A wide range of new coffee grinders were turning heads while spinning burrs at the SCA Expo last week in Portland, Oregon. Several newly launched brands appeared alongside established players in the grinding game to show off their latest and greatest machines.
In keeping with the overall trend we’ve observed in new products this year, the majority of innovations came on the home/prosumer front, although some exciting developments landed for professionals, as well.
Here we take a tour of the grinders we learned more about at the 2023 SCA Expo. (See DCN’s complete 2023 SCA Expo coverage here):
Commercial Grinders
The Compak Bolt grinder. Daily Coffee News photo by Howard Bryman.
Compak Bolt
The Bolt grinder by Spanish company Compak made its United States public debut at the Expo, showing off its automatic pre-grinding capabilities for fast-paced service situations. The same machine offers an on-demand grinding mode, as well, for non-peak hours. Compak calls these modes “Predose” and “Fresh”, respectively.
The Bolt comes in 64-millimeter and 83-millimeter flat burr variants, and includes Compak’s new mechanism for fast access to the grind chamber for cleaning without losing the grind setting. Read more on the Bolt here.
Another new Compak grinder is featured in the “home and prosumer” section below.
The Pinecone Foxtail grinder. Daily Coffee News photo by Howard Bryman.
Pinecone Foxtail
A brand new Swiss company called Pinecone held its worldwide launch at the Expo while putting its first two products on display. One of those is the Foxtail, a production grinder centered on 120-millimeter flat burrs spun by 1.2-kilowatt motor that Pinecone Founder Ilan Maimon told Daily Coffee News is equivalent to 1.5 horsepower.
Through the modular design, a set of four screws can allow user the user to remove an entire grind chamber for maintenance and replace it immediately with a fresh module that is factory aligned, calibrated and ready to go with minimal downtime, according to the company. Daily Coffee News will have more on this product soon. See Pinecone’s other 2023 grinder release in the “home and prosumer” section below.
Anfim Luna
Italian grinder maker Anfim used the Expo to launch sales of its latest release, the Luna. The first of what will be a series of new grinders following a rebrand by Anfim, the Luna centers on 65-millimeter flat custom burrs made in Germany by Anfim parent company, the Hemro Group. Its treatment of beans that descend from a 2-kilo-capacity hopper can be adjusted through a 3.5-inch touch display. Read more about the Luna here.
Home And Prosumer Grinders
The Compak Fino grinder. Daily Coffee News photo by Howard Bryman.
Compak Fino
In between Bolts at the Compak booth was a sneak peek of a compact, home-focused newcomer that is soon to arrive from the otherwise commercially oriented Spanish company.
Within a cast aluminum body, the Compak Fino features 61-millimeter conical burrs spun at a deliberate 260 RPM. A finely stepped adjustment collar offers settings ranging from espresso up to French press. An optional built-in dosing scale will allow users to weigh a single dose prior to grinding.
Compak America Managing Director Josh Fields told Daily Coffee News the company anticipates launching the Fino later this summer with a projected retail price of approximately $700. We will have more to report on this product as it develops.
A lineup of Zerno Z1 grinders. Daily Coffee News photo by Howard Bryman.
Zerno Z1
Chicago startup Zerno made its official trade show debut with the Z1 grinder, which was spotted at multiple booths throughout the Expo floor. A fleet of black Z1’s was lined up at the booth of Meticulous, the maker of an eponymous espresso machine that’s soon to launch, while a white version was showcased alongside the Argos manual lever machine at the Odyssey Espresso booth.
New features have been added to the Z1 with each limited production run, the next of which is slated to ship this summer. The company announced presales for that 250-unit production will open on May 10. See DCN’s complete profile of the Zerno grinder here.
The Comandante C60 Barracuda grinder. Daily Coffee News photo by Howard Bryman.
Comandante C60 Barracuda
Munich, Germany-based manual grinder maker Comandante revealed the largest-capacity hand grinder in its lineup to date, the C60 Barracuda.
The grinder body is milled from a single piece of stainless steel, and the outer ring of its custom conical burr set is permanently fixed in place to preserve alignment. The outer diameter of the C60 is actually the same as the Comandante C40, yet the grinding surface was widened on the inside, allowing more beans to contact its teeth at once. A longer crank arm provides the additional leverage for equally smooth operation. We’ll have more about this and other new releases by Comandante soon.
The Pinecone Pinion grinder. Daily Coffee News photo by Howard Bryman.
Pinecone Pinion
Alongside the Foxtail (see above), newcomer Pinecone also debuted a smaller consumer coffee grinder called the Pinion. Modeled in certain ways after the legendary commercial grinder the Mahlkönig EK43, the Pinion features a pre-breaker that feeds bean fragments into vertically-oriented 65-millimeter flat burrs made by a Swiss burr manufacturer. The burrs are spun at 3,000 RPM by a 380-watt motor. We will have more about this machine and company in an upcoming report.
The Timemore Sculptor 078 grinder. Daily Coffee News photo by Howard Bryman.
Timemore Sculptor 078
Chinese consumer coffee equipment maker Timemore displayed the grinder that has set the Kickstarter world on fire, the Sculptor 078. An ongoing fundraising campaign for this grinder has raised raised $5 million with two weeks remaining.
Inside a metal body is one of three different original burr sets spun at user-adjustable RPM speeds. A rotary knocker gets the last particles loose to be caught by its magnetically centered receptacle. We’ll have more about this grinder and Timemore in an upcoming report.
The Mx. Cool Aries grinder. Daily Coffee News photo by Howard Bryman.
Mx. Cool Aries
Another new brand making its official launch at the Expo was Mx. Cool, a coffee-focused brand from Taiwan that emerging as an independent offshoot from CNC and injection plastic production company Proch.
The flagship Mx. Cool product coming soon is the Aries grinder, which features an original 83-millimeter conical burr set whose magnetically-attached inner cone burr can be pulled out for cleaning without tools. Adjustable RPM, auto-stop and a rotating bean feeder at the bottom of the hopper are also among the grinder’s ambitious set of features. We will have more about this company and its upcoming products soon.
Does your coffee business have news to share? Let DCN’s editors know here.
Howard Bryman
Howard Bryman is the associate editor of Daily Coffee News by Roast Magazine. He is based in Portland, Oregon.
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Been looking hardfor suitable grinder for using with my batch brewers, particularly in a portable setting. Everything I had seen was either a moster beast to lug about, and costing two to thre thousand dollars, or a light duty slow home tpe unit that just did not stand up to grinding multiple110 plus doses of beans at a go.
I happened across the Pinecone Piñon at the GH booth. One of the designer/builder chaps from Swotzerland put it through its paces for me, demonstrating what it can do and how it works. When I asked the dreaded question the number he put back to me ws about half what I was expecting. I examined the burr set, played with the hopper and lock,asked the capcities of the bean and grounds hoppers. I came back Sunday early afternoon. One of the four units on display had been launched into the coffee world. I walked out with the second one. So far it seems custom designed for my particular setting and workflow. I am VERY pleased. A real workhorse, fast throughput, accurate grind, wide range of particle size adjustment, relatively lightweight (yet substantial.. not a plastic toy) , compact but not dainty, quieter than I had expected. And Swiss designed and built.