Hey, all. Like I mentioned in the title, I recently purchased a Fellow Ode and installed the SSP burrs (1 click past chirp, for reference). After a few dozen brews, I am begin to wonder if this is due to my unfamiliarity to the grinder or maybe it's just the grinder itself?
Hoping that some of you that have done the burr swap can speak to what I have been seeing.

1. There is a strong tension in the dial when I try to go finer (especially <6). It almost feels like I am going to strip the gear. Sometimes after running the grinder for a few seconds, this tension goes away. Has anyone else experienced this after the swap?
2. The burrs have jammed at least twice so I have started using it. Common Ode issue?
3. Lastly, and probably the most frustrating issue, may have less to do with the grinder and more to do with me. I have brewed a few dozen cups of V60 (60g/L ratio for a 250ml cup) with the tabbed Hario filters. I can not get it pushed past the 2:43 mark. I am not worried about that solely for the mathematical sake. My cups are tasting very under-extracted and are lack much of the clarity that I have with my Comandante. The only way I know to fix this is to increase the amount of time the water is in contact with the grounds. I have tried very slow pours (<5g/sec) and tried pulse pours and tried a few methods (Rao method, Hoffman method, etc.). I have tried at several different grind settings. Just this morning I pushed all the way down to 2,1 (which looks like what I would grind for espresso) and the total brew time was still 2:30-something seconds. I have jumped all the way up to 7,1 and 8 and there have been very little deviance from the 2 and a half minute mark.

Am I going mad? Lol.. Any help is greatly appreciated! (If I posted this in the wrong sub forum, please let me know. I'm a newbie to Home-Barista)

Hi, so great that you're making this thread. The common Fellow Ode thread has a lot of SSP info in there, but I certainly get that for all the people who (rightly) want to talk about the grinder as it is out-of-the-box, it's nice to perhaps separate the Ode+SSP specific discussions elsewhere.

I've had the Ode+SSP (in Silver Knight coating, not that it should matter) since late December, and I've experienced some of the same frustrations as you. So perhaps I'm not the best person to answer. But hoping to get the ball rolling, so I can learn something as well.

So, one of the main things I think would help is to remind ourselves that just because the brewtime is so short, due to the unimodal grind, it does not neccesarily mean that we should grind finer. HB user violin_geek123 wrote about his experiences here, resembling yours ( ). I also think that an important post in terms of extraction and grind size is Jonathan Gagné's ( https://coffeeadastra.com/2020/04/02/wh ... pour-over/ ), where he found that grinding finer actually decreases extraction, as it is found in espresso. My understanding of his explanation is that by grinding too fine you overextract those coffee particles near channels, which causes uneven extractions (this is what Matt Perger says as well).

So, how to go about it, then? To start with, I recalibrated my Ode+SSP to 8 clicks past chirp, because that allowed me a much more usable range. It also tricks my brain into thinking that I'm grinding fine on a '4' setting, even though it's really not. I've found really great results around 4.0-5.2 with my calibration.
Second, you could buy a bag of coffee that you don't feel attached to whatsoever, and then dedicate as an 'testing bag', going gradually from coarse to fine with each brew, in a standard-ish V60 range. This way I've had better patience methodically changing grind size, while using the same pouring recipe every single time. Perhaps choose a pouring recipe that you've previously liked.

Third, and this is in a way a cheat, you can try changing drippers. Perhaps your preconceived idea of brewing suddenly doesn't fit the V60, because of a new grind profile. I got the hang of the Ode+SSP with my V60, but I am hands down happier switching to the Stagg X dripper. My brews are SO consistently sweet, intense and great using Ode+SSP (with the aforementioned calibration). My go-to recipe is 15g, 99 degree water, 60-60-60-70 pulse pours, 250g out, 2:10 brew time. Every time. I let taste dictate my grind size but for this recipe and setup 4.0-5.2 seems to work great.

Hope some of this helps! Has anyone else had any good experiences, or learnings?

probablynotjacob wrote:
1. There is a strong tension in the dial when I try to go finer (especially <6). It almost feels like I am going to strip the gear. Sometimes after running the grinder for a few seconds, this tension goes away. Has anyone else experienced this after the swap?

