# Interesting coffee kit



## 4085 (Nov 23, 2012)

Does anyone have anything interesting, perhaps different from the usual stuff we all have? I like to collect quirky things and perhaps others do as well. My passion is old coffee machines, or different ways of coffee extraction, including but not exclusively espresso.

If you have anything, why not post a picture of it?


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## lookseehear (Jul 16, 2010)

I was going to wait until I had made a bit more progress before posting but here's my work-in-progress DIY hand coffee grinder based around a 40mm conical burr set. I can go into more detail if there's interest.


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## funinacup (Aug 30, 2010)

lookseehear said:


> I can go into more detail if there's interest.


Err....YES! Looks brilliant Luke.


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## 4085 (Nov 23, 2012)

Thats very interesting! Is the design borrowed, or all your own? And how far off working is it?

Keep them coming peeps!


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## lookseehear (Jul 16, 2010)

Here's a bit more info then! The basic design (using square aluminium for the main body) was borrowed from @pourmoreover on twitter and inspired by this tweet but my design is quite different from his after that. He kindly let me buy some burrs but I think that was a one off as he has bought them to make and sell his own hand grinders. His is a much more professional looking thing but mine was made with very few tools (and I prefer my burr adjustment mechanism








). Initially me and Mark (fatboyslim) were talking about making them together but I've only got tools back at my parents house so I've just bought enough materials to make two with the plan to get started on the other one when this one is functional.

It would work now if I could attach a handle and had a funnel to get the beans into the burrs. I've got the material for the handle and I've got an idea for the funnel but it might just be temporary and get 'upgraded' at a later date.

Here's a pic of the components separately:










The main part is box aluminium that I bought then cut to length with a hacksaw then filed down to the right length. The burrs are 40mm (I think) hardened steel Italmill burrs and look very similar to the burrs in the OE Lido. The main things I wanted to achieve were to have something solid for pourover brewing with easy grind adjustment and a clear path from the burrs to whatever collecting box/vessel I end up using. The ones made by Matt (@pourmoreover) have the axle going all the way through the case but I was keen not to have that interfering with the grounds if possible as I thought it might get a bit gunked up.

I initially bought some stainless steel to use as an axle but I didn't realise quite how hard it is to work. The grind adjustment mechanism I wanted to use meant I needed to thread the axle part of the way and that wasn't going to happen with the stainless unless I had a lathe - which I don't! My other half's dad is an engineer and suggested Nylon as an alternative as it is easily workable and has pretty good stiffness. I bought a length of 10mm diameter nylon but it turns out it is always produced oversize so that you can work it down to the required size. This ended up being pretty useful as it meant I could sand it down using a drill as a makeshift lathe so that it's a close fit in the brass bearings but leave the end a bit more oversized so that I could friction fit it into the inner burr using a g-clamp (it isn't coming out of there any time soon!).



















Burr alignment is pretty simple and a thumb nut on the top of the axle means I can set the grind coarseness pretty easily. The nice thing about the nylon as well is that it grips the thumb nut enough that the grind setting isn't going to walk at all - this was a bit of a blessing as the mechanism I had in mind would have been a bit more complicated.

I'll try and keep this updated (maybe I should start a new thread with more detail) as it progresses but I'm a bit tied up with exams for a couple of week


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