Grinder for press and drip

[akallio]

Wormdrives are great, as long as you don't have to do something else than espresso...

Could you recommend a grinder for press pot and occasional drip (and once-a-year open pot)?

The easy solution would be to buy a cheap burr grinder. The problem with those is that when I do something else than espresso, I'm doing large volumes. For example, week's worth of open pot coffee is several hundred grams.

So, I would need:
- stepped adjustments
- quite a large hopper
- can do large volumes (not necessarily fast)
- bag holder would be great

I would not need:
- fine grind
- consistent grind quality
- fine adjustments

[HughF]

Please say something about your budget.
Which country are you in?
What weight of beans do you need the hopper to handle at one time?
I'm very puzzled as to why you don't want consistent grind quality!

I'm looking into a Macap MC6 Doserless grinder myself for vac/press use at work but I don't know a UK supplier yet, I'm asking one of the usual TMC suspects for a quote now. This, even in the smaller MC4 version, might be over your budget though, which brings us back to my first question!

Cheers,

Hugh

[akallio]

Please say something about your budget.

I can get a cheap burr grinder for 40 euros, so everything above it should offer more 'bang'. Added capacity and easy grinding into a bag would justify something like 100 euros, maybe. If we are talking about significantly more than that: then I'll be perfectly happy to go on screwing my wormdrive back and forth, it's not THAT big a trouble.

Which country are you in?

Helsinki, Finland.

What weight of beans do you need the hopper to handle at one time?

Something like 300 grams would be enough. Basically, any real hopper would do.

I'm very puzzled as to why you don't want consistent grind quality!

Because I don't need it. We are not talking about espresso, so demands for consistency are smaller (a sidenote: even an espresso grind should not be fully consistent!). As long as the grinder is not producing too much dust, it should be ok for rougher brewing methods.

I'm looking into a Macap MC6 Doserless grinder myself for vac/press use at work but I don't know a UK supplier yet, I'm asking one of the usual TMC suspects for a quote now. This, even in the smaller MC4 version, might be over your budget though, which brings us back to my first question!

MC4 would be great, but 320 euros is way over the line. And talking about MC6, are you sure no cheaper grinder would produce good enough stuff for your press? I have never bothered to dial in my grinder for press: just set it a bit coarser than drip and we are ready to go. And I'm very happy with the coffee I get, as long as the beans are good.

[HughF]

Thanks for the extra information!
The Iberital I use at work now is fine; I just expect the Macap to be better quality, to give noticeably better results and coffee is my main extravagance right now. I have a lot of respect for the Iberital, if you like or don't mind worm-drive I don't see the Rocky as worth the extra money. The Macap is the next big jump up in quality from the Iberital (to my mind) and going by the Home Barista comparison I don't think I'll find significantly better grind quality at any remotely sane price (e.g. the VersaLab M3 would be too dear for me - mind you, someone on TMC was looking into a Mahlkoenig!!).

The possible improvements from grinding for press pot with a better grinder may surprise you, don't assume they will be insignificant until you've tried it yourself - when I went to a Rocky from the Dualit/Solis 166 the press results were noticeably better with a cleaner cup.

Nevertheless, I liked the Dualit for press use and in fact I gave my parents a Dualit for their cafetiere; they use maybe 100 grams per week and it's been without problems for 3 years. To go better in grind quality I'd suggest you would need over your 100 Euros. It is not worm drive, it's very clean in use (you would need to empty the grounds catch bin into your bag but that's fairly easy). The only thing is that it is not a really heavy duty grinder, some of the guts (burr carrier?) are plastic rather than metal.

Cheers,

Hugh

[akallio]

Thanks for your input!

I've been wading through different entry/mid-range grinders. I've never realised how few grinders have crude and simple tube for output... They have always attached either a container or a doser in the end. Most of the containers and hoppers are too small, but at least Dualit and Solis Maestro Plus look reasonable. So I might get one of those, which would allow me to think only about espresso grinding when updating my current Minimoka.

Another option would be to replace MInimoka with either Mazzer Mini E or doserless stepless Macap. I would miss the wormdrive, but propably get over it.

[monkey66]

You might want to check out the KitchenAid Proline?

http://www.homewarestore.com/pages/prod ... ctId=29263

Its a very solid piece of kit.