Hey guys

While using my Lido E cup for dosing my coffee into my PF a few days ago i thought of a small gadget that i suspect would improve the quality of my shots.

My "invention" would be a closed top for the cup with a net of sorts that would break up any bigger lumps when shaking the cup. Of the top of my head i would think the best design would be something with bigger holes than your average strainer and with sharper edges(think cookie cutter instead of thin wire). For the quickest results i assume that the top should be about the same size as the cup with the net around the middle of the two cups and the net sharp on both sides.

Of course this shaker doesn't need to use the Lido cup, but it is a good sized cup with antistatic properties and threading that a at least some people on HB own. Anyone who owns a Lido cup and has acces to a 3D printer can probably make a prototype in no time.

Just to make it clear. I don't believe this idea is original and i assume that a product sort of like what i've described can be bought somewhere online, or that someone on HB already use something like this in their routine. I'm not looking to steal credit, i just thought of this one day and wanted to hear what people think about it. So if you know somewhere that sells this product or something similar please link it! I'm interested in getting one.

In my experience, shaking ground coffee is not good. Long ago, I did some experiments using an electric (vibratory) scribing pen (against the filter basket, not IN it) to settle the ground coffee. Results were interesting, but not very useful. But I did observe this: after settling the coffee, the mass tended to fracture if I attempted to transfer it or stir it. There were big clumps that didn't exist before.

Jack

People don't sieve because it's a hassle. BUT, you could theoretically attach a removable mesh filter between the grinds container and the lido burrs to keep out the large pieces. All the shaking that happens when you grind would do most of the shaking work for separating the sizes out. Just get a sieve material and cut it to size. Maybe glue it to a ring that fits inside the lido and allows the catch jar to also screw in.

Thinking out loud here, but you could make a miniature stack of three nesting filters that screw into each other and the top one connects to the lido instead of the current catch jar. Then you just use the contents of middle filter to brew with.

I think there is a good chance that in a few years grinders that do some sieving may be all the rage - if someone can overcome some design challenges like making it fast and not super complicated.

Here's the video of my experiment using a scribing pen: The original post was on the CG forum.

Jack

Jack, while the pens looks like a great way to settle the grounds without losing any, I can see what you mean when you write that the results weren't that useful, it doesn't seem like it disturbs the ground that much, just settles it. I also tried shaking the grounds in the cup while holding a hand over the opening and the results were not very good.
I totally understand that normal sieving is a hassle and i wouldn't bother doing it John, but i think the shaker thing would solve it, at least partially. My idea was more of a "shaker sieve" kinda thing. Just letting the grounds fall through a sieve might not make the best results, even putting a sieve in the Lido wouldn't help that much i suspect, since the grounds only pass through the sieve once. vigorously shaking the grounds through a sieve would be more effective i think, since many passes through the sieve could be achieved in very little time. This is all speculation here, but shaking the cup like a cocktail shaker for something like 5 seconds would probably remove most of the bigger lumps.
All this would probably not make a big difference in a top of the line grinder where the grounds touches nothing but the basket efter it leaves the burrs, but for the more widely used grinders that aren't as direct in their grind delivery i suspect this might improve reproducibility, with only like a 10 sec increase in the time needed to prepare a shot.

How about WDT with the pen and a needle

I was doing this to see if it might be a better alternative to the WDT. I wouldn't do espresso if I had to go through that kind of exercise (WDT) for every shot. If this had worked, I'd have fabricated a way to do it quickly--like a touch-activated pad or similar.

But to answer your question, the vibration compacts it. Once it's compacted anything that disturbs it leaves it in fragments. I guess the WDT could break up the fragments, but then what was the point of the vibe?

Jack