Cotton Candy - Machine Design & Selection

[Lazarus]

Hi all - we are jumping into cotton candy this year and looking for a machine. I received a recommendation on the Gold Medal Floss Maxx from Fred Ahrens (thank Fred) with the special wider element that Gold Medal makes just for maple cotton candy. I would be fine with that, but the throughput of the machine about half of what I need. I'll die with only 3-4 servings per minute.

I'm looking for a much larger machine, 400 cones/hr (6-7 servings per minute). But the idea of needing a special element is a problem. Gold Medal only makes it for that one machine only. Other manufacturers .... I called Paragon, they didn't know much about maple cotton candy (or much in general). I also called Cretors, and got someone a lot more knowledgeable, and he is looking into it with their experts. Cretors does NOT use a ribbon element. Instead of a ribbon, they use a tubular burner element (like an older electric stove) and a separate screen the floss passes through. He couldn't imagine it being a problem even with a larger crystal / grain size.

Anyone have any experience with a tubular element instead of a ribbon? Or a large machine?

What exactly is the problem? Does the maple sugar melt at a higher temperature and doesn't floss finely enough?

I hate to drop $3K on a large and fast machine only to have it plug up in 2 hours .....

[Kh7722]

We have the Gold metal max, you can make a lot of cotton candy in a day with one. Great machine

[bill m]

We have the Gold Medal Econo-floss and have no problem with it keeping up with sales. Just curious what type of event are you doing where you are selling one serving every 10 seconds?

[Lazarus]

We do a few festivals per year that are on the larger side within major metropolitan cities. While it might not be crazy all day, there are usually several hours during the middle of the day that move at a significant clip.

But it's also for shows where we are not allowed to spin live. Due to the short shelf life of the floss, we need to spin the day before, and we just don't have hours and hours to prep a few hundred bags. We're trying to do set up and 100 other things. And if we run short on a weekend festival that goes to 9 pm on a Saturday, I don't want to be spinning all night to get ready for the next day.