Decent Espresso Machines (DE1) - Any thoughts?

[>decentespresso]

How to: no hands foam

Here's my technique for steaming milk without having to stand there babying it.

[Erimus]

^^^

You should have a longer steam spout, then you wouldn't need to place something under the jug. Elementary.

[>decentespresso]

You should have a longer steam spout, then you wouldn't need to place something under the jug. Elementary.

Something like this?

[Erimus]

That is the ugliest steam wand I've ever seen just extend the original and leave about 12 to 15 mm clearance to the drip tray.

[JMcCee]

Have to be a pretty short jug..

[>decentespresso]

Many tiny improvements in our v1.1 group head (left) as compared to our current v1.0 group head. This new design will be used starting in late September.

[>decentespresso]

Hands-free milk steaming for two lattes

With a larger milk jug (600ml) I can easily steam hands-free using this technique. No stand required.

[>decentespresso]

the early bird gets the worm





All our early customers now have a machine (or it's on their way to them via UPS)

A big push today has us sending the very last machines that were pre-ordered.

Next week, Mirjam and I will be offering v1.0 DE1PRO machines to the 70 people who have bought from us in the past few weeks. They'll have "first dibs" on these, or they can wait until the v1.1 model goes into production in about 2 months.

And so I also hope that in the next 2 to 3 weeks, I'll have a few dozen DE1PRO models (plumbed and not) in stock for immediate delivery, to whoever wants to buy one.

To all of you who bought a machine early from us, who put your confidence in Ray, me and the rest of my team: thank you! And a big apology to Mr Merhi, who had to wait the longest as he ordered so many machines from us (his is the big pallet).

-john

[>decentespresso]

Sensing when something is wrong.



This post is about a change we've made to the v1.1 DE1+ pc board.

With the first 50 machines we built and sent to customers, quite a few of them had wires come lose during shipping.

It's a "major bummer" to order an espresso machine, that apparently "worked fine when it left the factory" only to find that it doesn't work when you receive it. It was also a huge "time suck" for me, as I got on video calls with each person, to resolve their issue.

We've gotten much better at locking things down since then, but it's still a concern. I have one client who has--very rarely--steam that doesn't function. We haven't been able to detect the cause yet.

So... with the version 1.1 espresso machines, I had challenged Ray to invent a way to detect "bad wiring", which can also be "intermittently or only occasionally bad wiring". Those sorts of problems are typically really hard to figure out.

The v1.1 PC board now threads the neutral electrical line through a transformer, so that--in software--we can now see if the electricity we sent to a component was actually consumed by that component.

For example, this will tell us whether a valve that we think is open, really is open and is using up the electricity we've sent it.

It's also possible that the valve is blocked (say, by dirt in the water) and we believe that we'll be able to detect that too, because the valves' consumption of electricity will look atypical in that situation.

We still have all the firmware to write to support this new idea, but in summary, we think we'll now be able to detect wiring that is disconnected, a partial (bad) connection, or even intermittent failures. We also think we can find when a component is consuming too much power, and thus know that something is wrong.

We've had 3 clients have USB cables short out and melt. We believe that we'll now be able to detect that short and cut the USB power if it does happen.

Ideally, a future iteration of the DE1+ will cycle through every electrical component (valves, heaters, pumps, USB charger) with a single cycle, at every power-up, and detect if anything is wrong. Because the detection happens early, this approach should also allow us to isolate the fault before it causes permanent damage (such as a spark and blowing a component).

-john

[TampIt]

G'day John

Good thinking - well thought out. FWIW, I know of no other device that does this, so maybe patent it if possible?

My order: Please send me the V1.1 Pro when it is ready - the self checking and the new group make it a no brainer when I "only" have 5 espresso makers at present.

TampIt

[>decentespresso]

Good thinking - well thought out. FWIW, I know of no other device that does this, so maybe patent it if possible?

I'm not so big on patents: I prefer to "win in the marketplace" than to "win in the courts". The odds are a bit better for the small guy. Patents are a rich company's game.

I'm not entirely sure it's patentable either, as one has to pass the "obvious" test, and this looks to us like we've simply added a electrical clamp to the internals, which is a standard part of an electrician's toolkit.

My order: Please send me the V1.1 Pro when it is ready - the self checking and the new group make it a no brainer when I "only" have 5 espresso makers at present.

Tampit, can I ask you to send us an email from your decent login by going to:
https://decentespresso.com/contact

so that we've got a proper record of what you'd like.

-john

[>decentespresso]

Beautiful slow motion video of water flowing from the Decent Espresso Machine at the Institute for Coffee Excellence

[>decentespresso]

Philosophical: heated coffee mug?



I thought this bluetooth "smart mug" was pretty silly at first:
https://ember.com/products/ceramic-mug

but then I thought.... I do spend a lot of time thinking about the ideal beverage temperature. What if I could make a drink that I served at 50ºC, and which stayed at 50ºC during its entire drinking experience?

Would that be a good thing?

Or is the gradual cooling of a coffee drink an essential part of the experience?

Because technically, with this mug, I could likely change the DE1+ app to have a "beverage temperature" setting.

And that then seemed like an interesting idea.

Your thoughts?

-john

[JMcCee]

Part of the enjoyment for me is drinking espresso out of shot glasses or sipping cappaccino out of traditional italian cups with the accompanying downward drift in temperature so no, not for me.

[simonsk8r]

Yep I'm the same, the gradual cooling really let's you experience the flavours and how they stand out or change at different temps