Any advice and recommendations please.

My Baratza Maestro has given up the ghost earlier today.

Looking for something that will grind the beans a bit finer and with more consistency.

Budget of £200

Iberital, happy donkey

Got one of these for my birthday of the Mrs. It is brilliant.

http://www.hartsofstur.com/acatalog/Gaggia_MDF_Coffee_Grinder.html?gclid=CK7C0LGA7rUCFZDKtAodUnUAWg

Rancillo Rocky had mine for 6 years used every day no worries

Not being funny, my Bodum one was twenty quid. Works fine.

HD0869 Iberital MC5 Grinder + FREEBIES – LIMITED TIME OFFER

+1 for the iberital

Eureka Mignon if you can stretch to it above the MC2.

**** hell.

I have a Bodum one. Really guys. You need to take a good look at yourselves if you can spend almost two hundred quid on a grinder. It cost me twenty quid and has been going or years. It’s great.

Why do you need more than that?

**** hell.

I have a Bodum one. Really guys. You need to take a good look at yourselves if you can spend almost two hundred quid on a grinder. It cost me twenty quid and has been going or years. It’s great.

Why do you need more than that?

I got a bike from from the local sports shop for £99 and got one free, why do you need to spend more than that?

The iberital from happy donkey is the one to go for, just make sure you order the doserless one as grinds sit in the doser and go stale unless you are pulling a lot of shots in a cafe.

could list lots of differences between a cheap bike and an expensive one – but as I know nothing about coffe grinders – can someone please explain the difference in the fragments of bean produced from a £20 grinder and a £200 one.

A cheap grinder will have blades so produce dust plus various fragments of different sizes which is useless for espresso.
for espresso you need fine grounds of consistent size. They come with flat or conical burrs, big flat burrs are often preferred, a slower rpm motor means less heat (a good thing) it’s no good having good burs if the worm drive that adjusts them is plastic (cheap grinders) or the spindle and bearings have play in them as this means the spindle can move side to side (inconsistent grind)
Commercial grinders start at about £500 so £150-£200 for a home grinder is where you start to get value for money, the marhlkonig vario is the next step up at £300 which gets you electronic control and the ability to change the grind setting but be able to repeat a previous setting without having to twiddle a knob back and forth to fine tune the grind (only needed if you need to swap between espresso and filter grinds)

As above and also that nearly all of the sub £100 grinders don’t grind fine enough for real expresso machine use. Fine if u are using them for filter use though.

So 1300rpm is a slow grind?

I’ve got a cheap “James Martin Design” one (re-badged Wahl) . I’ve sanded the pig-eyed arsehole’s name off the front and it works fine.

Harry_the_Spider – Member
I’ve got a cheap “James Martin Design” one (re-badged Wahl) . I’ve sanded the pig-eyed arsehole’s name off the front and it works fine.

Is that James Martin, TV chef and wannabe racing driver? Your description sounds like one of his recipes 🙂

I got a Macap M4 off Coffeecortes on fleaBay. They have ex demo units on there for about half normal price. Having a decent grinder does make a difference. I started with a cheap blade ‘grinder’ that wouldn’t produce anything that would work with my machine. I then got the supplier to grind which produced nice espresso but you could tell it was drying out/going stale over time.

Having a decent grinder lets you freshly grind exactly how much you want at exactly the right grind for your machine and it does make a significant difference. It’s hard to justify £££’s ‘just for coffee’ but we don’t struggle with discretionary expenditure on here do we?

ha ha no, not something suffered around here. The only grinder ive ever used was a hand one inhereted from my grandfather. no blades and did the job – I fear my buds wouldnt notice the difference enough to justify the expense of anything more

Kitchen Aid, it looks like a 50s Ray Gun, job done.

Harry_the_Spider – Member
I’ve got a cheap “James Martin Design” one (re-badged Wahl) . I’ve sanded the pig-eyed arsehole’s name off the front and it works fine.

Genuine LOL. 😀

Thanks for all the replies, I’ll look at all the recommendations and you’ve all been a great help.

Particular like the look of the deal at Happy Donkey on the Iberital MC5.

And, yes a good quality grinder does make all the difference to the coffee – don’t mind paying the money for something that will give good taste and long term efficiency.

Bought one of these Gaggiathe grind quality is consistant and there are more settings than you can shake a stick at gets the right espresso grind.
It’s got a couple of little of quirks but it’s not missed a beat and I’d recommend one. It’s a 4 out of 5 from me 🙄
Cheap grinder chop where as when you get a slightly more expensive grinder are burr grinders and tend not to hack your beans to death getting the best out of the beans.

You’ll find it does make a difference.Some beans grind different to others so you’ll find you can’t just stick it on setting 4 and get the same results every time(unless of course you only buy one type of bean)

Second hand Mazzer SuperJolly (got mine for £100 a few years back), new set of burrs, job done. If you’re only grinding one shot at a time, you can take the enormous hopper off and just plug the top with a spare tamper.

You can smash beans to a pulp using anything & TBH I can’t tell the difference once the coffee’s made which grinder’s been used 😉

Rancillo Rocky had mine for 6 years used every day no worries

That reflects exactly my experience & it’s been an absolute pleasure to own 8)

D.

I’ve got a cheap “James Martin Design” one (re-badged Wahl)

Hey cool, it’ll match my kettle.