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Breville Smart Grinder Pro 40% off at Amazon Au Coffee Grinding machine
Breville The Smart Grinder Pro Coffee Grinder, Brushed Stainless Steel BCG820BSS $269 Delivered @ Amazon AU
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silenthillrocks on 09/07/2023 - 10:45 amazon.com.au (2840 clicks)
Last edited 09/07/2023 - 15:07 by 1 other user
Last edited 09/07/2023 - 15:07 by 1 other user
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May i know why it's not good for espresso? I never had high end grinder so this is good enough lol. Thanks.
Thanks, i need to be more coffee connoisseur to upgrade tho. ATM, I'm quiet happy with my espresso and long black but I'm no coffee expert.
Eureka mignon manuale is also good option, cheaper and similar performance to specialita at ~$402 delivered.
Definitely worth the $130 extra for much higer quality burr and finer adjustments compared to breville.
Can you provide a link for that?
I just purchased a baratza encore ESP as I intend to mokka and V60 most of the time, but want the option to espresso in the future. Is the Eureka mignon manuale as flexible in that sense?
@Kill Joy: No. Eureka grinders are very hard to switch between filter and espresso. You probably need something like Varia vs3 or DF64.
@carlJack: I agree, the dial is less than optimal. But if you have a 3D printer, this makes it very easy to switch between filter and espresso on any (I think) Eureka Mignon (I have the manuale). I printed it and love it.
https://www.printables.com/model/473351-grind-setting-dial-v…
@ASA: The dial is a bloody pain to print though with the 2 colors (one embedded in the other). Probably my 0.6mm nozzle causing issues with slicing it, but I really don't want to switch back to 0.4 for it…
I've decided I'm just going to have to print the dial upside down (in black) and print the numbers on top (in white).I'm thinking of trying to remix it for easier printing…
@NigelTufnel: It is actually a bit of a pain. I turned them upside down and printed the numbers first in white, then started another print over the top of that in black. I was getting terrible results with the numbers until I realised my 1st layer calibration was crap (I am a noob with a new printer!). I fixed that and got pretty decent results. I am also using a 0.4 nozzle.
All up it was worth the hassle because (a) I learnt a lot and (b) the flexibility of being able to accurately move around grind settings, not to mention keep accurate recordings of what I've done.
But yeah, maybe just print in black and paint on the numbers. A really helpful guy in the comments made his own stick on dial numbers. He sent it to me but we both realised he had the numbers upside down. Still looks great. You'd need to print to a sticker or something - or maybe a cricut machine… but another option. DM me if you want it or ask the guy if you can find it in the comments.
@ASA: Cheers mate. I've printed it. The numbers just look a bit crap. Printed them as 2 layers on top of the cog.
I've been working on a remix of it that should be easier printing (just pause and change). Will upload to printables when I've printed and checked it…
@Kill Joy: Eureka are a stepless grinder/dial which is great for full range and minute adjustments. But the problem is that the dial is too small. It doesn't have a marking for every position so it's impossible to know exactly what setting you were using if you need to toggle between an espresso and filter grind setting. Do not recommend. You could look at a Baratza Sette 270 or DF64v
It's a step up from this grinder for sure. But full disclosure, it's not just missing the electronic dosing and display that the Specialita has. It has smaller burrs as well (50mm vs 55mm). Tbh I'd just bypass this grinder price point and get a DF64v
@sAmiZZle: Yeah DF64 meant to be good.. but even then there are recommended extras and mods isn't there..?
@G-rig: The newer V model doesn't require the mods as such. It improves upon all the issues with the declumper, dial and zeroing, etc with the addition of rpm control.
@sAmiZZle: It's good they sorted that out, shouldn't have to do mods to a $750 machine. Mind you the new version is about $400 more expensive.
@sAmiZZle: Interesting. I think for now since the Encore ESP is on its way, i'll stick with that. I only have a cheap manual grinder right now and am sure it'll be a big upgrade. If I hit the limits of the encore ESP I'll look to rehome it and see whats best in the DF64V's price range by then.
Thanks for everyones feedback and advice.
@sAmiZZle: I agree but its too much of a workout, especially when trying to pump out a few for guests.
It's barely good enough, I get so much spurting and channeling from mine even after switching beans and stirring with needles.
Which beans do you use?
@John Doh: Most coffee beans of different roast levels but never old ones unless I'm seasoning the burrs.
Without knowing anything about the Brevilles I'd get a sunbeam conical burr grinder (mine is an EM0480, who knows if the new ones are as good quality).
No chanelling with average aldi beans :).
https://files.ozbargain.com.au/upload/213835/104943/pxl_2023…Sky is the limit with these machines and hobbies.. also don't mind the saying buy right buy once but haven't felt the need to upgrade to be honest.
