the diameter of the shaft on which I installed the Head was 8 mm (it’s just that I found only such bearings, and it was easier to cut the M8 thread for our “turners” than the non-standard M7). Everything worked out in the best possible way.

By the way, these soft bushings are simply a Chinese miracle - you can order any size on each side of the bushing, they cost a penny and the quality is beyond praise. In this regard, the Chinese are super.

Look at aliexpress by just typing "soft sleeve". I was shocked by the price when I saw these bushings on the site and shocked twice when I received the order and appreciated the quality. Well, it seems, I consider myself cunning in the "piece of iron", but, my homemade friends, I don't understand how they do it!

But, back to "our sheep."

So, I fixed everything and applied 220V to the engine, the Head (a container for the formation and spraying of sugar caramel) rotates with minimal beating. Everything's OK!!!

It remains only to make a stable heating of this Head in the lower part, so that the poured granulated sugar can, having warmed up to 180-200 ° C, turn into caramel syrup, under the action of centrifugal force, fly out into a 0.2 mm slot and, having cooled under the blades of the built-in fan, driven by an air current, rise up in the form of Sweet Mist, so that it is wound on a stick and fed to “hungry humanity”.

• So, heating element.

At this stage, “dancing with a tambourine” began for me.

I could not find anything ready-made suitable for my design, so I decided to make a heating element (hereinafter referred to as NE) myself.

Initially, there was an idea to organize the heating of the Head using a gas burner that operates autonomously from a collet (dichlorvos) cartridge,

however, after several tested options, it was not possible to obtain a stable operation of the NE. When the Head was rotated, the flame of the burner either blew out and went out, or began to smoke, overheated the sugar caramel, and it flew out without forming a sweet fog (cotton candy). During experiments with gas, the lower part of the Head became sooty (you saw it in the photo).

In addition, on reflection, I decided that using two sources of energy (electricity and gas) in one design is at least wasteful, and at most stupid. It was decided to make a home-made mini electric stove on the model of those that were made by our grandfathers, when there was nowhere to buy everything, and there was nothing to buy.

My NE (mini electric stove) was supposed to consist of a frame with legs, a stone in which a nichrome spiral was laid and the nichrome spiral itself.

Under the frame in all respects (inner diameter, height and material that can withstand high temperatures), a tin can from under the "red" fish - Sprats in tomato sauce - ideally suited. There is one important point here, we must take tin can, i.e. she must definitely magnetize. Its inner ø 98mm and outer ø Head 100mm - well, just what you need!!! The height was also suitable for my design, so that I did not have to cut it.

In the bottom of the can-frame of the NE in the center, I drilled a hole for the shaft - ø 18mm and three holes ø 5mm for the mounting legs-bolts.

but during operation, the asbestos cement began to delaminate and, in my eyes, lost its right to exist. final, the most reliable and secure an option was to make a Stone for a spiral from refractory brick(also called fireclay). It is not difficult to find such a brick, and, as it turned out, it is processed quite easily. Without much effort, I sawed a whole brick with a grinder (cutting circle for stone) along, leaving a plate 22mm thick, then I made a 100mm square out of this plate, processed it to a perfect circle ø 98mm on an electric grinder and drilled a hole ø 18mm in the center.

(When processing refractory bricks, a lot of dust harmful to all living and non-living dust is formed, therefore I recommend doing this work outdoors. and at least in a gauze bandage. To reduce dust during processing, of course, it was possible to soak the brick by dipping it in water for a couple of hours, but I did not do this, because. I was not sure how it would behave during processing, I was afraid that it would start to crack).

What child, going to the park with his parents for a holiday, does not ask for cotton wool? This white air mass of sugar is liked by many kids. And so that the feeling of fun and good mood always accompanies our kids, parents can cook such a delicacy on their own. How to make cotton candy at home is described in this article.

Making cotton candy using improvised means

1. Prepare the syrup, and for this you will need: sugar (300 g), water (100 g) and half a teaspoon of vinegar. Mix all the ingredients, pour the mixture into a small saucepan and put it on a slow fire. To make cotton wool bright, you can add a natural dye, for example, beetroot juice or raspberry jam.

2. Be sure to stir the contents so that the sugar does not burn. When the syrup boils, remove the pan from the heat and wait 5 minutes for it to cool. Repeat this procedure 4 times. The syrup will be ready when it begins to stretch and turns golden brown.

