The Mahlkoenig Pro-M is available now in the U.S. market, and last week Gary Horne at Mahlkoenig USA (a very cordial and helpful person) told me that 20-some units had been sold at that date.

Question: Are any users of the U.S. model of the Pro-M able to give any sort of report?

I have had mine for about two months. This "post-NSF" model does not exhibit any of the problems reported on the original version. [Edit: In a last-minute change, Mahlkonig went with the 65mm steel burrs for production.] And it still has a magnetic burr carrier, which adjusts with silky smoothness and holds its position. It is the best of the grinders I have had from the standpoint of grind quality, lack of waste, ease and stability of adjustment, economical use of space and quiet.

There is almost zero bean waste and no clumping or static cling. No need for any cleaning rituals between shots. It has a much smaller presence on the counter than the titan grinders and looks far better in the home. It is relatively light to pick up and move or empty.

The only drawback I can see is that the grounds are so fluffy that they will start overflowing a typical double basket at about 12 g. Since I prefer about 18 g., I usually interrupt the grind twice to settle the grounds. This, of course, means I cannot just leave the portafilter unattended while the timer runs, which defeats part of the purpose of the clip holder for me. I would rather have a simple removable fork. But the extreme fluffiness is most likely a factor in the grind quality, so I will live with that.

I will be interested to see some taste comparisons with the titan grinders, because I think the ProM has the potential to make them all obsolete for home espresso use.

Have you got any photos of the grinder and its output, Marshall?

Here are two pictures to show the scale.





Grounds:

Marshall wrote:I have had mine for about two months. This "post-NSF" model does not exhibit any of the problems reported on the original version.

That sounds sweet. But I'm still skeptical about grounds getting stuck to chute eventually. As far as I know, ProM is the only serious grinder in the market that does not let you access the burrs for cleaning.

Marshall wrote:But it still has a magnetic burr carrier, which adjusts with silky smoothness and holds its position.

Actually the early models did not have a magnetic carrier.

Marshall wrote:It is the best of the grinders I have had from the standpoint of grind quality, lack of waste, ease and stability of adjustment, economical use of space and quiet.

So true...

akallio wrote:Actually the early models did not have a magnetic carrier.

I don't believe that is correct. Signing off now for Thanksgiving!

I've looked on the web and looks like nobody sells it yet. How much is it?

In the Malkhonig page it says that the grinder is universal. It is good for both espresso and french press. My immediate reaction is that something is up. My K10 sucks at french press and the Tanzania sucks at espresso. Could it be that this grinder is in between (master of all ...)? If one needs fines and the other doesn't, how can the same burrs produce good results at both spectrums?

http://www.mahlkoenig.de/file/download/default/id/2557

Very important was also that the grinder can not only grind espresso
directly into the port-a-filter but grinds filter coffee or French-Press in the
same high quality. Additionally to the espresso preparation Filter coffee or
French-Press gains more importance and the different extraction methods
are celebrated intensively.Here also the ProM is to prove its strengths!
Very important for the design was the appearance as stand alone design
object in the process of preparing coffee and not a design in dependence on
espresso machines.

Cheers

Arpi wrote:I've looked on the web and looks like nobody sells it yet.

It is available through Mahlkoenig USA, and there are evidently design changes after the European specifications were published. Information about the U.S. product and availability has not yet been published online.

So is the plan to have this slot in between the Baratza Vario and the K30 Vario?

Marshall wrote:I don't believe that is correct. Signing off now for Thanksgiving!

At least my ProM had screws in burrs. It was a some sort of preproduction model.

Arpi wrote:My K10 sucks at french press and the Tanzania sucks at espresso. Could it be that this grinder is in between (master of all ...)?

My experience is that ProM could replace your K10, but not so much the Tanzania. Espresso quality was superior to coarse grinding. It was mostly about usability issues, static being the worst of them. Vario is better for coarse grinding.

We did compare Vario, ProM and large Ditting for french press. The result was uindecisive. They seemed similar, with maybe vary small variation. Differences between the grinders were tremendously smaller than differences between difference FP techniques. There is one thing, though. Both Vario and ProM have a bit nasty limitation in coarseness: when you calibrate them to produce nice espresso, they don't go as coarse as you would like.

My experiences come from a preproduction model (and a couple of more people who had also a preproduction model I believe). It would be very interesting to hear what has happened to coarse grinding performance. If Marshall is not using his for french press, someone else has to step up in the name of science and get a latest ProM to produce data for us.