peacecup wrote:Not with a truly scientific approach. You just need a large, randomly-selected sample of tasters from your target population, and the aforementioned NSF grant. Science has it's limitations, but I don't think the answer to this question exceeds them...

One of the big problems with this whole discussion, in fact, is who is the the target population? Most of the "experts" are just that - experts. They have the experience and skills to appreciate the differences between grinders. If you scientifically tested, and asked them "which grinder makes the best shot" you might get a different response than if you chose 100 newbies, 100 random tasters off the sidewalk, etc.

If one wishes for proof that large segments of the population may have differently-developed appreciations of taste there's McDonalds and Starbucks...a PizzaHut just opened in my town here and it is constantly packed full, while the neighboring family-owned pizza shops languish. Does PizzaHut make the best pizza?

But the consensus has been that the target audience at HB is the serious hobbyist - those with enough interest to take their knowledge and skills to the level that will allow them to appreciate the differences among different equipment, e.g. large and small conicals. Even within this target audience, however, a valid scientific study would be possible given adequate resources. Would such a study yield different results than does the current "expert opinion" approach?

Very well said!

Some have concluded that larger burrs typically produce better results than smaller burrs. But it could be that the relevant metric is grams ground per square cm of burr per second. Ie, related to how fast heat is produced and carried away. If that's the case, then there are several ways to make smaller burrs outperform larger ones.

> "which grinder makes the best shot" you might get a different response than if you chose 100 newbies...

And you would get a different response depending on the coffee, roast and brewing parameters used.

Yes it does in my gerneral experience and in relative terms of course I find larger burrs produce grinds that generally make grinds from smaller burrs seem like crap. I hope that is a simple enough explantion.

Not to say smaller burrs make crap they make good tastes but generally in no uncertain terms they do not hold up against larger burrs. I find smaller burrs tend to produce more sharpness (translation in more direct terms bitterness echhh ! and less flavors)

I remember back in the old days when Silvia and Rocky WERE THE ONLY ECONOMICAL ALTERNATIVES for people who wanted a home setup that made passable espresso (not great espresso just passable.) For the prices back then it was not a bad deal at all.

This was before espresso machine and grinder manufacturers got the message that the home crowd was evolving (getting educated both taste wise and equipment wise) past the mediocre garbage that was being marketed to them (those cheap plastic machines which ran cool and had wide wild variations in terperature and garbage grinders that turned coffee into hot sawdust.)

Now we have home double boilers with temperature control, adjustable pressure (even commercial machines back then didn't have adjustable temp controlers) and some good hand crank grinders (Please make more Pharos grinders Mr. Garrot) as well as other commercial grinders that were once not really marketed with home users in mind not to mention the used commercial grinders that educated espresso drinkers know are better buys.

In fact it was the home amatuers that set the commercial industry straight. Now temperature control and pressure profiling are considered standard among many top end commercial coffee shops.

Silvia and Rocky (boy has the price on them gone up due to hype and maybe to be fair building costs) are no longer the value they once were.

I don't need any blind taste tests to know that I like larger burrs better whether flat or connical.
There are of course exceptions but that is what they are exceptions meaning far and few smaller burr grinders can match their larger burr counter parts.

This is not a condemnation of smaller burrs. Good ones generally make good coffee but rather a blunt comparison to those larger commercial burrs also unless you are running a busy coffee shop pulling shot after shot or with the exception of those cheap weed wacker whirly bird propeller grinders (they do have their uses though not for coffee) and grinders with zero cutting edges (coffee bean crushers why not just use a hammer) that can make anything powdery, hot and toasty heat is not an issue.

Oh please make some more Pharo grinders now that they are few I am missing them. My coworker borrowed mine along with my Sama export and I know he is now spoiled by it's output. He wants to buy a Pharos but good luck. I just missed the last batch (I was going to grab one for him)

opother wrote:Yes it does in my gerneral experience and in relative terms of course I find larger burrs produce grinds that generally make grinds from smaller burrs seem like crap. I hope that is a simple enough explantion....

...I don't need any blind taste tests to know that I like larger burrs better whether flat or connical.

And I can guarantee you that it is in my own hands to make you prefere smaller burrs in a better aligned grinder than bigger burrs in a less accurate aligned grinder at any blind test, incl. measuring TDS + visual extraction.

The bigger the burrs the more tricky the alignment because radial play will show up more compared to smaller burrs.
So 68mm flat vs 83mm flat will not make a difference in general.
Mostly the built quality of grinders with bigger burrs is just better and they are more expencive, but the grind quality and consistency does not correlate just with the burr size.

RapidCoffee wrote:My Mazzer Major (83mm flat burr) produced more consistent, less clumpy grinds than my Super Jolly (64mm flat burrs).

Also clumpy grind does not correlate with burr size.
There are other factors relevant like the neutralizing / discharging of the ions due to triboelectric / static.
A faster grind speed also has an effect to triboelectric and the amount of produced fines.
So I would never say that your taste is fooling you, just there are other factors involved and not just a difference in burr size.

I think Frank is making a good point, however.

My Lido2 has extremely impressive alignment and I've posted that I can't quite distinguish between it and my Pharos. Maybe I can or can't if I do it blind (I haven't tried) and maybe I prefer or don't prefer one or the other, but the point remains that the smaller 40mm burrs with killer alignment makes excellent espresso. Perhaps my palate isn't sophisticated enough yet to distinguish the differences, and I don't want to generalize too much, but I do think that alignment here is key.

Im familiar with all of those posts. However, I'm not comparing the lido1 and Pharos but the lido 2. Having all three, the lido 1 alignment is nowhere near as good as the lido2.