Someone who knows I have lots of time on my hands gave me
one of these things along with a challenge: Make this into a decent coffee roaster! What can I say - I'm a sucker for a dare.
The
Presto Pizzazz pizza cooker looks interesting. It looks like I'll need to fabricate a ring to cover the rotating bottom plate that'll seal the unit so the beans stay in the machine & helps to retain heat.
I'll also have to do something about chaff removal since there's no fan to help push it out of the roast chamber (I may not worry about this & let the cooling fan take care of the chaff).
I'm hoping that the heat being directly over only a portion of the bean mass as the bottom plate turns, will let me regulate the temps more closely? Using the upper & lower heating elements, the thing is rated ~1300 watts - a mite lower than I'd like.
The only tricky part to the conversion will be fabricating the cover that must remain stationary as the bottom plate rotates. If this works, it'll be a cheaper alternative to the UFO/CO & TurboCrazy home built units.
I'll let you know how it goes.