The line between 'customer is king' and caring too much.

While browsing Trader Joe's for some Trois Pistoles and Chaucer's, I was able to overhear a conversation about wine that gave me a kick. A lady asked about the case of $2(3 round here) Chuck. She stated how her friends had all been recommending it and how she heard in a blind tasting of 300+ wines, it purportedly won the tasting.

The guy was working the coffee section and giving away samples while having this conversation. I continued browsing not really listening until the guy begins to raise his voice in indignation of her insistence that this cheap wine is actually good even though she had not tasted it. She was looking for a party wine selection which seemed to strike a nerve for the guy behind the counter. This guy begins relating how he makes 10/hr and would rather buy 5 solid wines in the $10 range than waste his time with this wine. He relates how every party he attends is serving this wine and how he finds it insulting. 'What, your guests are only worth $2?' he retorts as they debate. He relates how it is inferior and the taste just isn't there and the entire tasting sounds like a scam much like the tastings of Folgers coffee vs other roasts. He then begins a series of rants finishing with a flurry about how our consumption culture misses out on great tastes and somehow ties it to our taste for Dunkin Donuts coffee with lots of cream and sugar. Oddly entertaining as it ended with her walking away as another customer who missed the debate walked up asking for help getting two cases of the Chuck.

It is situations like this that lead me not to give many recommendations of any roasted coffee except what I have in hand presently (behind the bar) that I like. In coffee and unlike wine, roasts change bag to bag and green coffee ages(changes) over time. To keep some credibility, I hope to keep the scoring/reviewing off our site aside from a bit of commentary. It is well known around our circle, we have a poor opinion of coffee review and it's particularly flawed methodology in scoring espresso. I don't think the industry is develped enough for coffee critics like there are wine critics but that's my own opinion.

That aside, I am quite ambivalent about the particular $2 wine. The question is, snob or just passionate about the product? How far is too far when you care but you have to sell a product you may not believe in?

I don't have an absolute answer but I know I don't invest time in people who push me to acknowledge what I feel is inferior coffee. The guy who says, 'darker the better' may not be worth arguing with so I get them what they want and move them along. Those who really seem interested, I will engage in long conversations and invest myself in sharing what I love.

Huky Motor Replacement (aka "Let the Good Times Roll")

Based on the feedback of my recent roasts, I am convinced that the increased rpm (from 43 to 52) contributed positively. The roasts are more even and the heat transfer efficiency increased. The roaster response also increased slightly as the result of the higher rotation speed.

The next step in this experiment is to replace the stock motor with a higher rpm one and install a motor speed controller so the rotation speed can be profiled throughout the roast. After watching ebay for several weeks, I finally found a unit with the right rpm and torque that is affordable as well. I quickly snatched up the motor and eagerly waited for its arrival.

Here's a quick comparison of the new and stock motors (running at 24 VDC):

Stock motor:

Manufacturer: Shayang Ye Industrial Co.
Model#: RB400150-06202
Reduction ratio: 100:1
Rated speed: 54rpm
Rated torque: 6.1 lbf-in (97.2 oz-in)

New motor:

Manufacturer: Pittman
Model#: GM8723G567
Reduction ratio: 96:1
Rated speed: 86.5rpm
Rated continuous torque: 7.1 lbf-in (113.3 oz-in)

The new motor is a much heftier unit and the construction is very solid. It is also not cheap if purchased new. The NOS unit I got is very reasonably priced. As usual, trimming and fitting are necessary to get it go into existing housing. The current coupling sleeve was drilled to accept the circular shaft. I was initially concerned about slippage and mis-alignment, but so far it seemed to be fine.

I had originally planned to purchased a PWM (pulsed width modulation) motor control unit from ebay but after conversation with a very generous co-worker (Dr. Gizmo), he designed/installed a analog motor speed control for me. Below is his schematic of the circuit:
The new motor/controller setup allows me to vary the speed from 20 to 80 rpm. At speed below 20rpm, the tachometer no longer register the speed and I do not think such low speed is necessary. The maximum rpm dropped from 83 to 80 due to the voltage drop at the transistors. Noted that in actual use, the rpm will go up 1 to 2 more when the roaster is fully warmed up.

