Hand grinder with Ditting burrs

Grinders are one of the keys to exceptional espresso. Discuss them here.
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Dieter01
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#1: Post by Dieter01 »

I bought an OE Pharos grinder a while back to use for drip coffee at work. I am sure it does well for espresso (I never tried) but it doesn't live up to my expectations for drip. It doesn't even come close to a good "cupping grinder" and I of course blame the burrs...

So... I see there are quite a few new hand grinders out there these days. Any of them come with Ditting burrs or similar? If not, has anyone replaced the original burrs with a Bunn / Ditting set?

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TomC
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#2: Post by TomC »

High quality Ditting or even Bunn burrs designed for great drip preparation are large and flat, not conical. The Pharos and most other old fashioned hand grinders are designed for conical shaped burrs targeting espresso preparation. I think it would take quite an engineering feat to modify a Pharos design to accept suitable sized flat burrs.

It might be a subjective opinion, but I think the high torque/rpm's of an electric grinder are more suited to flat burrs. With conical shaped burrs, the coffee's path is still mostly directed by gravity. With flat burrs, I'd imagine you'd have quite a bit of residual coffee backing up near the burrs, unless you mounted them on a horizontal shaft like the Bunn G1.
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bostonbuzz
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#3: Post by bostonbuzz »

Agree with the above. Flat burrs don't work well in a typical hand grinder design. That being said, horizontal axis flat burrs would work, and there are many many examples out there of this. They are typically the large cast iron hand grinders "Philadelphia" or something like that. These could likely be modified to accept any flat burrs. Philadelphia enterprise no. 3 double wheel coffee mill Not a ton of info on these grinders with awesome looking bulk burrs. I'd like to see a test of one in good shape against a bunn/ditting grinder.

The HG-one design could be modified to accept flat burrs on a horizontal and the result would likely be a simplified and cheaper product (no gears or 90 degree turn needed, and 1/2 the bearings).
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DJF
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#4: Post by DJF »

You would still need reduction gears I would have thought. Otherwise it would be like operating a chaff cutter :shock: .
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