Santos Grinders

[mhoy]

I've searched the forum but there is little said about the Santos grinders. They seem to have been around for quite some time though. I've found a used one from an old coffee cafe but the owner can't determine the model number (and doesn't have a camera). I'll try and take a look at in in the next couple of days. It is not a current model.

Their main web site in France
http://www.santos.fr

Costco Canada seems to have them (claim to be quiet):
http://www.costco.ca/Browse/Product.aspx?Prodid=10287919&whse=BCCA&Ne=5000000+4000000&eCat=BCCA%7C20442%7C22227&N=4010042%205000014&Mo=12&No=0&Nr=P_CatalogName:BCCA&Ns=P_Price%7C1%7C%7CP_SignDesc1&lang=en-CA&Sp=C

Mark

[mandioca]

I have two of these, they work very well, with the exception of the path from the grinder to the doser being quite long. Mine are the model 6A and 6AC (chrome base) I believe, there is a sticker on the bottom indicating model number. Their american distributor is on the east coast, I can't remember where right now, but I have bought parts from them and they are nice to deal with. The grinder is stepped, with reasonable distances between steps.

[matthyx]

My father has a doserless n55 model at home: http://www.santos.fr/55.html

We use it everyday to grind a dozen espresso a day and it is really nice to use: grinds in 3sec, no clumping, no need to redistribute... it is much faster than the Cimbali Max I have at home and the taste is not so different. It is very silent since it only grinds 3sec and then you don't hear the twack twack thing of the doser. The only problem is its size, this baby is huge!

You can watch a video (not mine) here:
.
And yes, it is this fast!

[mathias]

Original burrs for No6 (and others I believe):

[mhoy]

The YouTube video is pretty impressive.

Mark

[orwa]

Other than being very expensive in my place, I would like to comment that this isn't a conventional grinder. It has a vertical auger that, possibly, regulates the feeding of whole beans into the planar, horizontally-seated burrs, while, possibly, breaking them upon entry. The burrs on the other hand feature a special design, similar to the DRM planar burr design but lacking the grooves (which I am still not certain of their function). I am quite excited to know that it's comparable in grind quality to the Max grinder.

[mandioca]

I am not sure they have any espresso grinder info on their site but here is the address if anyone needs parts.
http://www.miracleexclusives.com/ I think I finally found this by going to http://www.santos.fr/ and following the "where to buy" and then they emailed me.

[another_jim]

They have the distinction of using an augur to push the beans down, so their flat grinding burr doesn't need to waste space on a bean breaking area, similar to the DRM, M3, or Max.

I got emails about the grinder when the M3 thread was running. It is a potential Titan grinder, but afaik, there's no US rep.

[networkcrasher]

I saw this grinder a few months ago and would be very interested in acquiring one, but I've yet to find a USD price.

[mhoy]

I found a used Santos which I think is a Model #6 in San Jose, CA. They wanted $250 for the Santos and it seems to be in reasonable shape. Sorry, but I forgot to take my camera with me. They also had a used Cimbali Cadet which I pickup instead.

Looked a lot like this one:


They also had a Santo dispenser (although I can't imagine anyone reading this would want it).

=-=-
Mark

[IMAWriter]

The YouTube video is pretty impressive.

Mark

Wow....agreed!
Wish my SJ had that retro rock track as well