First few roasts, understanding roast levels

[drozendal]

I've just received my KL and I'm using it connected to my Windows laptop for live logging in Studio.

I'm attempting to understand how roasting levels influence the roast so I experimented with 3 roasts.

Attached is the summary of the data points for each roast. The roast level was set prior to beginning the roast and not adjusted during the roast. First crack was indicated in Studio but beyond that, I made no adjustments to the profile. The three roasts were done right after eachother.

I was expecting that the higher the roast level, the higher the development time % would be. But the exact opposite occurred.

I'd appreciate any insight from the group.

Thanks

Decaf roasts.jpg (52.44 KiB) Viewed 1438 times

[kaffelogic]

Please post the actual log files and we will be able to give you some analysis

[drozendal]

Thanks for the willingness to provide feedback. I'm eager to learn.

[kaffelogic]

Your roaster is 'flatlining'. Simply put that means it is running out of power. The power line increases to a maximum and then goes flat. At that point the roast stops following the profile and this causes the irregular first crack times. You will need to install Kaffelogic Studio so that you can see this for yourself. You will need to see it so that you can also see when you have fixed the problem.

You need to improve the power supply to your roaster. Plug your roaster in closer to the mains board and do not use an extension cord or multibox. Once you have good power going to the roaster it should start following the profile. You can monitor what is going on with the power with one of these. You could also reach out to the distributor where you bought the roaster for additional support with this problem.

[drozendal]

Thanks for the insight. I was using an extension cord so when I removed that from the setup, the new roasts followed the profile very nicely. The three roasts I did at 2.0, 2.5 and 3.0 all followed the profile, had very consistent first crack time and temp and the development percentage was progressively longer for each step in the roast level.

I'm very pleased with the results and look forward to progressing in my new hobby.