Again, you are mistaken.
I am not interested in roasting theory, I am simply comparing machines.
From reading this forum, I get the sense that there are two main types of Bullet roasters:
-
The ones that like fruity and flavorful natural coffees
-
The ones that like a traditional dark 2nd Crack coffee
I was quite surprised how 2nd crack appears to taste sweeter on the Bullet that it would on a gas machine. My assumption is that because the Bullet may roast less even, there is an element of medium roast within the 2nd crack profile on the Bullet.
But I cannot really say, because I have had machine issues and I don’t know what is specific to my machine and what is specific to the Bullet design.
Swapping two parts got my machine closer to good operation, but something’s are still off, and my rear chaff filter has warped again. Which seems to mess up my airflow.
I am trying to figure out where my machine is behaving differently.
I’ll be buying roasted beans from another Bullet user soon, but they roast naturals, so I have to figure out how to get roasted washed beans from them.
There aren’t any people on this forum that post regularly that live close enough for me to try out their machine to see if their machine is any better or not. But for now, I am just looking for people on this forum that are willing to exchange roasting parameters and notes and even possibly ship beans back and forth.
So far, I have not been able to get smooth profile curves with washed coffees, like the nice curves we see on coffee mind. I there are times when adding a flick in development tastes better than a coffee mind curve. the coffemind curves taste of defect when I use them. Sometimes burnt, sometimes grassy, sometimes baked.
Moving over to see the airflow temperature helps me avoid baking at least. I noticed my airflow temperature can drop while the IBTS is still rising.
There are certainly factors like bad beans and even a muddy character can come from some grinders. I feel like the Baratza Encore leans more into the earthy flavors than a nicely aligned EK with nice burrs might. So, one certainly can’t blame everything on the roasting machine.
Currently, on my machine, I get pretty good results just leaving the setting at P9 right through FC and then dial back after that. But it runs the risk of irregular burn marks or oily beans. But I thought it was funny that P9 all the way made better espresso than a coffeemind curve on my machine. Something has to be wrong there. And that is not my opinion, that was in a blind taste test with a pro. Haha.
So, i tend to believe I have a machine with some bad tolerance somewhere and that ends up causing some issue with heat transfer.
That all being said, I learn a lot by things going wrong, more than I do from everything going well. So perhaps I make the most of a bad situation. However, it has caused me to lose way too much money, and I need to move on. I just keep reading this forum and people seem to be roasting up good stuff and I want to believe I can make the bullet work too. And I am too poor to change my system right now.
Support didn’t believe me at first, but we fixed something eventually. Took a long long time, but eventually we improve things, but never fixed it.
Is the Bullet just bad at washed coffees and medium roasts? I never get “silky” or “caramelized”. I get steamed, grass, herbal, earthy (and sweet earthy), burnt, char. Car tire.
Some of the best I have had were a nice interplay of brown sugar and sweet citrus grass. It just didn’t brew in drip machines, so I decided against focusing on those profiles. I liked it, until my machine airflow got worse. Eventually swapping out the rear chaff container helped with clarity and sweetness, but then that one warped and my roasts got earthy again. So why does my chaff container warp with normal use? Apparently no one else has reported warping. I believe it messes with the airflow and therefore the roasting.
But what do I know. Right? I’m just looking for an easy fix, right?
Yes, I believe there is some physical issue, but how or what is unclear.
What has been useful is learning what other people’s results are and seeing how my machine behaves.
I started a thread about best default recipes, and realized my induction board was overheating and made roasting larger batches difficult, and that helped me find out I needed to fix that. However, it took other proof to convince anyone else though. So it was still months before a fix was possible.