Pfunk Senior Member Joined: 20 Jan 2002 Posts: 30 Location: So Cal Expertise: I love coffee
Posted Wed Dec 5, 2012, 4:51pm Subject: Extractmojo alternatives?
Are there more affordable alternatives to extractmojo out there for those who want to test their coffee extraction at home? I'm interested in testing to dial in my technique and grind with various brew methods but I can't justify the $500 price tag for this purpose.
I got a cheapo Brix handheld refractometer but it's a bit of a pain to use and readings seem to be inaccurate to me.
GlennV Senior Member Joined: 27 Oct 2011 Posts: 28 Location: UK Expertise: I love coffee
Posted Wed Dec 5, 2012, 5:15pm Subject: Re: Extractmojo alternatives?
I don't think there are, I'm afraid. The cheaper Brix handhelds, both analogue and digital, are well below the accuracy required to give anything remotely useful for coffee (and I have tried both). The vst units really are way ahead of anything else in the same price range in terms of accuracy - and you need every bit of that accuracy to get useful results.
Posted Thu Dec 6, 2012, 5:12am Subject: Re: Extractmojo alternatives?
Pfunk Said:
Are there more affordable alternatives to extractmojo out there for those who want to test their coffee extraction at home? I'm interested in testing to dial in my technique and grind with various brew methods but I can't justify the $500 price tag for this purpose.
I got a cheapo Brix handheld refractometer but it's a bit of a pain to use and readings seem to be inaccurate to me.
GlennV is right - the cheap sugar refractometers also need to be converted to coffee. They have almost as much variation as the TDS meter method (although, if you can get a set point, for dynamic measuring of concentration it works better than I thought, but you need a TDS or electrical conductivity meter that registers a large enough range).
You need a VST refractometer, but the downside is it does not output the index of refraction itself - thereby preventing it from being used for any other purpose than measuring coffee concencentration.
You COULD just get one of the reichart or other digital refractometers, but to get something with the compensated accuracy and repeatability of the the VSTcr, you'll need to spend more than a kilobuck. AND then you'll have to come up with your own conversion. Why do all that work when it's already done?
The biggest advantage of the VST is the amount of work done by Vince and company to correlate the output of the coffee refractometer with filtered coffee dehydration measurements using a industry standard dehydration oven.
Notice I mention the coffee refractometer. The choice on whether you need the software (the title of your thread is actually the name of the SOFTWARE, not the refractometer itself) is up to you. VST has done a ton of work to have a plug-in data output on chart and results assessment software suite.
It's a "nice to have". Do you need it? Not if you can do some simple calculations or are moderately adept at Excel or other spreadsheet.
------------------------------------------ ----------------------------------------- Le café doit être noir comme le diable, chaud comme l'enfer, pur comme un ange, et doux comme l'amour.
"There is no right answer with coffee. There is only the elixir in your cup at the moment you partake."
"...I often say that when you can measure what you are speaking about, and express it in numbers, you know something about it; but when you cannot measure it, when you cannot express it in numbers, your knowledge is of a meagre and unsatisfactory kind;..." - Lord Kelvin RECIPES thread => http://www.coffeegeek.com/forums/coffee/machines/585708
Pfunk Senior Member Joined: 20 Jan 2002 Posts: 30 Location: So Cal Expertise: I love coffee
Posted Fri Dec 7, 2012, 3:16pm Subject: Re: Extractmojo alternatives?
Hmmm, looks like I'll have to save up for the real deal. It would be a cool gadget to have for sure but I think $500 would be better spent on a new roaster.
In the meantime I think I need to do some brewing experiments to learn how to taste under extraction vs over extraction, sour vs bitter.
rhodes553 Senior Member Joined: 24 Feb 2005 Posts: 9 Location: Brooklyn, NY Expertise: I love coffee
Espresso: Moka Pot Grinder: Solis Maestro Plus Drip: Melitta Pour-Over Roaster: D'Amico Foods, Brooklyn
Posted Wed Feb 27, 2013, 6:39pm Subject: Re: Extractmojo alternatives?
So I bit the bullet and ordered one of the VST Lab Coffee II refractometers yesterday. I've been using the MoJoToGo iPhone app for the last few weeks to guide my brewing ratios but the frustration of not being able to measure the resulting TDS finally drove me to order the device. For now, I've got a spreadsheet I'll be using to track and calculate TDS, extraction, LRR, CBR, etc. The device arrives tomorrow -- I can't wait!
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