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PostPosted: Wed Dec 17, 2014 8:21 am
by GreenBean
CakeBoy wrote:
simonp wrote:And fingers crossed that the wife doesn't kill me when she sees it :shock:

True, but if the worst comes to the worst you at least wouldn't need to worry about the switch anymore! A real win win situation :wink: :shock:

As long as she doesn’t hit you with the new grinder. That may damage more than the switch :? :(

PostPosted: Wed Dec 17, 2014 11:10 am
by simonp
GreenBean wrote:As long as she doesn’t hit you with the new grinder. That may damage more than the switch :? :(

Yes, it might chip the paint too :shock:

So, the new burrs in. The new Super Jolly ones are reasonably different to the ones that came out (which were marked Fiorenzato) with a much more aggressive first bean crush stage and longer finer grind blades. On closer inspection there were signs of the odd stone having gone through the old burrs, nothing bad but a few small dings. Under the microscope at work the edges are quite rounded too plus there is quite a bit more evidence of stones, so definitely worth replacing. Have to go to the wife's singing group Christmas concert tonight so will be Thursday before I can try the burrs out with some crap beans to clean and season.

PostPosted: Thu Dec 18, 2014 12:43 am
by simonp
I had half an hour before I had to go out this evening and my new switch had arrived so I popped that in. Couldn't resist quickly firing up and finding/marking the zero point. then of course I had a small amount of old beans lying around so backed off 3 notches which is where I got an espresso grind with the old burrs and fired up. I got a Turkish grind! Boy was that ever fine powder. Backed off about another 4-5 notches and got something close to an espresso consistency.
The first thing i noticed was how very, very consistent the grind was. Very uniform and very little in the way of fines. Seemed noticeably more consistent than the Mini which has burrs only a few months old.
The second thing is just how much coffee gets stuck in the exit chute from the burr chamber which is going to take a bit more effort and possibly some form of tool to get out each shot.
The third thing is that the beans seem much more reluctant to get pulled into the burrs (without much weight of beans on top) than on the Mini, presumably due to the larger entry hole. I'm guessing it isn't a problem with a weight of beans in a hopper, but for single shot dosing it may be.

I have to go to my company Xmas do tomorrow evening now after failing to get out of it, so it's probably going to be Sunday before I get a chance to run some seasoning beans through and then play with some shots :x

PostPosted: Thu Dec 18, 2014 8:19 am
by GreenBean
It all sounds very promising. I use a small brush to clear the grinds from the exit chute on my SJ. This is quick and easy to do but your grinder may be different.

I keep at least 250 g of coffee in the hopper at all times. I find this produces much better results in the cup than single dosing with or without weights on top of the beans.

PostPosted: Thu Dec 18, 2014 9:37 am
by simonp
GreenBean wrote:I keep at least 250 g of coffee in the hopper at all times. I find this produces much better results in the cup than single dosing with or without weights on top of the beans.

I'd be too worried about the beans going stale, plus I often switch about messing with different bean mixes on the fly. If I'm blending I do it per shot to experiment. That and the little matter of the hopper not fitting under the cupboard :roll:

PostPosted: Fri Dec 19, 2014 8:29 am
by GreenBean
simonp wrote:I'd be too worried about the beans going stale, plus I often switch about messing with different bean mixes on the fly. If I'm blending I do it per shot to experiment. That and the little matter of the hopper not fitting under the cupboard :roll:

For further views on this subject see this thread starting with posts dated Mar 03, 2014.