@G-rig: I don't know which cretin negged but obviously they don't make these 'kitchen brand' appliances like they used to.
Will post of vid of the next shot I do - with a botomless portafilter it's plain that the shot is fine. The weakpoint would be the beans now. Great bang for buck. Not vouching for the maching in the OP btw, just demonstrating you don't need to spend excessively.
It'd be either comparable or better than the inbuilt grinder in my barista express. Which after buying fresh roasted beans and fixing all my technique issues, I very rarely get channeling.
If you're using beans without a roast date, change that first.
@John Doh: I was torturing myself with supermarket beans and raging to my mate that espresso was stupid and I was over it. They just sit way too long in the supermarket supply chain.
Changed to somewhere that roasts to ship and immediately started getting logical changes as I changed my technique. SF happy
I'm here to help.
1. What pressure is your machine set to?
2. What size portafilter have you got?
3. What dose (in grams) do you use?
4. Are you using the pressurised basket? (If so, stop this nonsense and change to the double shot unpressurized basket)
Out of the box, it doesn't grind fine enough. However, you can adjust the fixed grinding burr (instructions are in the manual), and once you do that, it grinds well enough for espresso. I needed to go 2 steps finer on the burr adjustment.
I had to do this on my barista express too. Couldn't work out why water was pissing through even on the finest grind setting.
Changed my burrs 2 steps as well which put my typical grind right in the middle of the adjustment wheel.
Odd, I have this and grind on 10 or 11; if I go below that then nothing gets through
@dtc: 11 is usually perfect for me too. That's with a pretty firm but not excessive tamp. It probably has a lot to do with the pressure of the machine though?
@Sleepycat3: The beans shouldnt make a difference between 'cannot grind fine enough at all' and '11 is a good number'. It might make a difference between, say, 7 and 11 or something like that.
@dtc: Might be time for me to add a shim. Mine is pretty stable in my BES920 at grind 5.
Actually - I'll let sleeping dogs lie - it's fine.
Haven't seen it sub 200 for years now.
Lowest i ve seen recently was $249 n thot it's a good deal alr.
This hasn't been $180 since 2020. Cheapest it has been in the last 12 months is $230
I agree. Also it'll be worth $20 once used. Pay more for a Eureka Mignon
wtf are you talking about not good for espresso? false! This thing is great for espresso.
Then you don't know what a good espresso is lol
This grinder is rubbish for espresso. Lots of clumping and retentionisn't that why people get those fancy little tools?
@G-rig: That's not a magic tool. Sure it will make it better than not using but a wdt tool doesn't make a crappy grinder perform like a high quality grinder. You can't miraculously make a high quality espresso using a cheap grinder that grinds inconsistently
@dji1111111: probably, but where is the cutoff? The things being recommended are 2X the price of most coffee mahcines they will be used with (exclamation mark!).
I don't think it's that hard unless i'm lucky or skillful. Takes a bit of care but usually grind stright into the basket and do a few mini-tamps to get it even and not make a mess. The washer mod makes it go pretty fine so whatever, good enough I think.
@G-rig: How long is a piece of string but you can spend a bit more if you are serious about making decent coffee at home. Funny people have no hesitation buying coffee for 5-6 bucks twice a day every single day but they think a few hundred dollars for a grinder that lasts 10 years or more potentially is too much money.
500-600 gets you a much better entry level grinder. Also grinder is more important than your espresso machine
@dji1111111: the thing is you could buy a coffee out or spend 2k. I'd rather get the machine and skills going, they last a long time if you look after them and can be bothered servicing and upgrading. back in the day I could have got a rocky grinder and probably should have but this was surprisingly solid and a good bundle with the Gaggia Classic for $500 all up.
I can upload a video, what amount of seconds do you consider channelling to be after hitting go?
@G-rig: I have a similar mindset. No bitterness and minimal channelling with my shots. Got 1:2 ratio with 9 bars pressure. I can't really taste the sweet note so far but I came to believe the key is mostly fresh roasted quality beans (in my case off course). I may be wrong since I never had experience with higher end grinder. If the Eureka machine is on sale then may be I'm willing to experiment. Lol. I'd be interested to see Ur video btw. PM me :)
@Bargain-er: Not the best shot, tamped a bit hard. Usually stops chanelling after a few seconds.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5MfMzg290yE
@G-rig: Most people who know coffee would say the grinder is much more important than the coffee machine.
@dji1111111: Let s say I spent more time breaking the clump and stirring the ground with wdt. Any other benefits flavour wise with a better grinder? Thanks
@Bargain-er: As i said it's not just clumping that's the problem. These grinders produce inconsistent grind which will impact flavour. As with most things If you haven't used/experienced something better you don't know what you are missing out on.
@dji1111111: @XeKayeM Oh right which one do you have?
