It doesn't fall down at all. You need to check that the grinder has been set up correctly when it was made.
https://www.coffeeforums.co.uk/topic/49058-how-to-check-any-sage-grinder/?do=embed
You have flexibility on the pressure you brew at, the time the shot takes and the amount that comes out. Those on there own are enough to take care of having a grinder with steps. The other one is small variations in the quantity of beans used. That's the tricky one. My favourite way to use the machine was to use the razor while tuning for a bean as I was using the hopper and timer and each time the grinder is adjusted the quantity that comes out changes so the timer was set to give a little too high a dose. Then comes the problem of finally adjusting the timer. It takes really small adjustments. The other problem is that the weight out wont remain constant for ever. In my experience if the same bean is always used several tiny adjustments will be needed in the first week and then the need tails off but is still needed now and again. If the grinder is cleaned out it can take much longer to settle down. Some people just accept the variation and adjust shot time to suite. A volumetric machine tends to do that anyway.
This is why a lot of people weigh beans in including me. There is no need to do anything to these grinders to use them this way. Just empty the hopper and run the grinder until nothing come out. Then weigh a dose of beans and grind them. Check what comes out. The usual problem initially and when the setting is changed is that it will be a touch light. Add a few more beans to make that up. It may just be one or two or accept some variation. Having checked loads of doses I had +/- 0.1g. It's down to bits of beans staying or not staying on top of the burrs. Hoover those out and the dose will be a little less than what went in until they build up again. There is also some permanent retention in the grinder. Clean that out and it will take much longer to settle down so it's best left unless the grinder starts choking up and has to be cleaned. If a different bean is used there will be a little carry over from the previous one. I just drank what came out. If you were silly enough to run vanilla flavoured beans through it you would notice the carry over. Others are pretty subtle. Another option is to just run say 25g of the new bean through it and throw them away.
When a hopper is used must waste X grams of grinds after an over night stand as the grinds will be stale. If so the same must be done if some one makes one in the morning and one in the evening. Why not try wasting and not wasting to find out?
Must have a minimum weight of beans in a hopper. Pretty true on flat burr grinders. From my use Sage ones don't much care until it gets very very low.
Beans go stale in hoppers. In practice there isn't much difference to keeping them in a vented bean can. A lot depends on how long they are in there just as it does just about any way they are stored apart from freezing.
Many of the problems in this area are down to the web and Sage's instructions for brewing aren't much help. If people don't meet them they say oh I'm over or under extracted. That can only be detected via taste not some rule. A fairly common comment on here when some one says that a bean is bitter is to grind a little finer and usually it will sweeten. Strange as that increases extraction. If time is fixed it also reduces the output
so if they stick with it they have under extracted so they stick with a ratio and extend time. People weigh out and vary time to achieve a ratio. You might be surprised how hard it is to set an exact ratio purely via the grinder setting on any grinder even the Niche is a bit tricky where I need to use it. I don't work that way and use a fixed button press. I didn't realise how much the BE was helping with that until I started using timed shots on the DB. Using a mazzer I had to allow time to vary by at least 5secs because that was the smallest adjustment I could make and that could be hit and miss.
Then ratio. Sage manuals mention one if ml is viewed as grams. Around 3 for the single and a little higher for the double because as they say the extraction can tend to be more efficient on larger baskets.
I found overloading the single a
little fixed that on the BE. Then there are commercial baskets. 2 for doubles one holds 12 and the other 14g. 12 is a ratio of 5. I've never found a fresh roasted origin bean that needs to go that high. Plenty that need over 2. The aim is to achieve a balanced flavour and also one that suites the drinker. Beans vary so people are bound to find some that they don't like what ever they do with them. There is a lot of scope in that though and without going through the changes there is no way of knowing if the bean will ever suite the drinker.
Someone said a while ago that coffee brewing is getting too complicated. Blame the web. My impression is people leap in having read this and that and do all sorts without really knowing what effect they have or if they are needed. The same person all so said what about 40sec brews, something some do all of the time. Others do strange things with Sage DB's that make a nonsense of the usual rules. You might say it's all a matter of taste - it all is really.
LOL No point in posting this either as nothing will change.
John
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