Vendor Discussion Boards > Commercial Hardware discussion

Buckeye coffee roasters

(1/9) > >>

donnie cole:
Anyone have any experience with Buckeye Coffee Roasters. I'm considering the Phoenix Oro 2.5 but haven't seen any reviews on them.
Thanks Donnie

hankua:
Randy at Buckeye was an active member on coffeeforums before starting Buckeye, and had an early Artisan V5 fluid bed machine as well. I think he started around the same general time as Steve at MillCity.

One of the big differences between the two (afain); MillCity sells one brand of Chinese roasters and Buckeye sells multiple brands of Chinese machines. I got a bit of an inside look on this last year, helping someone self-import a Chinese coffee roaster; eye popping FOB pricing by the way.

Randy has some positive feedback on HB, on the Santoker and BC series. He claims to fire up every machine testing the overheat cutoff and if it's working properly. Nice touch!

Because the "Oro" looks like the North says nothing; in China there are knockoffs of the knockoffs. Kind of a "Wild West" you might say, where trusting some alibaba ad could turn out great or a disaster.

The best advice I can think of is to get some leads from Buckeye and call his customers, better yet bring your own greens and test drive the machine in question.

donnie cole:
Hankua, Thank you for the insight. That's a great Idea... I'll see if Randy can get me in touch with some Oro users. I guess my main reason for considering the Oro was the the use of a double wall drum. Seems like a good attribute. Not sure if that makes it a better option over the North though.

peter:
I'm curious why you think a double-wall drum is a positive attribute...   not trying to threadjack or start a discussion...  just curious.

hankua:
Donnie
Double wall drums are a feature of some high end European machines such as Probat. Randy might have switched manufacturers on the Oro as well, at least it looks so.

The guy I was helping in Chicago was a novice and wanted a 2k machine, in the end talked him into getting a 1k. I'm not a fan of the 2k size in the realm of Chinese roasters, mostly due to price vs size. For the majority of drum roaster, users roast less than full capacity with a few exceptions (mill City 1k). My thinking is the next step up from a 1k is a machine capable of roasting 5lbs of finished coffee taking into account 15% weight loss. It gives you entry into commercial accounts which can be kind of a "bread and butter" gig.

Just took a look at the Oro and there are a lot of things I like such as: precision damper vs adjustable air fan, ribbon burners, some cast iron components. The specs have some typo as well, I'd have to communicate with him to clear them up. Randy rates his machines in pounds instead of kilo's so you have to be careful there.

If you notice the front section of the drum has a cast iron hub and ring; it needs to be faced/turned on a lathe. Could end up being fairly precise; what is the gap between the faceplate and drum? Again, fancy European roasters often have this feature.

Navigation

[0] Message Index

[#] Next page