Ok, I went back and checked the manual and it states to keep the door closed for the first 1 1/2 minutes. The one time that I did accidently open the door right after going into cool, the two chaff piles in each corner of the chaff tray started smoldering and burning. I can see where this might not occur if you hit it with a blast from a fan instead of the chaff being undisturbed from just opening the door.
Do you think there would be any chance of the quarz heating elements cracking if they were cooled too quickly?
kelppaddy
Been ?lurking? for a while, this is my first post, hi all! This post prompted me to respond because the ?fire? situation is an important topic. I have about 20 roast on the Behmor so far. Many include several different High Chaff producing DP Brazils, including a ? # roast tonight of the Brazil Stubbie is distributing. (Thanks Stubbie for getting them out so fast!). I have yet to have a fire or even a smolder. I have always waited at least a minute before opening the door. Is that why I haven?t had a fire? I don?t know, but it seems to work for me. I have read on another group that one has gotten a small fire admittedly by opening the door right at the end of the roast. I believe that by opening the door too soon with a large roast, with a high chaff bean, could increase your chance of a fire; especially in darker roast. I think if most use common sense when using this roaster, that there will be no problem, but if the limits are pushed, you take a risk of problems, and that?s ok, if you are willing to accept any bad consequences. However, I seen too many ?break the rules? or not use common sense, and then fault the manufacturer. I think the key is knowing there are risk associated with roasting, know the limitations of the roaster, and most important, just use common sense to reduce risk. One problem is, this roaster makes roasting so easy, once you know the roaster well, it can tempt some to just ?set it, forget it? and walk away, but that would be a bad idea, a very bad idea.
I?ve been keeping up with most of the threads on Coffeegeek, and I have not seen (although I could have missed it) that cooling too soon will damage the unit, However, I do remember Joe saying that the unit should not be turned off early, so the unit can thoroughly cool . This came up when there was talk about turning the unit off right after the roast, to pull the drum early to cool by other means.
One tip that seems to be working for me is; I do wait minimum of 60-90 seconds before opening the door. I then use a small shop vac for a short time above the chaff tray to suck out the hot air. It must be helping somewhat, cause the hose gets pretty warm. Of course the shop vac makes clean up a breeze afterwards.
One final tip, I now use a rag to clean the window before every roast, it cleans off very easy, and you have a clean view every roast. It seems that the longer you leave that crap there; it just multiplies the work getting it off.
Merry Christmas all!
Bud