PostPosted: Tue Dec 23, 2014 1:12 am
by simonp
So I finally got a chance to run some beans through the burrs for seasoning this evening. Got some quite revolting/ashy smelling dark roasted Brazilian (why would you dark roast Brazilian beans?!) beans from Asda fro £2 a bag. Bunged a couple of those through and whilst doing so adjusted the grind by eye/feel to an espresso grind.
First shot of Hasbean Christmas Espresso Blend gave a 22 second shot. Pretty damned close for a first guess! Looked and tasted good.
The next shot (with the grind a little finer) was a 26 second 26g cup (from 18.5g coffee) 8) The pour was very even band quite a bit darker than I have been getting with the Mini with this blend. Very sweet smooth viscous shot. The acidity seemed a bit lower than the shots I have been getting with this blend and the chocolate a bit more prominent.
I guess I should find time to do some back to back shots with the 2 grinders.
The grind from the F5 certainly has a fluffier look to it than the Mini's and does look very even in particle size. It also seems that the difference in grind seems less for a given movement of the adjuster but that could just be a better grind quality giving more forgiving shot.

On a sample of 2 shots I would say the F5 is a success so far. Hopefully I can play much more over Christmas and see for sure.

PostPosted: Tue Dec 23, 2014 10:19 pm
by CakeBoy
Sounds promising Simon! The Christmas Blend sounds good too. We have a bag here that we are about to start :)

PostPosted: Tue Dec 23, 2014 11:39 pm
by simonp
CakeBoy wrote:Sounds promising Simon! The Christmas Blend sounds good too. We have a bag here that we are about to start :)


For my palate it is the tastiest one Christmas blend Steve has done since the days when he used to put some Yemen coffee in, but then I did love Yemen in espresso blends :wink:

PostPosted: Wed Dec 24, 2014 12:01 am
by CakeBoy
Oh yes, I had entirely forgotten that! This does sound promising :)

PostPosted: Wed Dec 24, 2014 10:49 am
by simonp
It is a shame there seems to be no source of green Yemen in the UK any more, maybe the quality is very poor these days, or it causes too many chaff fires to be used :shock:

PostPosted: Wed Dec 24, 2014 5:58 pm
by CakeBoy
Yes, I remember Steve's warnings on the HB site about chaff fires! You are right, there doesn't seem to be any Yemen about these days :)

PostPosted: Wed Dec 31, 2014 12:39 am
by simonp
So, a few more days in and about 500g more beans through. I was having some issues with consistency of consecutive shot times which I put put down to the burrs still settling in, but now I am getting very consistent shots.
Every single shot done with this grinder (even the less than perfect ones) has given me much darker pours and crema than I was getting with the Mazzer Mini. Also each one is pouring much more evenly across the bottom the basket, not that the Mini shots were bad in that way but the shots using the F5 are noticeably better.
I have had to modify my regime slightly in that, whereas I would get pretty much what I put in to the Mini in terms of beans, the F5 sometimes likes to hide up to a gram that I can't immediately get at. This is not helped by the fact that the burrs take forever to stop turning when empty (good bearings !) . Therefore I've taken to grinding about 1g more than I need just in case and weighing the basket after filling. I'm sure with time I will get used to getting everything out of the F5 in terms of grinds.

In the cup the results are equally improved, a silkier mouth-feel and a smoother flavour with more depth revealed. It tastes to me like more of the sugars are getting extracted.

I will do some modifications to the F5 like fitting some sort of chute to direct the grounds out of the doser better (currently using the paper cone method used on Super Jollys) and I might experiment at some point with a short hopper (if I can find one to fit) and maybe fit a timer if I go down that route.

Basically the F5 will be staying and the Mini will be moved on to a new owner at some point.

PostPosted: Thu Jan 01, 2015 9:27 pm
by Chris
Have you tried using the main part of your Aeropress as a hopper? I do that on the Anfim at home and it fits perfectly. I wonder if it fits on your grinder too?

PostPosted: Fri Jan 02, 2015 10:45 am
by simonp
Chris wrote:Have you tried using the main part of your Aeropress as a hopper? I do that on the Anfim at home and it fits perfectly. I wonder if it fits on your grinder too?


No, I haven't tried that, I reckon it will be too small as the Fiorenzato's throat is much wider than most grinders. Worth a try though. Apparently a 67mm collapsible lens hood will fit to work as a mini-hopper.