ArrowWild wrote:...

However, the major drawback is the safety protocol in place which requires the roaster to completely cool down to 160F between roasts. ..

As does the Gene, to 140F.

I used to ignore that feature and I smoked through 3 heating elements. Since then, I permit it to cool down to 140F and haven't burned through another element.

ArrowWild wrote:...

However, the major drawback is the safety protocol in place which requires the roaster to completely cool down to 160F between roasts. ..

With the Gene, you are supposed to let it go through a cool down cycle to 140F, but it can be overriden.

I used to ignore that feature and I smoked through 3 heating elements. Since then, I permit it to cool down to 140F and haven't burned through another element.

I've seen a Hottop at a commercial roaster and a Quest M3 at another. I've seen the Huky and Quest in use and I've owned a Hottop. Because of the enforced cool down times and lesser build quality the Hottop would be my third choice.

ArrowWild wrote:However, the major drawback is the safety protocol in place which requires the roaster to completely cool down to 160F between roasts. My general sample roast profile takes (generally) 11-12 minutes in the roaster but you then have to add cool down AND preheat time, making each batch time around 45 minutes per sample.

Not really efficient if you have > 4 samples to roast in a sitting.

Otherwise it makes great coffee - if you can tie-in other unrelated business tasks between cool down and preheat times, I think you'd be happy with the Hottop.

I've been using a HotTop for sample and profile development roasting 8 years. Also bought a used Quest couple years ago. Once had 23 samples to roast (Best of Panama Auction), took 2 days on the HotTop. But I have one of the 10 Computer Controlled HotTops Jeffrey Pawlin built and sold way back when so wasn't baby sitting the whole time. No way I would want to do that many sample roasts any manual controlled roaster.

drgary wrote:I've seen a Hottop at a commercial roaster and a Quest M3 at another. I've seen the Huky and Quest in use and I've owned a Hottop. Because of the enforced cool down times and lesser build quality the Hottop would be my third choice.

I don't necessarily agree the HotTop is lesser build quality. Yes has plastic externals, but that does not necessarily equal lesser quality.

I've run HotTops harder than anyone else I've ever heard of. When I turned professional ordered a USRC. While waiting for it to be built and delivered ran 2 CCR HotTops 7 days a week to supply the hoppers and have a few bags on the shelf. Everyday when I got home until I went to bed and Sunday's 16+ hour sessions both running back to back batches non-stop. (off 2 laptops) AND was running boosted 132v to enable larger batches! Towards the end of the 3 month torture test one of them the heating element began to sag and rub the drum a bit but never died. Also had one cooling fan bearing started getting noisy and replaced it. After the USRC arrived sold one of the 2 CCR HotTops. Both still running today 8 years later.

OTOH a friend has a Quest lightly used at home a few years. One of the heating elements simply died. And it was a PIA to replace. (He failed, I replaced it.)

Here's what I meant. Disassembling a Hottop to clean it is a hassle since there are many small screws into plastic. Eventually the plastic wears out. I also found I had to bend the outer cowling, which is flexible sheet metal, in order to get it to line up and reassemble.

Did it run well and reliably? Yes.

Compass Coffee wrote:I don't necessarily agree the HotTop is lesser build quality. Yes has plastic externals, but that does not necessarily equal lesser quality.

I've never owned a Quest, but the Hottop build quality compared to the Huky is lightyears apart.

+1 for Huky as sample roaster. Your company will eventually get big, and Huky will allow you to have a decent amount of coffee for sampling.

Here's my workflow for my Gene Cafe:

Preheat gene cafe to 482
Coast to desired "pulling" temperature
E-stop
Pull the chamber with thermal gloves
Flip open
Quickly drop in the beans
Place back and restart roast from minute 30.0

I've already gone through an IMMENSE amount of coffee with the machine, starting my kiosk business. This month, the North Coffee TJ-072 just came in so I can now have at least 4-5 hours of sleep.

The Gene has limitations. For almost thrice the price of the Gene, the Huky 500 gives you simulation of ET/BT patterns, and will last a life time.

Gene - military bootcamp
Huky - being wing-commander after military bootcamp
TJ 072 - Fighter helicopter
(Loring roaster - military drone)

Good luck!! For the most part, it's the greens that matter. I've had some wonderful greens through the Gene, which I've used to convert people to the discipleship of coffee here and there.

Before beginning to roast on North's gas 1K, I roasted on the Gene Cafe for 8 years and enjoyed it. Today, Gene Cafe distributors put out this new guidance:

WEIGH YOUR BEANS. The maximum capacity of the CBR-101 is 250g (a little over 8oz), but for optimum performance and heater life, we recommend using about 80% of that (200g / 6.5oz).

They used to state 10.5 oz. I roasted for years with 8 oz (227g) without difficulties. I found it to be the roaster's sweet spot.

KNOW YOUR COFFEE. Many natural process coffees produce high levels of chaff, and therefore may need to be roasted in smaller batches.

I roasted 227g of naturals without any difficulties.

ALLOW YOUR ROASTS TO COOL. Do not cut your roasts short using the emergency stop function (unless of course there is an actual emergency). Your roaster and heating element will last longer if you allow the beans to go through the full cool cycle.

I always used the E stop, got the beans into a rigged up bean cooler with a shopvac, and got the tumbler within 25 seconds. Never experienced difficulties.

VENT NATURALLY. Using your roaster in a well-ventilated area (such as outside, next to an open window, or under and exhaust fan) is important. Using after-market ventilation such as dryer hose to vent your roaster can restrict air flow and affect roast times and heater life.

I used a dryer vent and put the exhaust out the basement window. No difficulties other than when the outside temps were below zero Fahrenheit.

I did burn up 3 heaters when I first started, often doing 10+ roasts back to back without even letting the roaster cool down. Once I began limiting sessions to 5 or so roasts, letting the unit come down to 140*F before starting the next roast, I roasted six years without replacing another heating element. That element is still going strong.

I strongly second edtbjon and BoldJava's comments. After nine years of roasting on the Gene Cafe finally splurged and got a Huky. It is truly made like a tank.
What I treasure most is it will roast six or seven roasts in a row and beg for more seemingly. And the quality of the roasts blows the GC out of the water.