I have been searching for an answer to a question that has been picking at me from the day my Max arrived home.

Has anyone thought of or managed to convert a Cimbali Junior Max to doserless?

It's not that I don't like my Max, I love it, got it practically brand new (for a song) so it's most probably going to be my last grinder ever. But I really don't like the doser at all.

I can't find much use for it with the small volume of shots (4 or 5 doubles a day) I pull on my Cimbali D/1 as I weigh and WDT every time.

I will eventually be changing the original switch and eliminating the doser flap ...
I'd love to be able to do away with the doser.

Comments?

Thanks in advance,

CIV



...split from La Cimbali Max Grinder - a first look by moderator...

That would be difficult at best. The doser is in integral part of the machine. If you remove it, bits are floating in the air. You would need to have a new front machined to fill in the huge gaping hole. I am sure it could be done, but it would take a lot of work IMHO. There is no after market bolt on part, you would have to fabricate it from scratch.

Hello Dave:

cannonfodder wrote:That would be difficult at best.

Yes, I don't see it being an easy task.

cannonfodder wrote:... integral part of the machine. If you remove it ...

Quite so.
But I think that the doser being an integral part of the Max is a characteristic that could be taken advantage of.

Back in early 2008 I exchanged a few mails with the late Brad Seaman (BradS) regarding his project for making a Mazzer Major doserless. It involved removing the whole doser and replacing it with a funnel (SS?). He had made a prototype he was very happy with and if I recall correctly, got to have a few working samples ready for sale.

In the case of the Cimbali Max, I think that the same general idea can be applied but by just removing the microswitch/flap and the rest of the doser mechanism internals while keeping the remaining parts in place.

Something like this:

Original drawing © cafeparts.com

By doing this, we would have an all OEM recipient with a lid for easy access to the exit chute and where the ground coffee will fall in exactly the same way as as it did before. It's also an advantage that, provided no parts get broken or lost, the doser could be eventually returned to it's original state. =-)

The real challenge lies in finding a way to get the ground coffee from the chamber's exit chute to the
doser container's exit hole as directly as possible, without clumping or grind retention.

A funnel fitted inside and with a shape that took full advantage of the kinetic properties of the grinds as they are expelled from the exit chute could be the answer.

Any comments will be welcome.
Thanks a lot for your imput.

Cheers,

CIV

EDIT: 02/09/10 changed drawing.

I tried similar to what you propose on a Macap MXK. I used a plastic bottle, heavy foil and tin for the funnels. In every case too much coffee gets sprayed onto the funnel walls and is a MAJOR PITA to get off the wall into the basket. In the end, the doser was reinstalled.

civ wrote:Has anyone thought of or managed to convert a Cimbali Junior Max to doserless?
...
I can't find much use for it with the small volume of shots (4 or 5 doubles a day) I pull on my Cimbali D/1 as I weigh and WDT every time.

If you are weighing your shots, you are grinding one shot at a time. In my three years of daily experience with this grinder, I have consistently found that failing to have a full column of beans above the burrs is certain to spoil the grind and the shot. This grinder was not designed for single dosing.

Marshall wrote:If you are weighing your shots, you are grinding one shot at a time. In my three years of daily experience with this grinder, I have consistently found that failing to have a full column of beans above the burrs is certain to spoil the grind and the shot. This grinder was not designed for single dosing.

An alternative explanation of his post would be that he weighs the grinds that come out of the chute from the doser. Why one would need to use the WDT with the Cimbali Max grinder is beyond me; one of the advantages of a Titan type grinder is that extra fussiness in basket preparation is unnecessary.

For what it is worth, I like the doser on my my Maxs, and find that it works fine for grinding per shot. I would however remove the flap and eliminate the autodosing. This enables using a chop stix to clean out the discharge chute each time, salvaging a lot of coffee for use in the shot, plus removing coffee that would become stale and end up in the next shot, if this is not done.

ken

Ken Fox wrote:Why one would need to use the WDT with the Cimbali Max grinder is beyond me; one of the advantages of a Titan type grinder is that extra fussiness in basket preparation is unnecessary.

+1

Hello:

Marshall wrote:... found that failing to have a full column of beans above the burrs is certain to spoil the grind ...

I'm quite sure you are right.
But I have not come to that part yet.

I am also planning to take the hopper off and replace it with a 55 mm dia. tube which will be loaded with a certain amount of beans and weighed down with a plunger of sorts. The plunger will move under it's own weight and have a recess in the end to accomodate the spinning nut so that by the time the borders of the plunger's end touch the upper carrier, all the beans will have been pushed into the burrs.

The tube will go through a flat piece of metal or plastic which would be exactly like the bottom part of the hopper and will screw in place the same way the hopper does.

I think it has a good chance of working well.

Ken Fox wrote:... he weighs the grinds that come out of the chute from the doser.

Yes, that is what I do.

Ken Fox wrote:Why one would need to use the WDT with the Cimbali Max grinder is beyond me ...

That's because I am not using it at the moment, the main motives being the hopper and the doser.
I pull my shots on the Cimbali Junior D/1 using the same KyM hand grinder I use when I fire up my 1970's Pavoni EP (AR made).

Ken Fox wrote:... advantages of a Titan type grinder is that extra fussiness in basket preparation is unnecessary.

Indeed.
That's why I was so happy to find out it was a Max when I purchased it.

Ken Fox wrote:... remove the flap and eliminate the autodosing.
ken

Yes.
That's part of the whole deal.

Thanks a lot for your input.

Cheers,

CIV

civ wrote:"... he weighs the grinds that come out of the chute from the doser."

Yes, that is what I do.

How does that work exactly? How much excess do you wind up throwing out?

Marshall wrote:How does that work exactly? How much excess do you wind up throwing out?

Hi Marshall,

I can't tell you how he does it, but I can tell you how I do it.

Like anything you do over and over again, you develop a sense of how long to leave the grinder on. I always intentionally grind less than I plan to use initially, to reduce potential waste. I use a chop stick to clean out the chute leading into the doser, then discharge the coffee I have ground into a ramekin, which I weigh (I've preweighed the empty ramekin and used the "TARE" function on my cheap scale, so then I am just weighing the difference, e.g. the coffee).

Let's say I have ground 12.4g, but I wanted to grind 14.5. I have a sense of how long to pulse the grinder on to get 0.5, 1.0, or ~2.0g, which I then do to make up what is missing. I don't usually get the amount exactly, but I can usually keep the potential waste down to a gram or less. If the wastage is more than a few tenths of a gram, and if I anticipate using the same coffee to make a shot within the next few hours, I'll put those grinds back in the doser and use them on my upcoming shot. If not, I toss them.

ken