Depends on how much you want to spend overall. Most people should just pony up 2.5k to start with.No doubt these ones are crap, what are your thoughts on the sunbream cafe series i mentioned? I'm sure the manual conical burr adjustments are a lot better than all the integrated autos on entry level auto machines.
Ok sure, everyone wants suggestions.@G-rig: I wouldn't buy a grinder from any appliance brands. They are all much the muchness.
You can get eureka grinders for not that much more
@dji1111111: I guess I need to have a blind fold test and notice a big difference to spend and upgrade :)
@Bargain-er: Ability to maintain uniformity at finer grind settings. This becomes more important for espresso as opposed to pour over since pour over does not require such fine grind settings (having said that uniformity still comes into play especially with lighter roasts). Flat burr grinders are generally going to beat conical for espresso 9 times out of 10 and bring out more character, clarity and acidity from medium to light roast beans (fruitier notes, etc)
what utter rubbish! you wouldn't be able to tell difference in a blind taste with two dialed in machines. you probably used to buy monster HDMI cables for $199 yeah ?
@noise36: once you put milk and or sugar in, the taste is masked by at least 50%
@dji1111111 I get your point and it's all ideal, depends how much of a perfectionist you are in general. Do you spend 2x the price on an amp as on your speakers etc? Mine is 50mm so should be ok.
@G-rig: People are free to spend however much money feel like spending on non essential things like a coffee grinder. Not everyone wants to spend 800 bucks on it and that's fine. Just don't kid yourself that this grinder can produce similar results as a much more expensive grinder. That would just be delusional
@dji1111111: Fair enough people can spend on what they desire.
It's also a funny hobby being so subjective and spending twice doesn't equal twice the enjoyment.
It's probably more helpful suggesting better alternatives for similar or sensible money. No one is going to spend $800 instead of $200.
@G-rig: There's been two mentioned in this thread already. They don't cost 800 - Eureka and sette. Both are miles better than this grinder. I would even get second hand of those grinders than buy this brand new.
Alternatively you can buy this and then years down the track buy another one realising it's just not very good@dji1111111: I could upgrade but happy with mine, the coffee machine is only worth so much. If I got a better machine then I would.
The coffee I make is still better than most cafes, better off just improving your technique and taking a bit of care.
@G-rig: With milk and sugar, there won't be taste difference between this grinder or expensive ones. Probably people drinking the concentrate as it is might be able to tell some difference.
@John Doh: Wow really? If you really think that there is no hope… i wonder why milk based coffee from crappy cafes still tastes so bad then..
@noise36: Lol non sense? I used to own this grinder. If a 250 dollar grinder does everything a much more expensive grinder does, nobody would be buying the expensive ones. If you think a puny 40mm burr can result in the same quality grind as 60-70mm burrs produce, i guess no education on this topic by anyone will help
@John Doh: Also the subjective factor of what constitutes a good coffee.
I mean, I bought this grinder and a Bambino Plus for about $550 total just before going into COVID lockdown, and it's served me pretty well since then. Once you dial in your beans and technique you can easily get coffee that tastes as good or better than half the cafe coffees I've had, and not far off from some of the better ones either. Could I get better results from a better machine? Sure. But that wasn't an investment I really wanted to make at the time, and not entirely sure I'd see that much value in doing it now either.
@dontpanic: I have a Breville Barista express and use Major Tom beans from ground control coffee and mum says she finds the coffee (with milk and sugar) as good as most good cafes. For me its more of beans choice first. The rest is optimal tuning of whatever hardware you have.
The costly ones are for those who are in search of fine tuning further and who consider this as a hobby. Most people dont need it tho, but nothing wrong in splashing more on grinders if you love coffee so much and find fine tuning fun :)
@dji1111111: I dont agree to the point that a 600$ grinder coffee tastes twice as good as 300$ grinder, especially if you make a flatwhite or cuppochino. How do I know? My office has a 2000$ grinder and i have a barista express built in grinder at home, which is the same as this grinder.
@John Doh: Tastes twice as good? What does that even mean? You are mixing your subjective assessment and comparing to a hard set of numbers like cost of the grinder? Is that meant to be persuasive?
There are so many variable here so it makes your comment a pretty much moot point.
@John Doh: Same thing can be said about this grinder. Is it twice as good as a 120 dollar grinder? Lol
Just throwing the term the law of diminishing returns everywhere doesn't make you look smarter.@John Doh: I don't have a gold plated grinder either. I upgraded from Breville to Eureka Specialiata (which I only paid 550 AUD or so from Espresso Coffee Shop in UK). The difference is night and day. I'm definitely not into paying ridiculous amount of money for that tiny incremental difference.
@dji1111111: OK, according to you what % of difference in taste did it change upgrading the grinder say if you had flatwhite from both? Say 10 to 15%? Just asking. I understand everybodys taste buds are different.