If the mass is undercooked, then as a result, the cotton wool will turn out to be not airy, it will be heavy and wet, it will begin to stick to the teeth.

And if the syrup is digested, then the delicacy can eventually turn out to be tough, even a little prickly.

3. Let's move on to the formation of a familiar figure: take the usual forks in the amount of 3 pieces. Place two of them in glasses at a distance of about 5 cm from each other. And dip the third fork in hot syrup and start driving around the other two cutlery so that the sugar cobweb is wound around them. Be careful not to get the hot solution on your hands and burn them. Do-it-yourself cotton candy is ready, and now you can enjoy this delicate and pleasant delicacy.

Dessert preparation with a special device

A device for cotton candy can be bought at a hardware store, however, not everyone can afford such a unit. Its price ranges from 10,000-20,000 rubles. But if you are lucky, and you have purchased such a device, then preparing cotton candy with it will not be difficult. This delicacy is made as follows:

1. Pour 1.5 teaspoons of sugar into the center of the rotating bowl, and then plug the appliance into the mains.

2. After a minute, white sweet threads will begin to form inside the bowl, so you need to catch them. To do this, take a stick on which you will wind the cotton wool, determine it vertically above the container and wait until the threads begin to cling to it. Then, in a horizontal position, continue winding the sweetness around the holder.

One serving of cotton wool with this method of preparation takes only 1.5 teaspoons of sugar. If you want to make a treat for two sweet teeth (or even more), then you need to clean the bowl so that subsequently the syrup does not stick to it.

Now you know how to make cotton candy at home using a special device for making dessert. Now find out how you can make such a treat without using a special unit. Rather, the device will still be, but you will make it yourself.

List of elements for making a homemade device

If you can’t afford a special device for making sweets, then you can make it yourself, armed with the following materials:

1. Plastic vessel with a volume of 5 liters.

2. Engine (no need to bother, a regular motor from any children's toy will do).

3. A metal lid from a can (its size should be slightly larger than the neck of the bottle).

4. Cell phone power supply. The power of the charger should be in the range of 12-20 V.

5. Cardboard box. It should fit a bottle.

How to make cotton candy at home using such a homemade device? Detailed instructions are provided in the next section.

Detailed instructions for the manufacture of the device

1. Connect the plastic and metal covers and make a hole in each of them, and then insert the motor so that its sharp end comes out through the hole. The plastic cap must be at the bottom so that the bottle can be screwed on.

2. Connect the power supply to the motor.

3. Place the machine in the box.

A homemade device for cotton candy is ready. It remains to learn how to get sweetness.

Cooking treats with a homemade machine

1. Lubricate the metal cover with sunflower oil. This is necessary so that the mixture does not stick to the cap.

2. Take out a steel mug and pour 4 teaspoons of sugar and 1 tablespoon of water into it. Food coloring can be added if desired.

3. Put the cup on the fire and constantly mix its contents. You need to keep the dishes on the burner until the sugar in the mug is completely dissolved. The mass should acquire a brown tint and ductility.

4. You need to cook quickly so that the caramel does not have time to harden. Quickly start the unit and start pouring the mass in a small stream onto the metal cover. Caramel will scatter in different directions and start cobwebs.

Now you can easily answer the question: “How to make cotton candy at home without a special apparatus?”

1. You need to use cotton candy immediately, because after a while it becomes dense and not so tasty.

2. In order for this delicacy to turn out not only tasty, but also bright, you can add food coloring.

3. For the preparation of such yummy, it is necessary to use only loose dry sugar, but refined sugar or a wet product is not suitable.

4. The hardened remains of the syrup should not be thrown away - they make delicious golden sugar candies.

5. Before starting the process, it is advisable to cover the floor and table in the kitchen with cellophane. Because drops of syrup will scatter, and removing them from the surface is not so easy.

6. During cooking, you need to take the children out of the kitchen so that they are not burned by drops of syrup that accidentally fall on their skin.

7. Forks, whisks, Chinese sticks can be used as a cotton wool holder.

Making cotton candy is not an easy process, but if you strictly follow all the recommendations, then you will get a wonderful dessert. And with the presence of a special device, without any problems, you can make this delicacy at least every day.

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