Hand (grinder) Jive - a photo essay - Page 12

[farmroast]

Dienes 658 inside

[peacecup]

I hope that Dienes works as good as it looks. One of the finest I've seen. I have a cherrywood model as well and they're special. From the writing style on the label I'd say its newer - not older than the 40's and maybe 50-60's. The older ones I've seen have a different font, and usually don't say Mokka. Sometimes the sellers on ebay.de mention ages, though I'm not sure how accurate they are.

My grinders are all on a ship somewhere on the N. Atlantic, and I can tell you I miss them. There was some bantering lately on how well these hand grinders really work, and I've thrown out a challenge to all the TITANS to do some blind taste testing against a Dienes or comparable but so far no takers. Regardless, somehow whining electric motors and silent lever machines seem mismatched to me....

PC

[peacecup]

The older-style font and no Mokka:
http://cgi.ebay.com/ws/eBayISAPI....&item=190225011164





Maybe the prewar version?

PC

[GB]

Wow, that grinder appears to be in mint condition. How are the bearings and burrs etc? Also great info from peacecup. Thanks to both of you. BTW what type of fasteners are in the top? They appear to be either square or philips drive which I think is rather unusual. If so maybe a search on when they were in common use in the country of origin may yield clues to the age of the grinder.

Cheers
Geoffrey

[farmroast]

My guess is early 50s. PC, Like your Dienes papers. What is the info on the grinder that is on the second page from the last, right side, bottom grinder? Looks similar. Here is a picture of the guts after cleaning.
Ed

[peacecup]

I just have the images you see - not the actual papers. Its difficult to see, but these catalogs show the older style font. The older looking one is pre-war (1929?), not sure about the one with orange, but it has the older font and no mokka label. Interesting to note that yours has the flat handle like the catalog, whereas the one I had like yours (some pages back on this thread) had a curved handle, common to the later models.

Your burrs look to be in good shape, so hopefully they'll have years of use left.

PC

[JB130]

Did anyone see this?
A $1500 hand grinder!

[orphanespresso]

I think the Cherry wood Dienes is a pre war model (WWII that is) due to 3 different factors. first is the heavy chrome strap across the top, which seems common to pre war Zass and Dienes, as well as other less known makes. The West German models went with the formed top in most cases and stopped the heavy top strap. The strap makes a good solid top bearing and is not prone to flexing as the formed metal tops are. Second is the bottom adjustment bearing mechanism. The cup that fits into the hole in the bottom of the burr is another common pre war approach to burr tightening. After the war, it seems that a ball bearing inside the burr bearing hole is the common design, and an improvement. You can put a small dab of basically any kind of thick grease in the hole on assembly (all of our restorations have old caked grease in there to begin with), the grease is pretty much sealed off from any coffee grinds when it is all assembled and tightened. this makes it easy to tighten it for the Finest grinding. Third is the overall build quality, in that, the wood is heavier and thicker, likely 3/4 or even an inch thick, making the grinder feel pretty heavy. Many post war grinders are made of much thinner wood, and also use plywood in many areas instead of solid wood. These observations are from restoring about 50 grinders, so far, with a lot of Dienes, KYM, Zass, Trosser, Castle, Leinbroek's, and more under my belt.

There are exceptions to the above first two reasons, as the companies made a wide range of quality throughout the years with, from my observation, overlapping designs.

Your Dienes is a high end mill due to the wood, chrome strap and general fit and finish. Very nice. Top of the line.

How does it grind?

Peacecup, good to know you are still among the living, and still watching HB. It is because of you that we have sold out electric espresso grinders and have gotten bitten by the hand grinder bug. Also we got a SAMA export, but it has not replaced the Conti Comocafe and Caravel from the espresso service bay.
doug and Barb

[GB]

Very interesting and informative response from Doug and Barb - thanks. In my earlier post I mentioned that maybe the uncommon type top screws were a possible indication of the history of this grinder (assuming they have not been replaced at some later date). I am not certain of this but I thought that in the U.S. philips head screws were first used in the Auto industry in 1939 and came into common use in Europe much later? Maybe D & B can comment from their experience with so many grinders.

Congratulations to D&B on their purchase of the SAMA, I look forward to hearing of their experiences with it. And BTW I still intend to purchase one of your grinders but unfortunately cannot at present.

Geoffrey

[farmroast]

How does it grind?