@G-rig: You stop where it aligns to your budget, needs and wants. Nobody can tell you how much to spend on a grinder lol
Nothing will however change the fact that this grinder does a pretty crap job at best for espresso.
@dji1111111: True. I don't even have this one but suggested a more manual alternative for the same or cheaper,which I have, and doing the job just fine.
It's a bad grinder for just about anything, particularly if you drink specialty coffee.
Source: I have this damn grinder.
If you consider inflation, then the price is ok.
My 4yo Breville Barista Express has just ground a double bean dose, started making a rattling noise instead of grinding and produces no grounds. Also I can't easily move the grind coarseness dial and I won't be forcing it for now. I imagine some cog in the grinder worn away or moved (?) and now slips, hence the rattling sound. Or something is blocking it, hence I also can't move the dial.
That's just what I picture and now I'm not sure if I'm buying this grinder (was ~$150 pre-covid!) or am I embarking on a mission to fix BBE. The machine still pumps, it's just its grinder.
They’re relatively easy to disassemble and put back together so you can check it out before spending the cash on another grinder
The Breville benchtop grinders are quite noisy btw
You should also be able to buy a replacement part from the Breville website. They list a lot of parts as accessories on the product pages.
Sounds like what happened to my first gen Smart Grinder. Breville stupidly (or maybe on purpose) used plastic instead of metal for the impeller which dispenses the ground coffee. Over time it breaks down and gets jammed. You can 3D print a replacement from Thingiverse (I think).
It doesn’t happen on the second gen grinder.
Thanks, everyone. I braced myself, got the toolbox and decided to check it right away.
Turned out there was a bad, very hard bean in Aldi's Medium Roast and it blocked the burrs. I had to chisel it with a pointy knife until I could remove it. Only after that I was able to remove the upper burr (in the pictures it's the one with the steel handle and red arrow pointing at ALIGN) and clean it all, but overall that one bean - or a hard piece of whatever it was - was blocking the grinder.
BTW, I cleaned the plastic insert in the portafilter for the first time, so after 4 years of making coffee and mine looked worse than the one on Reddit…
I also cleaned my portafilter shame under the plastic. 3+ years worth.
It's also worth taking the lower burr and the discharge disc out (easy enough with a socket) and cleaning the area below and the dump chute to the filter.
I thought mine was shagged, but it turned out that after 5 years there was enough build up in the chute to stop grounds flowing from the grinder proper. Cleaned it up and running beatifully again.
I removed that plastic altogether. Don't see the point in keeping it there and hot liquid flowing over plastic.
Yeah, what's the point of it? These people don't know either.
One person in the comments says:
From Breville: "It is to prevent heat loss when brewing and to also prevent any spurting or spitting from the espresso when it comes out. Espresso can be brewed without that insert in the portafilter but it is not recommended for the reasons listed."
Speaking of spurting and spitting - I have no idea how to prevent that in a bottomless portafilter. Espresso goes everywhere at every possible angle and direction in my case and it doesn't seem like a design flaw. I tried various beans, coarseness, amount, tamping pressure.
@pizzaguy: Could also just be the pressure of the machine… A lot of consumer machines brew at too high pressure at stock. Unless you can mod that, it's probably unlikely to completely rid yourself of spurts ..
@NigelTufnel: I tried packing less and using the infusion (lower) pressure in my BBE only, still lots of stray streams. I simply hold the cup under the basket and catch it all.
Bottomless is merely a gimmick, great for your hip barista videos, but it's convenient to have two portafilters and my other one happens to be bottomless…
@pizzaguy: Yeah. I've found bottomless to be good for training myself in my puck prep as much as possible. But on my Dedica, spurting is inevitable so I usually use my standard portafilter day-to-day to avoid extra cleanup.
bottomless to be good for training
As in if it flows smooth without spitting everywhere then it's a well formed puck? I may start playing around (or training) then and see, for real.
Do you do that with every new sort of beans you get?
As in if it flows smooth without spitting everywhere then it's a well formed puck?
Yeah, you can see pretty easily if you're getting particular channelling with bottomless. Might be due to your tamping technique, or need to do WDT, or maybe a puck screen?
Once you've got the technique mostly figured out and repeatable, you should be able to go back to standard and assume it's mostly fine.Do you do that with every new sort of beans you get?
Usually not, don't have time mostly, but dialling in a new bean is mostly about getting the timing/ratio/grind right to get the best taste (the puck prep should be the same regardless).
@NigelTufnel: Thanks, that's some food for thought.
I've been just fine with my pucks and coffees, but with that bottomless portafilter I see there might be room for improvement then.
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Good grinder for the price. But if you drink espresso, it isn't so good for that.
Also I don't think it has ever been $449… This is quite a normal price for it. It sometimes drops to around $180.