I'm stunned. Absolutely and completely stunned.

First, the coffee: Counter Culture Konga Ethiopia, by looks a C+ to Full City roast. Splits are golden, a bit puffed, beans are smoothing out. 11 days past roast. Also, a DP Sidamo that I keep on hand as a control coffee, roasted to FC+ using "equal measures" profile, stopped just before 2C.

Next, the machine: 1991 49mm Maximatic, Fluid-o-Tech pump. Pressurestat cycling at roughly 0.8 BAR. MCaL baskets.

The procedure: Flush and go. 3 seconds is hot. 4-5 seconds is medium. 6-7 seconds is cool. The Sidamo likes medium, as does the Konga.

I've had varying degrees of success with this machine when mated to the SJ. Changing between 2-3 coffees per week, even with the mods, were troublesome but achievable For a DP Sidamo that I worked on, the grind setting was F1.5 (i.e. one and a half notches counterclockwise from "start here" arrow, toward the "Fine" direction) with a 15.5g dose to produce a nice, fruity shot. Switch to C0.5 (i.e. half notch clockwise, toward the "Coarse" direction, from "start here" arrow) for a Burundi, 16.5g dose. Upon returning to the Sidamo later that day, I'd end up somewhere between F1 and F2.5 with the same dose to produce a similar tasting shot. Even with this, I'd still see donuts, occasional spritzes, and rare meltdowns. It felt like 1 of 3 shots was acceptable.

Pulling the Konga at 16g using SJ and Maxi resulted in an over the top, bright, almost tear-inducing acidity. The grind settings for Konga and the other Sidamo were the same. I couldn't take it, and it was certainly worse than the shot I had at Caffe Streets last week; the one that convinced me to buy and try the Konga. After trying a few different doses and grind settings, all with the goal of reducing flow, I couldn't tame it. Worse, the 1 in 3 ratio reared its head and made it all the more difficult.

Enter the K10. After dialing in 2 shots on the Sidamo, I switched to the Konga. Bam! 16g in, 15.9g out. No need to nutate or WDT. Just level, light tamp, flush, load and go. I watched, transfixed, as the flow started just as I expected. Bullseye. Nice tiger striping. Then, the smell. Momentarily, I was brought back to the cafe. Could it taste as good as it smelled?

yes. I could feel a grin creeping across my face.

OK. Lightning struck. Can it happen again? Switch to Sidamo. Same rhythm. 15.5g in, 15.4g out. Lock. Load. Pull. Drink. Mmmmm... this is exactly what I remembered. That grin? she's back and she brought a friend.

Switching back, 16g in, 16g out. Hmm... I'll live with a 0.1g variance from a $10 scale. Lock. Load. Pull. Drink. Indeed, lightning struck twice.

I'm a jazz geek. To me, this was like Stan Getz and Lester Young trading bars.

This reinforces a couple of opinions that I've been building:

1) The Super Jolly is a fantastic single dose grinder, as long as you don't switch coffees often.
2) The Maximatic (at least, mine) is finicky, but capable of great feats. Performs best when mated with a capable grinder.

I've got some Bonko resting and will see how it performs. Good times...

Switch to Sidamo. Same rhythm. 15.5g in, 15.4g out. Lock. Load. Pull. Drink. Mmmmm...

this is exactly what I love about the K10. consistently awesome shots with the agility to change beans on a whim. good stuff!

~j

It's an interesting comparison. The 64mm flat and the 68mm conical are industry standard grinders; and Italians know espresso well enough so that industry standard gear are fairly sure bets.

My belief is that the SJ can be dialed in to perfection, but that it takes time and skill, and that it is different every day and for every coffee. The 68s are idiot proof for one coffee, and a blessing for anyone using multiple blends.

Perhaps the easiness of pulling shots with a large conical helps when making blends on the grinder. For example, if a coffee is too bright, it is possible add some Brazilian beans on the fly to bring down the brightness. With other grinders, this would mess up the timing and the shot. It also helps to create blends. For example, prepare 4 roast batches and then create the blend by comparing individually blended shots. It saves on beans doing it this way, plus if the flavor changes, you could modify the proportion of beans on the fly.

Cheers

Hi Sherman,

Regarding your reply from this post:

Sherman wrote:Out of curiosity, which grinder did you try, and how were you testing it?

Thought I'd post thoughts here, in more relevant thread.

I tried the K10 Pro for a few days... I think it's close to your comparison -- my grinder is MiniE, but has SJ burrs.

First day I was prepped and ground ~5lbs to break in the burrs...

I was trying to use in single dose mode, but I didn't like how long it took me to clean out chute, and worst of all, even after many motor bumps, scraping, output was not consistent.... put 14.2g in... get anywhere from 13.5g to 14.5 out.... don't know where it was getting stuck. I cleaned it, etc... didn't help. I'm sure something wrong with me or it, since all reports I read here people have consistent output. MiniE is very accurate, losing .1-.2g from what I put in (so I don't weigh after grinding anymore)... I also like dosing using the funnel design much better.

Taste wise, I guess I had expectation that it'll deliver more consistency and easier time to nail a shot... but I didn't feel that was the case. Nothing scientific here... and I didn't test for long before deciding to return it. I'm sure it's a much better grinder in the hands of someone else, but I don't miss the beast one bit -- I love my MiniE even more now, and going to give it a bit more time to see if I can figure out what makes it click.... with the Scace I'm getting tomorrow, I hope it can shed some light on my routine.... and more importantly I think my focus lately on consistency using real time shot weighing is helping a lot.

Glad to hear it's happy days, Sherman.

I think people who like bright single origins are the most likely to appreciate the big conicals, since they really open out the acidity.

Not sure if any of you are interested but I converted my Wega branded K10 conic to doserless and did some detailed grind retention tests before and after.

Pictures and details are here Doserless Conversion Wega rebranded Compak K10 WIP .

Regarding consistency, I've found that adding a bit of electrical tape to both the lower (sweeps grounds out of the doser) and upper (sweeps grounds off the top of the exit chute) vanes is a necessary modification. Once completed, consistency improves significantly. This assumes that you're sweeping/bumping the chute 2-4x as well.

If you move the white nylon washer from above the block off plate (factory position) to below the plate the upper sweeper will sweep the plate clean with no tape mod required. I applied sticky back velcro to every other vane of the adjustable portion of the bottom sweeper. Much easier to install then tape on the bottom vanes.