That reminds me of a cheese farm I worked on in France. The farmer had slowly hacked together his cheese making equipment from an assortment of other food processing machinery. It ended up saving him something like 10k euro over a commercially produced device.
My favorite hack of his was out of necessity. He started getting shoulder problems from stirring milk for hours every day, so he found an old motor and attached it to the top of his vessel with a large paddle and voila no more shoulder problems.
The fact that this is considered a "clever hack" as opposed to "duh, totally obvious" befuddles me.
Who in hell would actually spend hours stirring milk for hours a day?
Saying that this is a clever hack is like saying "I know a guy who heats his water for a shower using a hot water heater, instead of jumping into cold water and thrashing his arms around for four hours - what a genius!"
My favorite hack of his was out of necessity. He started getting shoulder problems from stirring milk for hours every day, so he found an old motor and attached it to the top of his vessel with a large paddle and voila no more shoulder problems.