Well I am certainly a hobbyist and not as knowledgeable as many so am having difficulty getting comfortable with this roaster. I bought it used. Needed a good cleanup which I did so that the airflow would be decent and the drum would rotate freely. Changed the element too. Anyway the previous owner indicated that he would warm the roaster , set it to 180 degrees with the vent open and then just roast based on colour. Guess that works but I found the roasts took over 20 minutes. Thought it was too long. When I set it higher I would get lots of scorching and uneven roasts. So I started playing around with drop temperatures. Most recent setting as warm up machine to 220 degrees with vent open 1/4. Drop the beans and set the machine at 180 degrees. Just as drying phase is ending and beans are nearly turning yellow I open the vent to 1/2. At first crack I open to 3/4. With that I can get FC at around 16 minutes or less.

I do have a bean thermocouple placed through the bolt hole in the door and an ET as well. Truly though at this point the appearance, smell and sounds seem to reflect the roast characteristics as much as the temp. That is how rudimentary my roasting is now. With the HotTop I had a better fee for the roast although I prefer the 800 gm batch size over the 250 gm in the HotTop.

Does anyoone have any suggestions for me?

Please come and join us at the:
Toper Cafemino Roaster Owners Group on Facebook