Doserless grinders often have problems with clumping and retention. They're good for busy shops where speed is important, but no great advantage IMO for home use. The Mazzer doser is useless, though.

JP

 

Mmm ok that makes sense

So maybe actually dump the on demand idea but look at different options than the SJ

 

JP , how many doser less grinders have you used then? Usually if they clamour, your grind is too tight. Having run rr55, k10, k8 and endless Mythos recently, clumping is not something that has troubled me. If it clumps break it down! As soon as the water hits it the clump is gone anyway

 

Doserless grinders often have problems with clumping and retention. They're good for busy shops where speed is important, but no great advantage IMO for home use. The Mazzer doser is useless, though.

JP

The mazzer doser un modified is useless, but with some simple well documented mods you can get. Centre of the portafilter, clump free mound of coffee, plus with the amount of mods that people have done you can single dose on a mazzer fairly easily using a lens hood hopper.

 

So is the doser version better than the doserless once modded?? Confused a bit now

 

If you intend to single dose, I.e grind a weighted dose and get out what you put in, then a doser grinder will be better, as you can modify them, use a brush and pretty much get out what went in. Word of warning all commercial grinders except the ek43 and r120 will need some form of modification to get them to single dose.

 

I'm not going to contradict anything that CC, JJP or DFK say because they've probably forgotten more than I know.

But having had an MC2, then a Mazzer Mini, and now a Eureka Zenith 65E I would say that the 65E, which is on-demand, suits me perfectly as a 3-doubles a day bloke such as you. I don't get clumping, and it's a welcome relief not to have to mess about with getting the last couple of grams out of the Mazzer doser. Bearing in mind I'm not an expert on grinders but probably someone much like yourself Gary, I can't see much of a downside to the Zenith. I really enjoy the results and the ease of use. Of course something that costs twice as much would probably be even better but that wasn't really in question.

The electronic dosing on the zenith means you can chuck enough beans in the hopper for a day or two's drinks, set it up and just press the button and off you go. I don't single dose and so an OD grinder makes my life easy. With the Mini (which was unmodified apart from guards and screens being removed), I had to turn it on, guess when roughly 18g was present and turn it off, thwack it into the basket and then hoik out the last gram and a half from the exit chute, then thwack that into the basket too, and maybe whip round afterwards with a small brush. It was fun for a while and I didn't mind as the coffee was so much better than the MC2 used to give. But the Zenith is really so nice to use.

 

Ok so I suppose I should take a different view as to what kind of grinder I should look to purchase.

My coffee is made first thing in the morning for double espresso and one when I come home from work.

I am upgrading from a mingon so want to step up slightly

Edit-: I'll have a look at the zenith too

 

JP , how many doser less grinders have you used then? Usually if they clamour, your grind is too tight. Having run rr55, k10, k8 and endless Mythos recently, clumping is not something that has troubled me. If it clumps break it down! As soon as the water hits it the clump is gone anyway

Lots (and can we not put this sort of thing to bed - I own a speciality shop and have tried a large range of commercial equipment, as you'd expect). Take a look at your thread on Scott Rao - he's an advocate of dosers.

I just can't see an upside of doserless for home use. I mean, I don't need doserless in the shop and I'm doing up to 120 coffees a day. Much more than that and it would be a pain, but we'll always weigh doses first anyway, and there isn't a grinder out there at the moment that doses accurately enough to avoid that stage.

JP

 

and there isn't a grinder out there at the moment that doses accurately enough to avoid that stage.

JP

EK 43, compak r120, versalab to name three (what goes in comes out), agree that dosered is the way to go in the home though.....

 

but it is all about convenience for the home. If you are happy with what you produce, then the rest of the argument does not matter. I might know I can produce a technically superior shot with a doser, but could I actually care less?

 

Clumps contain (IMHO) a large amount of fines, so they can easily "destroy" the shot.

The EK 43 (at least mine) keeps about 4g retention inside, also the burrs are not really made for espresso, nor ristretto, at least not for darker roasts.

