I won't go on about the details of the Rocky, as the other reviews cover them well, and my experience is the same. I will just note a few of my "fixes" for the Rocky's eccentricities.
If you leave in the finger guard, you must cover up the screw holes, or you will be driven mad by the thought of stuck beans staling in there. I removed the finger guard, in which case beans stick in the screw recesses underneath the finger guard - but these are easily removable. Grounds collect in the hopper/grind area - if you are a clean freak, stick a vacuum in here as often as you feel compelled to do, to keep it "stale-free".
The chute. Made narrow, and perfectly horizontal, so as to be as inefficient as possible in letting grounds move through it. The designers at Rancilio then obviously thought, the only way we could make this worse would be to put on a curved plastic dispenser chute, held on by two long standard screws, so removing these grounds would require power tools, and a job where you don't start until 9:30.
The best tool i have found for flicking the beans from the screw recesses, and cleaning the chute w/o removing the plastic dispenser is a dental pick. This looks like a professional dental tool but is available for cheap at drug stores - metal handle with a pointy rubber tip. For the chute, probe with you dental tool, pulse the motor, and probe again. Don't forget to floss daily (joke).
I took off the porta filter holder w/in 5 minutes of getting the machine. Buy a shiny silver can of Illy coffee (dont forget to make espresso with the contents) then hang the portafilter over the lip of it, and hang some useful tool from it.
I leave a little bowl under the plastic dispenser at all times to catch the stray grounds. Ceramic is good as the stray grounds remove easily.
Static is a problem. If you think you are going to grind (eg) decaf beans directly into a a drip filter or porta filter, you are going to be looking at some coffee art on your walls. Small static charged particles will go everywhere. Find a smallish, but tall narrow jar (like a mini-mason jar) that you can hold up to the plastic dispenser chute, then dump the jar contents in your filter of choice.
I read on the internet of a simple plan to disable the switch you have to hold down to grind. I may try this, but not until the warranty expires. While a seeming pain in the arse, it keeps both hands busy while grinding, so an industrial accident is almost impossible.
I don't know why anyone complains about the manual - it is the funniest set of instructions I have ever reviewed. If you think the Italians should be embarrassed about their bad English - how is your Italian? |
