vico Senior Member Joined: 6 Nov 2009 Posts: 76 Location: carlsbad, ca
Posted Wed Mar 17, 2010, 2:06pm Subject: Hot Top Owners Thread
Just got my H T B last week and am roasting up a storm. Problem is I can't drink or give away fast enough all the coffee I want to roast. Hopefully that desire will slow down when the newness wears off. But there are so many regions, so many roast types, so many blending possibilities, etc, I don't know. It's really enjoyable though and I'm hoping it can be a life time hobby. My question is, how come there isn't a Hot Top owners thread, either B, P or all models combined? I'm sure there are enough owners with experiences and comments to share as well as newbies like me with questions. Any comments?
vico Senior Member Joined: 6 Nov 2009 Posts: 76 Location: carlsbad, ca
Posted Thu Mar 18, 2010, 6:56am Subject: Re: Hot Top Owners Thread
That's what I think. I just don't have any experience yet to make a good start. Perhaps a more experienced roaster can tell us newbies how long a roast should last. For instance, I can't get mine to go very far into the 1st crack w/o them getting scary dark, and that takes approx 13 1/2 minutes. Should I slow down by keeping the temp lower using the heating element button or fan. Is there a more appropriate time during the roast to use and not use the fan. What would be a first step or two to take after doing a few roasts on auto, which by the way only goes abt 13 minutes and auto ejects, because of reaching max temp. Just a world of questions and it would be nice to discuss things in 1 place if possible. Thx. vic
germantownrob Senior Member Joined: 2 Dec 2007 Posts: 1,621 Location: Philadelphia Expertise: I love coffee
Espresso: N.S. Oscar Grinder: Vario-W, Preciso w/Esatto,... Drip: pour over Roaster: Diedrich IR-1, HT B
Posted Thu Mar 18, 2010, 7:40am Subject: Re: Hot Top Owners Thread
vico Said:
That's what I think. I just don't have any experience yet to make a good start. Perhaps a more experienced roaster can tell us newbies how long a roast should last. For instance, I can't get mine to go very far into the 1st crack w/o them getting scary dark, and that takes approx 13 1/2 minutes. Should I slow down by keeping the temp lower using the heating element button or fan. Is there a more appropriate time during the roast to use and not use the fan. What would be a first step or two to take after doing a few roasts on auto, which by the way only goes abt 13 minutes and auto ejects, because of reaching max temp. Just a world of questions and it would be nice to discuss things in 1 place if possible. Thx. vic
Do you mean it ejects at 410f on the display? There are 3 safety ejects: the HT will eject if the progress goes to quickly in the early stage, you can check this by doing a roast with no beans and the machine will beep at you, if you do not hit a button it will automatically eject. The next safety is at 410f on the display of mine and again it will beep and if a button is not pushed will eject. Final is the max temp setting, default is 420f on mine but you can change it to a max of 428f which allows you to go very deep into 2nd crack if desired. What can effect the final dump temp is what you have the heating elements set at, if you have them at 100% the HT temp sensor will get to 428f very quickly and even reach it before second crack starts but you will also have scorched beans.
Check out FRCN's web site for HT info, almost everything you need is there. Michael at Hottop USA is very quick to respond (quicker then most questions asked on the forums) to almost any technical or problem questions.
I like to complete my HT roasts in under 17 minutes. This can be done by lower batch size to 225g. Pre heating the roaster to higher temps then when prompted to drop the beans allows bigger batch sizes and still keep the roast under 17 minutes, however this is much easier to do after adding a bean mass probe for more accurate temperature reading (also a mod that FRCN has at his website)
I like to get to 1st crack in under 12 minutes.
You own a machine that is fully manual so learn to use it that way, this will become second nature with enough experience but will keep you at the roaster making adjustments through the roast. I use my saved profile slots for different pre heats and then I take full control. I max out the time to 25 minutes (on mine) and max out the final temp to 428f (on mine) this allows you to proceed with out worrying about adding time or the beans dumping before you want them to.
