You should be periodically cleaning your pasta machine to remove buildup that accumulates on the rollers and guide blades. Overtime, the plasticizers from clay can cause a chemical reaction with steel rollers resulting in black streaks in your clay. In addition to cleaning your rollers, it’s also important to clean the guide blades because it accumulates clay deposits that can contaminate new colors of clay.
You may continue reading, but if you’re like me who prefers to listen and see, you can watch in video format:
Clean the Pasta Machine Rollers
To clean the rollers, grab a paper towel and dab with few drops of mineral or olive oil and wipe the rollers as you crank the handle. You can also clean the body of the pasta machine while you are at it. If you are on a time crunch, you can also use baby wipes to clean the rollers in between different colors of clay.
Clean Pasta Machine Guide Blades
To clean the blades turn your machine over and you should see two guide blades beneath each roller. Guide blades help lift the flattened clay off the rollers. Stickier clays tend to increase the level of buildup that occurs. The bottom guide blade usually has the most clay deposits, but the top one can sometimes have it too.
Use either baby wipes, toothpicks, or a Q tip with a little oil to run it along each blade to remove the buildup. Normally, right at the tip of the guide blade is where you’ll see the clay deposits (I usually run a toothpick along that area to loosen it up bits of clay), then follow with a Qtip. It helps if you already cleaned the rollers with oil, because some of that drips down to the guide blades making it easier to clean. You can also clean the top guide blade by wiping it with a paper towel.
After cleaning the guide blades, crank your machine to wipe the blades again with a dry paper towel since some of the residue you removed from the blades may have rubbed onto the rollers and don’t want to leave too much oil on the surface either.
Then follow by repeatedly rolling a large sheet of scrap clay though the machine to pick up any loosened bits of clay.
Additional Pasta Machine Care Tips
In order to reduce the amount of time spent cleaning your machine between different colors of clays, it’s recommended to start with light to dark clays. Also using firmer clays will reduce the amount of clay deposits. And if you have the budget, have two pasta machines — one for lighter and one for darker colors.
Read this guide on how to properly care for your pasta machine to reduce wear and tear, and avoid permanent damage: Ultimate Pasta Machine Care Guide (Tips & Tricks)
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