New Used Compak K-10

[GC7]

I've found a grind setting I quite like but I want to do some experimenting.
 
I'm trying to think of the best way on this gorgeous machine to mark a current setting so that I can easily dial a bit coarser and/or a bit tighter without losing track of where I was....

Suggestions?

Susan

I use an MS Word file that I print out that has a line with hash marks at short intervals that are numbered. I just cut out a narrow area and tape it to the grinder. A small very narrow strip of tape on the upper grind adjustment piece acts as a marker for the setting. It's worked well for years on the K3 before I got the K10. Still works great.

[SJM]

Susan

I use an MS Word file that I print out that has a line with hash marks at short intervals that are numbered. I just cut out a narrow area and tape it to the grinder. A small very narrow strip of tape on the upper grind adjustment piece acts as a marker for the setting. It's worked well for years on the K3 before I got the K10. Still works great.

I can do that :-))))
Thanks

Susan

[SJM]

Baking one puck in the oven doesn't even register on the olfactory Richter scale.

And, for me, I thought it was kinda cool to do the experiment and find that my extraction is well within the "best" range.    Todd isn't the first one to dismiss this particular way of sussing out extraction %, but given the lack of a refractometer, drying pucks is my alternative of choice.  A brix meter could be used (with all kinds of calculation adjustments), but I kinda like this approach.

If you want to know any more about this method or my results....fergeddaboudit.

Susan
 

[ecc]

One puck?  I expected much better from you!  I ran a few full cookie sheets, which is about .7 on the garden pea scale. 

Susan, I didn't intend the previous post as criticism or dismissal of dried pucks.  Some serious coffee heavyweights have played with the pucks, and stuff like this will lead us to better coffee someday.  Paying attention is cool, trying to improve your coffee is always very cool, getting Peter to consider baking a puck is off the charts.

[SJM]

Well, Todd, I did misread your comments as dismssive, so thanks for clarifying. 
There is no question that the variables are very variable, and that what I am trying to get a handle on for myself is waaaaaay below the level of true scientific inquiry, but....as any kid with a new mud pie, I'm having quite a lot of fun.

One puck a day is all I generate;  so data acquisition is slow....

[SJM]

Having weighed only four pucks so far, and having actually changed the grind only in the last instance, I am finding that Todd is probably quite right that changing the numbers isn't going to happen given the fineness of the measurements and the vagaries of measurements taken by fumble fingers.  However (and I know we aren't arguing at all), having done the first dry and found that my extraction ratio was "in the ballpark", it still makes making decisions about which way to adjust to try to fine tune the taste clearer to me.  The numbers (even if somewhat skewed) showed me I was probably at the lower end of the best extraction percentage, so it made sense to make fine adjustments to try to increase that. 

What I was pulling tasted good;  grinding a tad finer and lowering the dose?  even better.

When I get the SAMA plugged back in it will be even more interesting to compare the extraction percentages that I get from that deeper basket.

Susan 

Susan

[peter]

However (and I know we aren't arguing at all), having done the first dry and found that my extraction ratio was "in the ballpark", it still makes making decisions about which way to adjust to try to fine tune the taste clearer to me.  The numbers (even if somewhat skewed) showed me I was probably at the lower end of the best extraction percentage, so it made sense to make fine adjustments to try to increase that. 

What I was pulling tasted good;  grinding a tad finer and lowering the dose?  even better.

Isn't that something you could've realized w/o all the hassle of drying and weighing spent pucks? 

That's why I like the relative simplicity of weighing coffee going in and espresso coming out.  Keeping those two parameters fairly consistent, then the last thing I measure is the time of the shot, which is adjusted w/ the grind.  I find each of the little hash marks on the K10 collar equivalent to 5sec. of shot time.

[SJM]

Isn't that something you could've realized w/o all the hassle of drying and weighing spent pucks? 

Obviously not.
 

Susan

[grinderz]

Personally, I find making espresso offerings to the sink trolls is a mo-betta way to go than baking/weighing/mathematical-ing stuff. Pulling one shot a day when trying to dial in a blend is too frustrating for me. Pull/taste/adjust/repeat until I'm satisfied is how I like to do it.

[SJM]

Ah, well.....for me there is only enough attention span for one pull.
After that I'm on to something else for the day....

Pulling multiple shots in a row?
Not my style....

But I don't expect to be weighing and calculating on an ongoing basis.  This is just a little experiment in understanding extraction %, as opposed to (in addition to) brew ratio.

Susan