I don´t know about the r120, but if the burrs are also made for other brewing methods than espresso, it will be the same compromise like using the EK 43 (which doesn´t seem to be on the OP´s list anyway)

Light roast and longer shots good, dark roasts YIKES...

(man when I look at my tattoo... it still hurts)

 

I am sure your new grinder will be zero retention as well frank, as is Toms one, was not responding to OP as already covered that. Also think the disadvantages have been covered as well, apart from the fact that you really need weight of bean to get the best out of an on demand grinder, which will mean there will always be loads of coffee left in the grind path.

 

I never wanted to throw an unfinished and insane expensive product into the race (Mine) and I doubt that Tom is close to bringing out a product which has to run through much more processes than "just making it work" (i.e patent rights, CE certification and much more) BTW: you can use a weight like a tamper on top of the beans to avoid getting the "popcorning" inconsistency.

 

A decent Doser (or well nodded mazzer) will break up your clumps and leave you with a great distribution in the basket that requires very little prep. I would certainly get a Doser if I were looking in low end commercial range.

Good luck.

 

EK 43, compak r120, versalab to name three (what goes in comes out), agree that dosered is the way to go in the home though.....

That's a bit disingenuous re the EK43 - you have to weigh the doses beforehand.

JP

 

Having owned a couple of doserless myself (Mini E, Major E, K30) I must say I agree, they aren't very well suited for home use, you wast allot of coffee every time it has been sitting still for more then 15-20min. Most of these grinders have a 10-15g retention. That's a lot of coffee wast over the cause of one day, if you have more then one session.

And then we have to remember you have to purge more then what the retention nr. is as it's getting mixed with freshly grindeded coffee.

Although the k30 where a bliss to work on, and the shot where absolutely wonderfully, there where simply to much waste involved

but I have heard good things about the Mythos, my local speciality roaster says it has close to no retention, the same goes for ek-43 but these grinders are not exactly cheep.

the essential on demand are claiming to have close to no retention as well, but these claims are still unsupported by real life testing.

 

That's a bit disingenuous re the EK43 - you have to weigh the doses beforehand.

JP

The statement was about out put though, ok then the ugly but accurate in terms of dose, Azkoyen cappriccio, uses the same burrs as the k30.

 

Wow a lot of information.

I want to spend adequate money that I don't need to replace machine for a few years so I want to jump from the mingon to be substantial enough to validate the upgrade.

The EK43 just looks massive I need a smaller machine to fit in my kitchen.

 

Are we calling doserless a formerly dosered but now modded to be doserless? Are your Anfim's On Demand?

So we have possible types of grinder:

- on demand with timer - i.e. Zenith 65E

- on demand, no timer - i.e. EK43

- doserless - i.e Mazzer SJ with the doser removed and mods applied

- doser - i.e stock Mazzer SJ?

 

Hmm, I find this interesting as a thread; I hadn't even considered doser models either - I had understood (or assumed?!) that they were a massive faff for home use.

Be great if we could collect the best minds here, and create a "what grinder do I need?" type flowchart for all those people who want to answer this question; it's really hard to gather all the various thoughts and come up with a clear picture of what would be best I feel.

 

I recently switched from 10 years of owning deserves grinds, to a K10 pro Barista which has a loser. Now, Dave modded it for me so that the chamber swept cleanly, and the flap things were removed. I only kept it a couple of months. To make a cup, you had to:

grind some beans that you could only measure by eye

flap them into the basket

weigh the handle and basket then either remove grinds or go back and grind more then flap in. then after the shot was pulled, you had to get a brush and clean out the exit chute which had about 4 gms stuck in it. Sorry, but if you are suggesting that that is easier for a home owner than this routine on my mythos:

stick 250 gems into the hopper

push the pf onto the start button and dispense a perfect amount of coffee into the pf set on a timer

because of the mound effect, it is incredibly easy to tell by eye if you are within an acceptable limit

away you go

I do not believe you can tell the difference between 13.1 gms and 13.4 gems of coffee in the cup, so am quite happy with a little variance.

