I've just done my first few roasts with KL (with anything actually, a total first for me).
My 'learner' beans are Indian Elephant Hills. That's all I've used so far. Each roast is 100g in and between 84 and 85g out.
I've roasted them on the 1500-2000 Rest profile at 3.2, 3.4 and 3.6. Each time the first minute or two of the roast overshoots the profile quite a bit.
It is much better when I use RTD
None of the roasts using these MASL profiles follow as closely as when I use Steve's MD3 or MD4.
My question is: what does this all mean? What might I look to adjust in order to follow the profiles more closely?
Can you interpret these logs for me?
Re: Can you interpret these logs for me?
Hi femelle
Congrats on your new roaster ( at least by your log numbers)
Firstly - those beans and that profile are a good first start ( apologies if you aren't a newbie- ignore as like)
The Elephant hills i have found are a good base bean for many blends. ( My preference is for a touch higher roast level (low to mid 4s - but they roast well at differing levels)
The difference in the profile vs log is very common at the beginning and usually so long as they converge by about the 2 minute mark then dont worry ..... the 2 minute mark is subjective and my opinion - some people could probably say 1.30 is better.
I see you have bracket the roasts ( 3.2 / 3.4 / 3.6) which is far cleverer than me on my first few roasts.
My suggestion ( and this is also one of the suggestions i struggled to live with at first) is wait and taste. Wait probably 5 days for resting. If they taste good - then you may choose to ignore the poor early tracking entirely. Keep notes to see if they are better at 7 days etc
The next bit of info involves you downloading and using Kaffelogic studio- and editing a profile and saving to your usb - so look in the user guide etc if not already there.
If you want to pull down the difference earlier - you can go into the Roast profile section(on KL studio) and edit the preheat power - yours is 1200 - i would suggest go down by 50 or 100 max - - this may give you a warning but you can ignore the warning.
Again , if I am telling you things your are already aware of please forgive me.
On reading from your Log1 I would say you have had a successful first experience, well done
Apologies on not seeing this earlier ( your prompt on the other aussie site helped. Cheers Darryl
Try not to chop and change too much, standardise as many variables as you can to help make sense of the results.
so for eg. 100gms
Congrats on your new roaster ( at least by your log numbers)
Firstly - those beans and that profile are a good first start ( apologies if you aren't a newbie- ignore as like)
The Elephant hills i have found are a good base bean for many blends. ( My preference is for a touch higher roast level (low to mid 4s - but they roast well at differing levels)
The difference in the profile vs log is very common at the beginning and usually so long as they converge by about the 2 minute mark then dont worry ..... the 2 minute mark is subjective and my opinion - some people could probably say 1.30 is better.
I see you have bracket the roasts ( 3.2 / 3.4 / 3.6) which is far cleverer than me on my first few roasts.
My suggestion ( and this is also one of the suggestions i struggled to live with at first) is wait and taste. Wait probably 5 days for resting. If they taste good - then you may choose to ignore the poor early tracking entirely. Keep notes to see if they are better at 7 days etc
The next bit of info involves you downloading and using Kaffelogic studio- and editing a profile and saving to your usb - so look in the user guide etc if not already there.
If you want to pull down the difference earlier - you can go into the Roast profile section(on KL studio) and edit the preheat power - yours is 1200 - i would suggest go down by 50 or 100 max - - this may give you a warning but you can ignore the warning.
Again , if I am telling you things your are already aware of please forgive me.
On reading from your Log1 I would say you have had a successful first experience, well done
Apologies on not seeing this earlier ( your prompt on the other aussie site helped. Cheers Darryl
Try not to chop and change too much, standardise as many variables as you can to help make sense of the results.
so for eg. 100gms
Re: Can you interpret these logs for me?
Thanks for the comprehensive reply Darryl. I’m a bit of a nerd and did lots of research before starting my first roast, so had seen the advice on starting with one bean, resting, bracketing and so on which is pretty much why I’ve been doing it this way. Also trying to find the sweet spot for my palate. My roasts keep inching darker.
This business of pulling down the temperature at the beginning, I think you’re saying it’s a question of too much power at the start, so I could adjust the roaster to give me less and that would bring the lines closer together. Presumably that would be just for this 1500-2000 profile, not the machine generally, as Steve’s MD3 and MD4 didn’t have the same issue.
After reading your suggestion I’ve gone back to the first couple of minutes on the logs. I’ve just pulled up 003 (MASL) and 006 (Steve’s) as representing the two styles. With Steve’s, where the roast and profile go up more or less together, they both reach 150 after about a minute. With MASL the profile gets to 150 over about two minutes, but my roast still goes up as though it’s aiming for one minute until it gets pulled back to the profile at the one minute mark, somewhere around 135. So if I reduced the starting power a bit that should stop that runaway rise. That makes sense to me.
I’m not actually going to do that yet. I want to find out a lot more about the process using the parameters I have before I start fiddling with them. But I do like to understand what’s causing things to happen. I might look for other profiles that go up slightly faster or more slowly at the start and see how well my actuals correspond. It’s fun, isn’t it?
This business of pulling down the temperature at the beginning, I think you’re saying it’s a question of too much power at the start, so I could adjust the roaster to give me less and that would bring the lines closer together. Presumably that would be just for this 1500-2000 profile, not the machine generally, as Steve’s MD3 and MD4 didn’t have the same issue.
After reading your suggestion I’ve gone back to the first couple of minutes on the logs. I’ve just pulled up 003 (MASL) and 006 (Steve’s) as representing the two styles. With Steve’s, where the roast and profile go up more or less together, they both reach 150 after about a minute. With MASL the profile gets to 150 over about two minutes, but my roast still goes up as though it’s aiming for one minute until it gets pulled back to the profile at the one minute mark, somewhere around 135. So if I reduced the starting power a bit that should stop that runaway rise. That makes sense to me.
I’m not actually going to do that yet. I want to find out a lot more about the process using the parameters I have before I start fiddling with them. But I do like to understand what’s causing things to happen. I might look for other profiles that go up slightly faster or more slowly at the start and see how well my actuals correspond. It’s fun, isn’t it?
Re: Can you interpret these logs for me?
Hi Femelle
It is fun.
The thing with experimentation and learning , even at only 100gm loads, you still end up with a lot of coffee to try. One of the reasons i settled on 100gms is your 84/5 gms out figure..... with an allowance for purging or dialing in of the grinder, it makes 4 double shots for me. I find at 3 cups for me and 1 for my wife a day on average and now match my roasting days to suit.
As you mentioned, different profiles pull to the profile line slightly quicker or slower than others, and you will see different beans cause different uptakes/ temp change/rotation etc, so whether you mix and match to optimise is up to you.
I have found steve' profiles very good for the medium to darker roasts ( hot and fast) but i had to change a couple of settings to suit my power supply and machine.
The MASL profiles work well too, with the RTD ones quite good to get you out of trouble at a pinch. Cheers
It is fun.
The thing with experimentation and learning , even at only 100gm loads, you still end up with a lot of coffee to try. One of the reasons i settled on 100gms is your 84/5 gms out figure..... with an allowance for purging or dialing in of the grinder, it makes 4 double shots for me. I find at 3 cups for me and 1 for my wife a day on average and now match my roasting days to suit.
As you mentioned, different profiles pull to the profile line slightly quicker or slower than others, and you will see different beans cause different uptakes/ temp change/rotation etc, so whether you mix and match to optimise is up to you.
I have found steve' profiles very good for the medium to darker roasts ( hot and fast) but i had to change a couple of settings to suit my power supply and machine.
The MASL profiles work well too, with the RTD ones quite good to get you out of trouble at a pinch. Cheers