I have a question for the roasters out there… does the size of your roasting machine affect coffee quality? Pictures tell a thousand words, so let’s get to the point. Does it make any difference to use a smaller roasting machine vs a super huge one?
Linda E Gomez I was told that you have a small batch roaster is up to 30 kilos (70 pounds). According to some specialty coffee roasters, as long as you roast within a window of opportunity of 15 to 16 minutes in a well controlled environment, batch size should not be felt at the cup. This means, as long as you control the energies involved in roasting, you can roast in the same parameters regardless of the batch size. i.e. An average 10 kilo roaster that uses 150.000 btu will have the same flavor profile as a 20 kilo that uses 300.000 btu In respect to quality, a small batch roaster should focus in selecting better beans, since is easier for them than to a big roaster. In that case batch size does matter. 0 Reply December 4, 2006
Carrie Linda – I’m sorry….but I can’t follow your thought process….. the size of the roasting equipment making a difference in the quality of beans a Roaster purchases? I seriously doubt it, I think its more a question of what some roasters think they can get away with, buying lower quality beans, roasting them too long and selling them to uneducated & under-educated public, including, unfortunately, coffee shops. Quality green beans in….Quality coffee out….. Inferior green beans in…..Crappy coffee out…… Seems logical to me…….not the size of the equipment they are roasting on. But since this post was asking for input from roasters, I’ll just wait and see what they say, should be interesting! Carrie 0 Reply December 5, 2006
Austin I would think (and i may be wrong here) that in those huge batches, even with the air cooling, that the heat from all of the beans surrounding a single bean would keep roasting them for another minute or two. I would imagine that would be a hard thing to compensate for if its true. I could be entirely wrong though. 0 Reply December 5, 2006
steve Leighton I think the size does play a part but if the roaster is skilled and understands his machine then this is easily overcome. The roasting operator is far more important than the roaster for me. I speak with lots of home roasters a 2kg a 5 kg and a 15 kg Ambex (and experience of larger machines to0), so feel fairly experienced with them. Chris the top photo looks familiar, have I seen it somewhere before? Great pictures to capture the idea of roaster sizes Keep up the awesome blog. 0 Reply December 6, 2006
Victor Kessler The size of a “commercial grade” type roaster does not affect quality. The main difference is the rate at which the beans cool down. Larger roasters (hence larger batch size) tend to cool beans down at a slower rate, which can be of concern and is addressed in a number of ways such as regulating ambient air temperature in the roasting area. I’ve even seen auxilary high-powered fans positioned around cooling trays to aid in cooling. In the end the roast quality relies on the roaster operator and the bean quality, not the roaster size. 0 Reply December 28, 2006
Dagemawie please we need coffee roasting machine working with hot air system and a capacity of 2 tones per day. 0 Reply April 28, 2015
