I'm about 4 months in to owning an HG One 2014, bought new, with the 83mm aftermarket TiN burrs. I reckon it's had 10 kilos through it, plus four boxes of minute rice to season the burrs.

I was hoping that by now it would be broken in, but from discussions with Craig, he says it can take up to 100kg to season titan burrs. Jeez! I figured I was pretty much there, given that it now takes only about 22 turns to grind 16.5g of beans.

Anyway, I have a consistent routine that doesn't produce spritzers now, but it's a LOT of steps as follows:

1) RDT beans into HG One
2) Grind into paper cup
3) Stir contents of paper cup with miniwhisk
4) Pour from paper cup into basket with OE funnel, turning basket as I pour so that the grinds go right into the corner of the basket all the way around
5) Insert into PF on stand and tamp (I see no difference from a tamp, a staub tamp, a nutating tamp)

If I skip any of these steps, my Cremina spritzes a lot, and the pulls are off-center or have serious channeling. If I religiously adhere to the above steps, I usually get a good extraction. I've been using this routine for about a month now, after 3 months of serious pain.

Final thing to add is that the harder the beans are to grind, the more sensitive the routine becomes. WIth dark roasted beans, I can relax and there's little risk of a bad extraction, but with light roasted beans I have to really pay attention or the machine punishes me!

I'd welcome any input or advice on my processes.

Thanks,

Simon

If you are using fresh roasted beans, I have to wonder if there is an alignment problem.
I have the exact same grinder and same burrset. Probably ran 1/2 box of rice through it and have had good shots right from the start.
Mainly been using fresh beans from Bodka, then Red Bird that I store in mason jars in the freezer.
Had been doing weigh, RDT, grind into blind tumbler, stir a bit, dump to PF, level, nutate, tamp.
Recently switched to: weigh, RDT, grind directly into PF, stir a bit, level (if needed), nutate, tamp.

A quickie with alignment. Grind and remove the funnel, all sides should be similarly coated with coffee (ie if its all on the right, you might have an issue to look into).

I'm trying to cut down on my steps as well. I grind into a 5oz glass tumbler and pour that into the portafilter with a couple stirs with the glass rod. I then try to distribute with the glass rod (i'm looking for a glass container with a spout that I can use to pour as I'd rather have a mound and nutate).

I made a wooden pour over holder but it doesn't get used because I like espresso and my SO likes the chemex. Maybe I'll put a funnel with a skinny neck in there and try to pour the portafilter that way. So I don't need to wdt and don't need to deal with trying to level after its poured in using the current vessel.

Last summer I bought a lightly used HG-One 2014 model (uncoated 83mm Mazzer burr set) that had 80lbs of beans ground through it by the previous & original owner. I can't tell you, based upon taste alone, how many times I nearly moved it downstream during the first month or two; flavor in the cup was compressed, tough to balance and pale in comparison to my well seasoned Pharos I had been using for daily grind duty.

I assumed 80lbs would have been enough but assuming the PO bean weight was accurate I was well north of 100lbs before the taste in the cup finally blossomed and settled in. Generally, without exception but admittedly I do need to pay a little more attention to the grind prep with lighter roasts before it gets into the basket, I have zero issues today with spritzing/channeling. I am fairly aggressive with WDT, grinding into a bowl and use a spoon to stir/turn the beans over. And even in our coastal sometimes very humid climate RDT is mandatory.

The entire burr break in process is still a mystery to me. Whereas with any other sharp edge device, chef's knives, pocket knives, router bits, saw blades, drill bits, etc., etc., the best cutting is from the first cuts after sharpening and honing.

If one remove the "cone" from the Hg One and put a sheet of clean white paper on the base and then grind a normal amount of beans a ring of ground coffee will be on the paper. This ring should be rather uniform all the way around. If one have access to any kind of microscope one can examine the appearance of the ground coffee at different points on the ring. It should not show obvious particle size variation at different points around the ring.

My Hg One that arrived 7 July 2014, has the TiN burrs. It requires about 21 turns to grind 18 grams at this point.

Thanks guys for all your input.

I tried grinding onto a piece of photocopier paper, and I don't think I have an alignment problem. There WAS some asymmetry to the way the grounds fell, but I think this was because the vertical part of the HG One was coated in grounds. I do have static, even with RDT.

Given spressomon's experience, albeit with Mazzer burrs, perhaps Craig is right that I need more seasoning of the burrs. At this price point, with this amount of time passed, I'm frustrated that it's not working better than it is, but I'll keep the faith for a few more months and see where that gets me.

Here's my workflow with the HG One and the Cremina:

1) weigh 12g of beans into the metal shot-glass-thing that comes with the grinder
2) open the steam wand a little and RDT the beans from a distance
3) grind into blind tumbler, then drop the lower funnel onto the tumbler. This usually minimises retention to <0,1g.
4) WDT in blind tumbler
5) put blind tumbler onto portafilter and pull the bottom out
6) distribute and tamp
7) pull shot

I haven't had a single shot go bad in four weeks now with all kinds of beans and roasts. My HG One has ground maybe 500g of rice and 1,5kg of coffee by now. I don't particularly feel like grinding 100kg of rice through it and I don't see how that'd improve anything. It works perfectly for me. I love how easy it is to switch between beans without any waste during dialling in.

I'll probably do a little video sometime soon...

Another thing that I do with the HG one that I have not seen described by others is that I spin the blind tumbler centre as I pull it out to further increase the degree of mixing.

I acquired some Chinese painted quail eggs about 8 weeks ago. After they hatched I fed them ground cat food that I ground with an ancient style hand grinder. I did not have ever use this grinder for any kind of coffee; it was for display. From its appearance I doubt if it had ever been used much when it was new decades ago. After I had ground an entire bag of cat food, the simple ancient hand grinder quite clearly ground much more rapidly than it did when I started the project. So old primitive burr grinders also needed break in periods!

I've had my HG-1 for almost a year now, and I have been brewing and pulling very tasty cups and shots right from the beginning. I didn't do anything special to season the burrs. Just put in coffee and...grind. The grinding has, for sure, gotten much easier than at first...but even at first grinding was very easy.

For espresso, I dose directly into the basket with a wooden funnel I made...

,,,shake the grounds around a bit after grinding to level them, tap the basket a few times on the tabletop to settle the grind, tamp and pull. No RDT. No WDT other than the gentle shake and tap to level and settle the grind. The results are always yummy!

Perhaps my taste requirements aren't as finely tuned as others. A definite possibility. But from the first grind there was a very noticeable improvement in the cup that has spoiled me for anything less. For my taste and experience, the HG-1 is a perfect grinder.

Very nice Basket Holder!

Did you put a magnet into it?