Hand Cranked Grinder Static Solution

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ozo
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#1: Post by ozo »

Electric grinders are connected to an earth ground via the power cord. It only makes sense that the large hand cranked table grinders should be too. Electric grinders are connected to an earth ground for an entirely different reason but static dissipation I believe is non-existent for them due to the earth ground. I am getting a hand cranked grinder soon and will report my experience with this solutions effectiveness.

I already have the cord. I made it from a salvaged 3 prong plug/cable and an alligator clip. I may bolt the wire directly to the grinder later on if It actually is effective.
TIM

"Espresso is a miracle of chemistry in a cup."
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wsfarrell
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#2: Post by wsfarrell »

Not sure what all the fuss is lately about static electricity. If you spritz your beans with a little water before grinding, there's no static---whether the grinder is electric or manual.
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ncrc51
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#3: Post by ncrc51 replying to wsfarrell »

Exactly!

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ozo (original poster)
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#4: Post by ozo (original poster) »

It is not necessary to spritz, humidify or drop water in the beans with an eye dropper. I guess if the ritual is a big deal for you then yes it adds to the experience.
TIM

"Espresso is a miracle of chemistry in a cup."
Andrea Illy

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Bluecold
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#5: Post by Bluecold »

Electric grinders have static issues as well, with and without ground wires.

Spraying coffee with water before grinding is completely silly to me. Grinder manufacturers should fix their grinders instead of supplying or suggesting idiotic spray bottles.
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yakster
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#6: Post by yakster »

Past posts show that it is not enough to ground the grinder to get rid of static in certain environments. So far, the only reliable solution seems to be RDT / adding moisture before grinding.

Unfortunately, fixing the triboelectric effect is not simple, grinder manufacturers might be able to put ionic anti-static devices in their grinders to reduce or eliminate the charge.
-Chris

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ira
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#7: Post by ira »

Bluecold wrote:Grinder manufacturers should fix their grinders instead of supplying or suggesting idiotic spray bottles.
If it was simple or even reasonable I'm sure they would. The reasonable solutions are to force the beans through a restricted channel causing retention or use a doser or doser like device. Neither of which work for single dosing.

The potentially optimal solution would be a stream of ionized air pumped through the bean mass and out with the ground beans, but while the solution is simple, implementing it so UL and CE approve is likely expensive and non-trivial.

Or possibly just a reservoir for distilled water so the grinder could do RDT on the fly.

Ira

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AssafL
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#8: Post by AssafL »

Even constructing the path doesn't get rid of subsurface charges.

Only ions (humidity or spray bottle) do.

I am using a manual aergrind and no static at all. But then again Tel Aviv is humid at this time of the year.

As autumn sets in with lower RH static problems will be back.

BTW -I wonder what the big guys like Nespresso do? My guess is normalization Instead of dealing with static. Hard to do with a manual grinder due to the low RPM.
Scraping away (slowly) at the tyranny of biases and dogma.

mivanitsky
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#9: Post by mivanitsky »

ozo wrote:Electric grinders are connected to an earth ground via the power cord. It only makes sense that the large hand cranked table grinders should be too. Electric grinders are connected to an earth ground for an entirely different reason but static dissipation I believe is non-existent for them due to the earth ground. I am getting a hand cranked grinder soon and will report my experience with this solutions effectiveness.

I already have the cord. I made it from a salvaged 3 prong plug/cable and an alligator clip. I may bolt the wire directly to the grinder later on if It actually is effective.
It's been tried here before, unsuccessfully. RDT is easy and basically free.

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MB
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#10: Post by MB »

ozo wrote:It is not necessary to spritz, humidify or drop water in the beans with an eye dropper. I guess if the ritual is a big deal for you then yes it adds to the experience.
It may not be necessary, especially if you live in a humid environment, but many of us experience plenty of grinds which cling to the grinder in all sorts of annoying ways, and are a pain to get into the basket. As noted by those above, this common occurrence is easily fixed by spritzing the beans before grinding.
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