# Another lens hood mod for any grinder



## Charliej (Feb 25, 2012)

So having been watching the comments recently regarding weight of beans on the burrs making grind quality and dose amount more consistent I decided to look into making a larger lens hood fit the throat of an RR45 or RR55 and discovered that you can purchase a 52mm male thread to 58 mm female thread adaptor such as this:

http://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/Practical-52mm-58mm-52-to-58-Step-Up-Filter-Ring-Adapter-Black-UK-/130968496127?pt=UK_Photography_CameraLenses_Lens_caps_hoods_adaptors_ET&hash=item1e7e54a7ff

Or you could go even bigger and get a 52mm-72mm adaptor again 52mm male thread 72mm female thread:

http://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/52mm-72mm-52-72-mm-52-to-72-Step-Up-Filter-Ring-Stepping-Adapter-Adaptor-Black-/320979076869?pt=UK_Photography_Adapter_Rings&hash=item4abbd80705

I'm thinking of going with the 72mm version just need to take a trip to tesco or maybe ikea with a tape measure to find a lid.

What does anyone think of this idea, of course the step up adaptors are available for 58mm as well so this can be done on a Mazzer too. I'm waiting on finding a suitable lid but I think this should give me better grind and dose consistency with the larger weight of beans, the 52mm hood I use currently gives me ~95g of beans over the burrs.


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## Xpenno (Nov 12, 2012)

I'm not sure (and happy to be corrected) that the weight on the beans issue is related directly to the amount of weight. I think that the issue is for those of us who are single dosing, hence have nothing to consistently push the beans into the burrs, hence you get popcorning and the beans get smashed up rather the ground down.

Maybe there is a correlation between the actual weight on the beans and quality of the grind, I'm interested to hear others thoughts.


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## Charliej (Feb 25, 2012)

Well the consensus on amount of beans in the "hopper" seemed to also apply to those of using timed dose on demand grinders for the same reasons as those of you single dosing as the grinders are all gravity fed and also for pushing the beans through so that the timed dose becomes more consistent for ~£3 its something I'm going to give a try.


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## Xpenno (Nov 12, 2012)

Charliej said:


> Well the consensus on amount of beans in the "hopper" seemed to also apply to those of using timed dose on demand grinders for the same reasons as those of you single dosing as the grinders are all gravity fed and also for pushing the beans through so that the timed dose becomes more consistent for ~£3 its something I'm going to give a try.


Good stuff and as you say for the money it's got to be worth testing.

Any idea how the throat size of the RR55 compare to the Royal? I should have some mods arriving this week that I've had 3d printed for my royal, not sure if they would be transferable to other grinders though. If they work then the principles should though.


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## Charliej (Feb 25, 2012)

The throat on an RR55 is 52mm not sure on the Royal but I think a 58mm lens hood is the one to fit, luckily I have the on demand RR55 which delivers a lovely pile of grind right into the centre of the portafilter and I haven't seen any clumping worth mentioning from it yet.


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## Xpenno (Nov 12, 2012)

Hey man, did you get around to trying this? Just wondered if the extra weight had helped/improved things at all?

Spence


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## Charliej (Feb 25, 2012)

I've ordered the bits and pieces but they haven't arrived yet will report back when they do.


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## Pompeyexile (Dec 2, 2013)

Charliej, I know I'm probably being a bit thick here but from a previous post of yours and also as shown on your set-up picture where you recommend the 52mm rubber lens hood it is shown as a hood with high sides giving a small bowl shape into which your beans sit.

However, the ones you are recommending here now when I look at them seem to be almost flat which makes them look like they wouldn't hold many beans at all. Am I missing something?

The reason I ask is that my Brasilia RR55OD should be with me on Monday and I was about to order the original hood you suggested and have and take a trip to the supermarket myself to find a lid to fit.


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## coffeechap (Apr 5, 2012)

i think i have a hood that fits it but will have to check..


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## Charliej (Feb 25, 2012)

Pompeyexile said:


> Charliej, I know I'm probably being a bit thick here but from a previous post of yours and also as shown on your set-up picture where you recommend the 52mm rubber lens hood it is shown as a hood with high sides giving a small bowl shape into which your beans sit.
> 
> However, the ones you are recommending here now when I look at them seem to be almost flat which makes them look like they wouldn't hold many beans at all. Am I missing something?
> 
> The reason I ask is that my Brasilia RR55OD should be with me on Monday and I was about to order the original hood you suggested and have and take a trip to the supermarket myself to find a lid to fit.


