Mazzer Robur-E / Burrs / New horizons?

[Alistair Durie]

2011 and I'm frustrated about the same old subject.

The good news is the doser is dead. The bad news: the only good doser-less high-volume commercial grinder is still an antique. The Robur-E is the best of a mediocre market.

More bad news: the burr manufacturing for the Robur E is terrible. We recently installed 2 new sets and they gave terrible grind quality for at least 30-80 pounds of coffee. The 18g that normally takes 2.5-3 seconds delivers in 9-10 seconds when new. The grinder seems to really struggle to grind coffee with a new burrset. On closer inspection the manufacturing of the burrs is sloppy. No alternative. If it takes a bunch of coffee to "season" the burrs, how good are they to start with? Why are they not properly polished? The rough edges need to be 'worn' down for the burrs to perform properly.

James Hoffmann: http://www.jimseven.com/2011/06/15/dear ... facturers/

Even if these burrs were improved, the amount of residual coffee that sits - as ground coffee - inside the sweeper chamber is ridiculous, there's probably around 30-50 grams of warm ground coffee sitting in there. Think about that: when you grind a shot, you're not getting coffee from the whole beans, it is pre-ground coffee sitting in there being swept out. Which is also true for every other espresso grinder with a hopper I've seen.

This is the best we have to work with, still. I wish someone would deliver on grinder development. Oh, nothing we haven't all been ranting about for about 5 years now.

What is going to happen next?

/rant

[Kyle Glanville]

Call me crazy, but it still seems to me that something resembling the Versalab system, with a great set of burrs, could solve a lot of the issues we have with espresso grinders today.

[Elaine Levia]

No, I agree. I mean. I would really like to agree, and have wanted this to be so for some time, but I hope someone with extensive experience with the versalab can chime in. What would happen if it ceased to be single-serving? Would a purge (waste of fresh coffee) be the only solution on a Robur-E? Furthermore, would a versalab still fulfill its entire purpose if it was not designed for a single serving? So many vague questions. Would like to know more!

Maybe constant use of a Robur-E is the answer- with the grind cycle in operation every fifteen to thirty seconds. Is that constant enough? Of course, that does not solve the problem of the time taken to grind a commonly accepted dose for a double, nor does it remotely explain why burr sets are manufactured the way they are. I'm excited for a fresh perspective, a la basket and screen retooling in the past year. I really like it when the tools we use and accept as standards come into question.