I use the fan at various times but that may be overly complicated at this point. For now watch where the default fan comes on early in the roast to power 3 and shuts off about 30 seconds later and mimic, then use it just before 1st crack and increase it as you progress deeper into the roast with more smoke. There is one poster at HB that no longer uses the fan at all, he feels it is to much a variable in repeating roasts. I feel the fan if anything keeps the electronics clearer of smoke and resin. FRCN has a mod for the filter for the fan, I use the stock filters but replace them often (15-20 roasts), this gets expensive at $11 a pop but a clogged filter is going to be useless.
Controlling the heat is going to vary from HT to HT, after replacing my burner elements there was even a difference in how I made adjustments, seems I lost some power switching the elements to the newer version with the fusible link, not by much but enough to say that doing what I do may not be the same thing on your machine. What I do with heat varies from bean to bean and whether I am roasting for drip or espresso. A basic setup I might suggest is to run full power until the beans start to pale, drop heat to 80% until beans yellow then back to full power until first crack (or just before since there is a lag in the heating element adjusting). Around first crack I will cut back to 60% or lower to get control of 1st crack, I want to control this heat to achieve 3minutes from start of first to dump of roast for drip and 5-6 minutes for espresso regardless of degree of roast. After first crack I am continually adjusting the heat to achieve what I am after.
A cold HT roaster and a warm hottop will give very different stock temp read outs so another reason to add a thermal coupler.
vico Senior Member Joined: 6 Nov 2009 Posts: 76 Location: carlsbad, ca
Posted Thu Mar 18, 2010, 8:09am Subject: Re: Hot Top Owners Thread
This is exactly what I'm talking about and need to know. Thank you very much Rob. As things go on I'll post my results, comments, and experiences and maybe others can add as well. Thank you again for the helpful info. vic
Posted Thu Mar 18, 2010, 8:57am Subject: Re: Hot Top Owners Thread
Sounds like you need to read through the Owner's Manual as all the alerts are covered in there as well as extending the roast. I use the fan briefly mid way through the drying phase & that's about it. 227g loads, average brew roast 11-12 minutes, espresso roasts in the 14 minute range. Typically I hit 1st crack between 8.5-10.5 minutes depending on the bean. All my roasting is done inside so 65-75*F ambient room temp. I'm using a 22A Variac to control voltage & have BT & ET thermocouples installed.
With a Hottop KN-8828B? It sounds like you need to roast more coffee at one time. The minimum for safety sake is 225 grams iirc. I recommend at least 250 grams, particularly for new home roasting folks. I do 300 grams. If you do not have a good scale, inexpensive ones are available on eBay.
Should I slow down by keeping the temp lower using the heating element button or fan. Is there a more appropriate time during the roast to use and not use the fan.
Yes... ;-) I run the fan when I see smoke at the top of the roaster, and adjust speed as the roast goes on to keep the smoke flowing out of the roasting chamber. It is also handy for maintaining a temperature (or slowing the rate of rise) during the drying phase as well as between first and second.
What would be a first step or two to take after doing a few roasts on auto, which by the way only goes abt 13 minutes and auto ejects, because of reaching max temp. First, read the manual in detail. I spent a lot of time putting it together trying to cover all the needs of a new roaster in particular. The roaster will self eject if you leave it on its own as it has three safety points (at least the later models do) in the programming that require the press of a button or the beans will auto-eject.
vico Senior Member Joined: 6 Nov 2009 Posts: 76 Location: carlsbad, ca
Posted Thu Mar 18, 2010, 2:16pm Subject: Re: Hot Top Owners Thread
Thanks to all for your help. I would like to say I have thoroughly read the manual and keep it next to me when I'm roasting. But it doesn't say things like turn on the fan when you see smoke in the roasting chamber, etc. That's a great bit of info. Thank you for that & all the other suggestions that aren't covered in the manual as well as any that are. The kindness that everyone expresses here by taking their time to help people is really a great thing. Something else that might help me to take it beyond the auto mode is where and how to start learning to profile for various beans, etc for a stock B. I know that's a very open ended question but it would help to know the first and second step, etc as far as roast temps, timing etc. Any comments would help me and maybe others. Thank you all again. vic
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