The original one such I have in the picture about my setup works just fine, I have basically decided to have a play around to see if I can improve on it. If you make sure to buy the 3 stage collapsible hoods they are just a bigger version of the one I'm currently using. For the sake of roughly £3 it's an experiment worth trying, the links I included earlier are just the adapter rings not the hoods themselves.


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## Charliej (Feb 25, 2012)

So the bits for the Mark 2 72mm lens hood mini hopper arrived, I screwed them together, replaced the 52mm hood and all was looking good, I didn't yet have a lid thought. I filled the new version with beans and started to grind, it was only after the beans already in the throat of the grinder were used up I realised something was wrong, the lip that the 52mm-72mm thread adapter left between the hood and the throat was way to big and beans were getting caught up and not feeding into the throat properly, I guess a 20mm lip was behaving more like a platform. If I could be bothered to get something to smooth out the lip by building up the ledge into a slope it may work, but that's on the back burner whilst I try and work out what would be simple and cost effective to achieve this. Meanwhile I've ordered a 52mm-58mm thread converter and a 58mm collapsible hood and the difference there I can build up with some Sugru.


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## Charliej (Feb 25, 2012)

So the bits for the Brasilia Mini Hopper Mk3 have arrived and I just had to find a lid, searched all the supermarkets and found nothing so had a scout around local charity shops and found a tub of body butter for 75p which had a nice shiny lid just the right size.

  

SAM_0047 by charliejeal, on Flickr

Mk1

  

SAM_0051 by charliejeal, on Flickr

Mk3. This one works so much better than the attempt with a 72mm lens hood and reducer ring, and the extra weight of beans seems to help with consistency and also far easier to load beans than with the 52mm hood. It also looks more in proportion as well and the nice shiny lid matches the shiny funnel.


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## El carajillo (Mar 16, 2013)

If you keep on adding lens hoods it will be the same size as a Mythos


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## Charliej (Feb 25, 2012)

Lol, the 58mm one is about as far as you can realistically go without the reducer ring creating a significant ledge which when using the 72mm one messed with beans feeding into the throat. Its also taller than it looks as the lid comes over the sides its about 7mm taller than the 52mm one and obviously a lot wider.


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## irishcoffee42 (Jan 31, 2014)

Love this idea, Charlie.

Just wondering if anyone has done a similar lens hood mod for the Iberital MC2?

I measured the external diameter of the throat of the supplied hopper to be 33.60mm / 1.325", which is probably too small to hope for a lens hood that fits (but does seem to be the external diameter of standard 1" pressure pipe).


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## Charliej (Feb 25, 2012)

irishcoffee42 said:


> Love this idea, Charlie.
> 
> Just wondering if anyone has done a similar lens hood mod for the Iberital MC2?
> 
> I measured the external diameter of the throat of the supplied hopper to be 33.60mm / 1.325", which is probably too small to hope for a lens hood that fits (but does seem to be the external diameter of standard 1" pressure pipe).


It's not my idea originally credit for that has to go to Coffechap for suggesting it for Mazzer grinders so when I got my RR55 I found one to fit that and then recently noticed the thread adapters. I did have a look for something to use the same idea on an MC2 whilst I still had mine and couldn't figure out anything that would fit and actually be any better than the standard hopper. I used to single dose with the MC2 and sit a bag of rice on the beans for some added weight.


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## El carajillo (Mar 16, 2013)

irishcoffee42 said:


> Love this idea, Charlie.
> 
> Just wondering if anyone has done a similar lens hood mod for the Iberital MC2?
> 
> I measured the external diameter of the throat of the supplied hopper to be 33.60mm / 1.325", which is probably too small to hope for a lens hood that fits (but does seem to be the external diameter of standard 1" pressure pipe).


If you obtain a short end of 32 mm waste pipe you can abrade it down or heat it and squeeze it down it will fit into the MC 2. You could then stretch a lens hood over the stub of pipe !!


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## Charliej (Feb 25, 2012)

El carajillo said:


> If you obtain a short end of 32 mm waste pipe you can abrade it down or heat it and squeeze it down it will fit into the MC 2. You could then stretch a lens hood over the stub of pipe !!


Hell of a faff though a 250g bag of rice get the job done with an MC2 and much easier to deal with it when deep clean time comes around again.


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