Hi everyone. We've had our home setup for a week and a half now, and I'm still getting used to adjusting everything, particularly the grinder (Eureka Mignon Specialita).

I went through about ten shots tonight trying to dial it in for a new blend. With the grinder set at 3, I'd get a 20 sec shot with an 18g dose. With a very small adjustment to 2.5 and a purge to get the old grounds out, it would be a 40 second shot. Back a hair coarser to 2.75 and I'm back to a 20 second shot.

These are very small adjustments on the dial. Is it normally this difficult to dial in that setting? Are the adjustments on this grinder just not fine enough? I feel like getting a 27-30 second extraction is a total shot on the dark, no pun intended.

Don't use any of the lines or numbers other than for personal references. The benefit of stepless grinders is not being bound by the pre determined adjustments. My adjustments are tiny. If it had finite indicators, I'm moving from 2 to 1.9 to slow my shot 2 seconds.

Your experience matches mine. Imagine there are 5 marks between each marked 1/2 number. That's how little I turn the knob for minor adjustments in grind.

Agree with others about the small adjustments. One other thing that I've noticed is that the adjusting mechanism has some backlash, at least on my unit.

I deal with this by always reaching my desired setting by rotating the knob clockwise. So if I want to grind coarser, I rotate anti-clockwise past the desired setting, then clockwise back to the target.

Thanks, guys. Very helpful. Yes, I was only referencing the numbers to give you guys an idea of what I'm doing.

yertchuk wrote:Agree with others about the small adjustments. One other thing that I've noticed is that the adjusting mechanism has some backlash, at least on my unit.

I deal with this by always reaching my desired setting by rotating the knob clockwise. So if I want to grind coarser, I rotate anti-clockwise past the desired setting, then clockwise back to the target.

May I know what does the backlash mean?

Example:

Grinder is initially set at 2. You turn the knob clockwise to get to 1, and the grind gets finer. Then you turn anticlockwise to get back to 2, but the grind isn't what it was at the start for setting 2.

It's caused because there has to be some slight clearance between the gears in the adjusting mechanism. This means that if you reverse direction, you have to take up the clearance before all the gears start moving again.

ah.. sounds very complicated. how do I "take up the clearance" then?

I realise that if the grinder doesn't spit out, I have to empty all the beans and refill a fresh set before it will work again. it's so frustrating!

It's something familiar to machinists. Before CNC, you would always position driving the screw in one direction only. Been moving "in" and need to move "out"? Back it out past where you need, then drive in to where you need to be in the dial.

Try throwing the first two doses after a grind change.