FreshRoast Plus too fast

[Coffeefreak]

I recently had a crack across the plastic top of my FreshRoast Plus. As usual, Tim at Fresh Beans came through with a replacement sent very promptly. The roast chamber base was always a tight fit, and I might conjecture that could have been a contributing factor to the plastic cracking prematurely. I asked Tim if I might help matters by using some emery paper on the rough surface of the aluminum base of the roasting chamber.
He said to go ahead, and it now goes in and out easily.

Now the slight problem. My house voltage has been on the high side lately as measured with my KillaVolt.
The open circuit voltage said 125V and under roasting load is in the mid 121's. This morning, I roasted some Costa Rican Dota with my usual method of going until first crack, cooling for 15 seconds and then going back to roast until the desired degree is reached. The time until 1st crack was 1.7 minutes and the second round was only 1.5 minutes. This seems too fast to me. Perhaps I shall try adjusting the slider on the variable resistor.

[ButtWhiskers]

Try cutting back on the amount of coffee that you load.  That is the biggest factor in determining the profile in one of these, since bean-to-bean heat transfer is very significant.  Try cutting back to 55g or 60g. 

Split-wiring the fan (so you can toggle the heat on and off) or internally setting the fan to max power and using a variac to reduce power to the heater are other easy options to slow down the roast.

[J.Jirehs Roaster]

I recently had a crack across the plastic top of my FreshRoast Plus. As usual, Tim at Fresh Beans came through with a replacement sent very promptly. The roast chamber base was always a tight fit, and I might conjecture that could have been a contributing factor to the plastic cracking prematurely. I asked Tim if I might help matters by using some emery paper on the rough surface of the aluminum base of the roasting chamber.
He said to go ahead, and it now goes in and out easily.

Now the slight problem. My house voltage has been on the high side lately as measured with my KillaVolt.
The open circuit voltage said 125V and under roasting load is in the mid 121's. This morning, I roasted some Costa Rican Dota with my usual method of going until first crack, cooling for 15 seconds and then going back to roast until the desired degree is reached. The time until 1st crack was 1.7 minutes and the second round was only 1.5 minutes. This seems too fast to me. Perhaps I shall try adjusting the slider on the variable resistor.

Did you mean 1st or 2nd crack??  If 2nd crack than a longer would be better but if 1st than that is VERY short IMHO.  I think the little roasters are prime candidates for variacs... but for the money I skipped all that and built an SC/TO (amongst other roasters) but then again I love to tinker as much as I love to roast coffee.

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