This latest mod puts the little huky a step closer to a "commercial" sample roaster that I desired. I am very excited to start experimenting with speed profiling and anxious to see if it can solve one of the remaining deficiencies of the roaster.

Gardening and coffee

I am out of Cambridge right now in Eastern TN to be exact. Not exactly on a coffee related mission right now therefore the lack of noise. What I have been doing involves a lot of painting, repairs, decking, flooring, and gardening.



Gardening doesn't have much to do with coffee but there is something of an analogy I was thinking about this morning while driving through the Heights. Every house had neatly trimmed shrubs and hedges, boxwood and spruce, all green and neatly cut green grass. Every house was different but every yard the same... from a distance. Hedges, decorative grasses, and the occasional Impatiens or Petunias by the mailbox. Yard after yard, the same, all green and tightly kept. Immaculately homogeneous.

Nothing wrong with that until I pulled up and looked over the garden project we had worked on earlier. Color, lots of color, heirloom Lilies and Gladiola's. In a way, that really summarizes how I often feel in coffee.

Some are focused on the trimmed hedges while I adore the blooming varietals.




To me, the best coffees have great descriptors or rather they are worthy of great description. The boring generic ones are not worthy of much beyond a generic description. I find that good coffees have a ledger full of adjectives and this is what makes it hard to relate to most regular coffees drinkers.

I get the luxury of knowing where to get good coffees and have been honored to sample a large variety of grades from many different roasters. Sometimes I get lucky and find great ones but I also spend a lot of time bemoaning the lack of access to the greatest ones.

On this trip I have only been able to taste a few home roasts so let me first apologize to all the coffees we wronged in learning how to roast. It took some time to get where we want to be but now there's a lot less bad and a lot more good. Locally for coffee, there is nothing readily available except for bottomless pots and fast food chains. I have been spared as I have been drinking a lot of tea and luckily Ben sent just enough home roast for a few vac pot brews.

Tachometer for Huky300

Bicycle tachometer modified to fit and measure drum rotation rpm. This is done in anticipation of future motor replacement (of a higher rpm unit) and addition of variable speed control. Goal is to have drum rotation as part of the profiling, in additional to gas and air settings.

I replaced the stock 20vdc adaptor with a 24vdc unit, which "restores" the stock motor to it's default speed. The "as-purchased" configuration down-rated the motor (reason unknown). Drum rotation increased from 44rpm to 52rpm.

Trial runs already showed differences in the profile. At first glance, roasts seemed to be much more even at the higher drum speed. How it affect the cup will be determined in the coming weeks...

Iced Tea

If you get iced tea in this area, you get something quite often resembling Lapsang Souchong(aka campfire tea). This is a byproduct of Mark at MEM dominating the majority of the market in Boston and his chosen 'iced tea blend' has been a slightly smoky black tea in it.

I hate it.

No disrespect to Mark's palate but it's horrible. When you get Iced Tea, you get unsweetened plain cold black tea, that's pretty much the New England way and that smoke note is painful. When you go South, at a certain point, you start getting an option. Sweet Tea.

Now, it's not bad when done with care and made fresh but I grew up with my mother constantly making note of the simple fact it's sweetened tea, not sweet tea. She was a teacher, go figure. I had long since broken my habit of putting sugar in beverages but I got a chuckle from this page on 'Sweet Tea'and the Sweet Tea Line.

Someone had the gall and sense to do a paper on iced tea and used it to define the Mason-Dixon line. What it means is that you are in the South when you reach the point that 'sweet tea' is being offered.

It doesn't mention anything about the Great Lakes region and the most disgusting raspberry iced tea phenomenon there but that would be a good followup.