I plan on comparing the grinds to my 2007 Mazzer Major in the next couple days. Thanks for all your info.! It is an aggressive grinder but still quite smooth. I very impressed with how well these hand mills grind. You can actually feel the shaving occurring. I did spend a bit of time adjusting the centering of the lower burr collar and appears it does make a difference with a fine grind. Used some Dow Corning 111 lube on the fixed bearing. Has anyone seen the book "Antique Coffee Grinders" by Michael White and Judith Sivonda? Does it give info on function and identification/dating or more for the Knick Knack shelf collectors.
Ed

[prof_stack]

Great looking Pede grinder above!

Avert your eyes for these photos, before cleaning, of the grinder I'm currently using. It says "Made in Western Germany" on the bottom. I don't know who made this grinder. I got it cheap off ebay and haven't used the Trosser since this one went on the counter next to the Gaggia Factory.



The blades are very sharp and it takes more turns to grind 14g of beans than the Trosser I used before. Finer grind than the Trosser. It has a type of step-adjuster, but I can put the tab in-between the steps and it stays there (unlike some newer Zass...). Remember that all my grinders have seen better days.



Oh yeah, it looks better these days after a good cleaning... Being cleaner doesn't change the coffee flavor, though.

Here is a shot of the bottom.

[peacecup]

J-axe wrote:

I think the Cherry wood Dienes is a pre war model (WWII that is)

At some point Dienes changed fonts and added the Mokka to their label. A good guess is that this occurred post-war, but its just a guess. All of the Deines' I've owned have been Mokkas, and they've all said W. Germany. If anyone have a Mokka that says other than W. Germany that would help solve the question.

The heavy strap was phased out at some point. Coincidentally, the only Dienes I ever tried that didn't work well was a strap model. I'm not sure that the strap reduces flexing more than the dome, and in fact, would seem to allow flexing more in the perpendicular direction. The ones I have with good solid domes are pretty well centered and steady. I do have a low-end, flat-topped hopper Dienes that has more play in it. It grinds very well anyway.

Dienes also produced mills in Holland I think, under the PeDe label. The blue PeDe that went up against the Titans is Dutch, and older, maybe pre war. It has a flat handle (but machined in a S shape) with PeDe (not Dienes) etched into it. Its also a dome top, and grinds to a fine powder, some 60 years after it was made. right now it should be in port, and waiting to speed its way home to me. I am sick of preground moka pot coffee!

[peacecup]

A pair of previously-owned grinders next to the blue Pede. Note the flat, S-shaped handle on ol' blue, vs. the offset on the newer Dienes and Trosser knee mills:

[farmroast]

Did a google search on Peter Dienes and it turns out he is somewhat famous in the plastics history world as one of the first to use Bakelite. Here a picture of a PE De Bakelite grinder 1924.

[farmroast]

My cherry wood PE De 658(shown earlier) has the early plastic drawer and I had to get another to compare. It is an older model "Solida" 638? with the older font and the drawer is Bakelite.


Cleaned and refinished parts

Done

[peacecup]

I have yet to see a plastic drawer that was not warped - I think they are another indication of post-war production, but this is just a guess. Is the drawer yellow? I always meant to make a wooden one for mine, but ended up passing that grinder on to someone else - the shipping container was only so big!

Your newest one must be 20's or 30's - how does it grind? The blue PeDe I have also has a bakelite drawer.

[farmroast]

The drawer on my first grinder is the yellowish color thermo-plastic and is/was warped. I heated it up and was able to reshape it pretty well. The thermo-set bakelite drawer on the second grinder is black and in great shape. I haven't ground any coffee through the older grinder. It is all disassembled to be cleaned and refinished first.
farm

[farmroast]

Found a web site in France with a nice collection P. Dienes/PeDe grinders. Lots of Pe De plaques too.
Ed
http://www.dienes.fr/moulin/index.htm

[kahvedelisi]

Found this at a Turkish auction site for $2500!! (Ottoman Coffee mill, made of brass, wood, ivory and engraved bone it says)

[peacecup]

Found a web site in France with a nice collection P. Dienes/PeDe grinders. Lots of Pe De plaques too.
Ed
http://www.dienes.fr/moulin/index.htm

I'm surprised I never saw that one - I've done a little web searching for PeDe. I'm not much of a collector type, I don't like shelves full of things about the place. But each PeDe has so much character that its easy to end up with several. Knowing that they are out of production doesn't help - one needs to be sure that the espresso needs for the next ~50 years are covered. That means at least two PeDe's - one for daily use and one as a backup. Then theres the office, vacation home.....I've parted with five PeDe's over the past couple of years (plus a pair of DeVe's), and never without a twinge of regret. I like to think that each one is being loved....or at least used. I think my current tally is still four or five. Well, I'm just across the pond from Germany, so maybe I'll get lucky and get another sometime.

PC