The mounting plate that holds the rotating burr is floating when you have SSPs in. This means that if you screw it in all the way you will have burr chirp at around 6. This isn't an issue for the original burrs since that are designed with the dimensions of the burr carrier, so screwing the burr carrier all the way down will give burr lock at setting 1. Due to the geometry of the original burrs, this burr lock isn't very fine. With the SSP burrs do not tighten the screws on the rotating burr carrier all the way or you will lose half the settings of the grinder by having burr lock at setting 6.

What I did when I put SSPs in was to play around with how much I would tighten the screws to see what gave me burr chirp at setting 1, that way I had full play of the dial.

This being said that doesn't really answer your full question. If this is what was happening to you you would have a very fine grind, think espresso. You may have some unalignment due to the burr carrier being floating. My recommendation is to try and tighten all the screws the same amount and not tighten them all the way. Also if you are not getting super fine grind when you feel that tension something is not correct.

Side note, I put in SSP multipurpose and did not keep them in. They were really good, but I actually liked the original burrs a lot, and the SSPs made more of a difference in my Super Jolly. That being said I do mostly flat bed brewing and usually have brew times of 3-4 mins at setting 2.

I'm curious, did you manage to achieve better brews?

Don't know if if this of any help in terms of grind size, but I found the first video to show the capabilities of the Ode+SSP across brew devices. If anything, it's nice to have someone to compare one's calibration to.

Word_salad wrote:The mounting plate that holds the rotating burr is floating when you have SSPs in. This means that if you screw it in all the way you will have burr chirp at around 6. This isn't an issue for the original burrs since that are designed with the dimensions of the burr carrier, so screwing the burr carrier all the way down will give burr lock at setting 1. Due to the geometry of the original burrs, this burr lock isn't very fine. With the SSP burrs do not tighten the screws on the rotating burr carrier all the way or you will lose half the settings of the grinder by having burr lock at setting 6.

What I did when I put SSPs in was to play around with how much I would tighten the screws to see what gave me burr chirp at setting 1, that way I had full play of the dial.

This being said that doesn't really answer your full question. If this is what was happening to you you would have a very fine grind, think espresso. You may have some unalignment due to the burr carrier being floating. My recommendation is to try and tighten all the screws the same amount and not tighten them all the way. Also if you are not getting super fine grind when you feel that tension something is not correct.

Side note, I put in SSP multipurpose and did not keep them in. They were really good, but I actually liked the original burrs a lot, and the SSPs made more of a difference in my Super Jolly. That being said I do mostly flat bed brewing and usually have brew times of 3-4 mins at setting 2.

I'm a bit confused/baffled by the advice being given here. The only screws on the outer burr carrier are the 3 screws that hold the burr to the carrier.

The grind adjustment mechanism mounts to the front of the grinder, and contacts/presses against the outer burr carrier on a bearing. This mechanism is on a plate which is mounted to the body of the grinder, and should be tightened down uniformly and snugly all the way until it is seated to the main body of the grinder. These screws should not be adjusted or loosened in any way!

When changing burrs in the Ode, it is necessary to re-calibrate so that the burrs do not contact while grinding. Fellow have a video on their YouTube which shows this procedure but I'll give a brief description:

Pop off the grind dial plate (part with the numbers on)

Remove the black adjustment dial/knob while it is set to maximum fine '1' (the 4x screws to remove this are the small ones in North, East, South, West locations.

This will reveal the grind adjustment mechanism. There will be a metal 'cog'. To ensure the burrs are not physically touching, rotate this clockwise by approx 20 clicks. *It may be necessary to loosen/turn the cog clockwise a fair few clicks prior to installing aftermarket burrs, in order to account for any increase in thickness in the new burrs.*

Run the grinder while it is empty. Slowly and carefully turn the cog anti-clockwise click by click until you hear the burrs 'chirping'. When you hear the chirp, turn back clockwise by one click so that the chirping disappears. (Some people prefer to calibrate so that they have more range for coarser grind. The more clicks you turn it clockwise at this point, the coarser your grind range will become).

Reinstall the black knob/adjustment dial, and then the metal number plate.


As for the adjustment dial being stiff to turn, this is likely due to beans/grinds trapped between the burrs, which prevent the burrs from moving closer together. A good habit to get into is to make grind-size adjustments while running the grinder empty (especially when going finer for grind settings in the espresso range). I had this issue happen to me when using Mazzer Super Jolly burrs in the Ode. The Ode isn't particularly good at getting all the grinds out, so there's always something retained/lingering in the grind chamber.