I had a k10 Fresh prior to this, and whilst that was a fantastic grinder, it had serious retention issues. For those who do not understand retention (Me included until recently) then any space left inside the burr chamber will eventually become packed with coffee grinds. The modern grinders seem to understand this and restrict the space. the Mythos has burrs at 45 degrees and the grinds drop off the burrs straight into the exit chute and in to the pf. So, perhaps non modern grinders are more of a faff. If you are after perfection, and I would query why you are when acceptable is an easier standard to maintain, then a dowered grinder maybe for you, if you do not mind a routine to have to perform. If you are an occasional drinker, say up to 5 a day, then why would you not buy a Versalab or HG One (money aside) as they will cope with everything you chuck at them!

 

Nicely put Dave (I'm getting used to your typos.

)

I agree whole heartedly. I have a couple of Pharos hand grinders, one modified, one stock. (Ought to sell the stock one but haven't got around to it.) I also have a Eureka MDL 74mm flat burr doser which I'm slowly cleaning and sorting out. However, it is quite obvious that it has retention issues while the modded Pharos retention is miniscule. A tenth of a gram perhaps. I've concluded that my next grinder will either be a used Mythos for all the reasons you state, or an HG1, or better still a powered equivalent, when somebody gets around to making one! (I've been doing a lot of doodling on the backs of envelopes and I just might go for it.) Not keen on the Versalab and the price rules it out anyway. Meanwhile, for the three to six drinks a day I'm making, the Pharos is fine. A bit like hard work but not too much.

So to put some numbers on this, a Pharos rivals much more expensive grinders and we like what we are getting in the cup. Therefore my next upgrade will be a double boiler machine because the single boiler I have now is a faff to steam with. (We drink all milky coffees.) I'm just trying to decide between an Expobar at around £1100 or one of the prettier ones at around £1800. I'm not skilled enough and don't have the palate or budget to make a Vesuvius worthwhile. I've considered a lever and might go there one day if my palate improves.

Not sure if this helps but you can see my thought process.

 

Hi Gary, i literally just upgraded from a mignon to a Mazzer Mini that i picked up from Hotmetal so maybe i can give you some of my experiences.

I liked the Mignon but found it very clumpy and grounds retention was a bit if an issue at times. It was a lot less messy than the Mazzer and a lot smaller but that is the only difference for me. I have switched to single dosing as i tend to have 2 beans on the go at any one time (one for espresso and one for milk based drinks).

Aas for on-demand, there is a timer on my mini but as hotmetal said it is a bit of guesswork and not hugely accurate. It depends how you want to do it. I haven't been able to do a proper mod of my grinder but i have attached a brush inside and this does a pretty good job of clearing away most of the grinds. Not sure i would want to use the mazzer for on demand.

I guess it depends on how you dose? Do you want to fill a basket and then use WDT or another distribition technique to get rid of excess grounds and prepare the coffee for tamping? If so then no worries but you might be grind 20g and discarding 2g every time. BUT if you want to measure the weight then its not as easy in my opinion. I don't like having to take the basket out of the portafilter and then weighing the output although you can still do this but again you are just guessing how much has been ground into the dosing chamber. I decided for the Mazzer to weight 17.5g of beans and single dose, i then use my brush mod to get as many of the grinds out as possible and also use a tool to get any leftover grinds in the chute that drops down to the dosing chamber. For me this is fine as i am aiming for a 17g basket and 0.5 extra just gives me a little leeway.

I guess you have to weigh up how much convenience you want. For me the Mazzer adds a few extra steps in my coffee making "ritual" but for me this worth it as i am getting more consistent shots!

Hopefully this afternoon or tomorrow i will be doing a side by side comparison between the 2 grinders and i will post the link here so you can see what you think.

I saw hot metal's Zenith and it was very nice and simple, just push a button and you're done!

I also single dosed on my Mignon too as it was easier for me get an exacting amount of coffee out of the grinder. Another reason is i keep my beans in the one way valve bag and then inside a vacuum sealed container that i can pump the air out of (vacuvin) so I can keep the beans fresher for longer.

 

Thanks big dan!

I'm now thinking I should skip the £500 S|H market and go straight for the £750

Just seems that's where you need to go to get 5 years down the line.