Parts of a Meat Grinder – Auger, Knife, Plate and Ring

All 10 parts on the diagram

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The meat grinder 10

Hopper The wide funnel on top. The meat goes in here.
Auger A screw that carries the meat forward and presses it.
Knife Four blades that turn against the plate and cut the meat.
Grinding plate A plate full of holes. The hole size sets how fine the grind is.
Locking ring Screws on last and holds the plate and knife in.
Crank handle Turn it by hand to drive the auger.
Grinder head The barrel that holds the auger, knife and plate.
Pusher Presses the meat down through the hopper to the auger.
Clamp Holds the grinder fast to the edge of a table.
Stuffing tube Goes on the front for filling sausage casings.

How this list was compiled: Every name checked on 2026-10-01 and kept only where two of these use it. (1) Wikipedia, Meat grinder, text only, https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Meat_grinder : a hand-powered grinder taken apart into crank handle, body with funnel and clamp, auger, knife and perforated plate. (2) A meat grinder owner's manual, read as text at https://archive.org/details/manualzilla-id-6358821 : hopper, meat stomper (food pusher), grinder head, auger, cutting blade, grinder plate, ring cap, stuffing tube. (3) Kutas, Great Sausage Recipes and Meat Curing, read as text at https://archive.org/details/great-sausage-recipes-and-meat-curing : auger into the grinder head, then the cutting knife, the grinding plate against the flat side of the knife, and the locking ring; hopper; stuffing tube. (4) Passages found by archive.org's full-text search in a visual dictionary (pusher, feed tube, grinding plate), a general store catalog (spiral feed screw, four-bladed knife, perforated plate, ring, detachable crank with thumb screw) and two books on sausage making and butchering (hopper, cutting blade, a hand-crank grinder clamped on by a thumb screw). Licence: own work

The drawing: Drawn for this site on 2026-10-01 from plain geometry; nothing traced. Licence: own work

How it works

A meat grinder pushes meat along a screw, past a turning knife and through a plate full of holes. The drawing pulls the working parts out of the front in a row.

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In at the top

Meat goes into the hopper, and the pusher presses it down. It drops into the grinder head, the barrel that holds the working parts. The clamp holds the head to a table.

The order of the parts

The auger goes into the head first; the crank handle at the back turns it. The knife fits on the front of the auger, then the grinding plate against the flat side of the knife. The locking ring screws on last. For sausage the stuffing tube goes on the front, and the meat is pushed through it into the casing.

An electric grinder has the same row of parts, with a motor in place of the crank handle.
The quiz accepts stomper for pusher, screw for auger and die for grinding plate.

Questions and answers

What are the parts of a meat grinder?

A hopper and pusher on top, a grinder head, an auger inside it, a knife, a grinding plate and a locking ring at the front, and a crank handle or motor at the back.

What order do the parts of a meat grinder go in?

Auger into the head first, then the knife on the end of the auger, then the grinding plate against the flat side of the knife, then the locking ring screwed on to hold them.

What is the auger in a meat grinder?

The screw inside the grinder head. As it turns it carries the meat forward and presses it against the knife and the plate.

What does the grinding plate do?

It is a plate full of holes at the front of the grinder. The knife turns against it, and the meat comes out through the holes; smaller holes give a finer grind.