What small batch roaster produces closest to a Commercial roaster?

[Javaphile]

Each type/design of roaster will have its own style of roast that will be different, and in some cases extremely different, from each of the other types/designs. Solid drum vs perforated drum vs fluid bed and gas vs electric vs infrared as examples. Some roasters are hybrids and combine types such as your Solar which uses a perforated drum but also incorporates some fluid bed roasting design/function. Lots of different roaster designs out there.

I suspect that your Solar will lean towards the brighter end of the spectrum where the fluid bed style sits at one end while the Behmor will fall in the middle perforated drum region with a lean towards the solid drum end of the scale. So yeah, I can see how there would be a difference in the roast characteristics between the two.


Java "Solid drums" phile

[NewToEspresso]

Smallest I will do on the solar is 1.2kg green yielding just under 1kg roasted. Anything less than that gets hard to control and time between 1st and 2nd crack becomes too short.

I was leaning towards the baby roaster being closest to a commercial and a good sampler. But the Baby is extremely manual and easily reproducible.

The Behmor seems to have the specs ie. quartz heating elements like the Solar, drum, reproducible, but where it falls over is the lack of a preheating function, and somehow the taste of the final product is very different. Its not necessarily bad, its just different which makes it a poor sample roaster for a solar.

Graham, interesting about the Hottop. I know of a roaster who's just sold his Behmor to buy a Hottop for a sample roaster because of the difference between the roasts coming out of the Behmor and that of a commercial roaster. If the Hottops weren't so darn expensive, I'd go that way too.

That said, the Behmor is the best value-for-money home roaster available and it is capable to reproducing the same results over and over again. I've gotten some fantastic roasts out of the Behmor, but it seems to produce very different results to that of the Solar.

[chokkidog]

As is the Behmor 1600, which would be my (budget ??) sample roaster of choice.

Behmor is probably closest result to a commercial drum roaster and extreme value for $$$$$.

How small a batch can you do in your Solar? I don't particularly like samples less than (about) 500 gms.....

some to cup, some to have as SO espresso and some to trial blend .....

[GrahamK]

A Hottop is used by some commercial roasters as sample roaster

[NewToEspresso]

Having toyed around with all manners of home roasters (popper, corretto, baby roaster, a Korean one ( I forget it's name but it works just like a popper with more specific coffee roasting features) and now having a 2kg Solar roaster, I find myself needing a sample roaster. One which produces coffee as close to the solar but not a full on commercial sample roaster (can't afford another expensive toy). So, which do you reckon best emulates a commercial roaster?