Posted Sat Nov 11, 2006, 4:42pm Subject: Re: iRoast 2 Home Coffee Roaster
mrgnomer Said:
I think the volume/mass of the beans would be a factor in circulation. Also the size: the peaberries circulate slower as well. Also the temp setting/time. When I finish with a programmed temp of above 430F or so as soon as the stage starts the fan motor slows. I imagine that's to help the roaster ramp up and maintain the temp. The fan stays slow, however, with brief pulses of higher revs and the beans circulate much more slowly.
I also read a while ago where someone noticed that oils left on the walls of the i Roasts chamber make it sticky and seem to impede the circulation of the beans. I noticed that myself, especially on the higher 5-5.5 oz roast batches. He figured that keeping glass clean of oils would help with circulation and since reading that I've been washing the chamber and the chaff collector parts every time I finish a roasting session.
richedie Senior Member Joined: 17 Jun 2006 Posts: 683 Location: Pennsylvania Expertise: I love coffee
Posted Sun Nov 12, 2006, 1:43pm Subject: Re: Spare parts??
Enkerli Said:
A silly question from one of those who have never used a Hearthware roaster... Is it at all possible to repair those roasters with spare parts? Is it usually the heating element which fails? Wouldn't that part be relatively easy to replace, for anyone who's good with electrical appliances (i.e., not me)? Just wondering because durability seems to be an issue for a number of people. And if voltage has an influence, there might be a solution for those with irregular voltage.
When I started roasting a few years ago, someone told me that most of those specialised fluid-bed hot air roasters were very good but don't last. I don't have the kind of money to buy one of them specialised roasters, so I always stuck with popcorn poppers. (I did get one popper to stop working out of three poppers bought for about 5$ each in Salvation Army-style stores.)
As I eventually will get enough disposable income to buy a specialised roaster, I want to know that the unit itself is not too disposable.
I would say you are fine sticking with poppers. If you can do the same for less cash, why not? Sure, you may not be able to control temperature as easily but you can make incredible coffee from only a few poppers. I now have a popcorn pumper with widened slots that moves 5-6 ounces of beans. With two of these, I can rosat almost 10-12 ounces in a half hour. One pumper will roast most coffees to full city or FC++/Vienna in about 11-13 minutes. That is much longer than your average popper. I really like the flavor this one produces! Way more than my Hearthware Gourmet I bought used for $50.
I was on the cusp of going the Stir Crazy route or a BBQ......but it is amazing I can roast 10-12 ounces in a half hour with a long roast profile.
t2h3 Senior Member Joined: 8 Mar 2007 Posts: 1 Location: ny Expertise: Just starting
Posted Thu Mar 8, 2007, 8:39pm Subject: Re: iRoast 2 Home Coffee Roaster
I'd really like to know whether or not these roasters can also be used for nuts. It would justify the expense of an expensive model. Would appreciate any thoughts.
geertdevries Senior Member Joined: 6 Mar 2007 Posts: 27 Location: Netherlands Expertise: I love coffee
Posted Thu Mar 15, 2007, 6:05am Subject: Re: iRoast 2 Home Coffee Roaster
Thanks for the review. I'm wondering about an own roaster: 1 Is it really an improvement against normal beans? Fot the investment I can buy a lot of good branded beans. 2 How do you know the quality of green beans? So what should I buy and will it be better than normal beans?
MarkPrince Moderator Joined: 19 Dec 2001 Posts: 5,462 Location: Vancouver, BC Expertise: Professional
Espresso: KvdW Speedster Grinder: Compak K10 WBC Vac Pot: A bit too many Drip: Clive Coffee Drip Stand Roaster: Hario Glass Retro Roaster
Posted Fri Feb 13, 2009, 2:55am Subject: Re: iRoast 2 Home Coffee Roaster
Just an update on this First Look.
I don't think I'll be publishing a Detailed Review for this product. I haven't compiled enough data, and I'm not confident that my own testing skills at the moment are up to snuff to give a home roaster like this one the full Detail Review process.
I will be working with this and other roasters much more in 2009, and posting about it on various portions of the new CoffeeGeek website, and if the year progresses well, and the product is still available, I may revisit doing a full review.
Posted Fri Jun 19, 2009, 2:15am Subject: Re: iRoast 2 Home Coffee Roaster
I roast every day, usually twice per day on weekends, and my iRoast probably has 500 roasts. It's a year old and it just went belly up. The electronics failed – the motor stopped, but both heating elements were still on full! – this is a major flaw. Luckily I was present when it quit. I took off the chamber and the heating elements were bright-yellow hot and I yanked the plug out before it caught on fire. fortunately the elements were still in tact, so I threw out the electronics and added three switches to control it manually. I drilled a hole through the top to insert a temperature probe. Now I control the motor, and I have switches to activate the high and low heating coils independently (iRoast has two heating coils).
altaso Senior Member Joined: 30 Sep 2009 Posts: 6 Location: Indonesia Expertise: Professional
Posted Tue Jan 18, 2011, 9:14pm Subject: Re: iRoast 2 Home Coffee Roaster
Hi there!
My i roast 2 worked properly only one week, I have bought a power stabilizer more expensive that the roaster itself and I used it from the beginning but the machine never worked steady. It stops suddenly loosing your programming time but not always. So I can't use any roasting curve since you loose it when it stops. I use it only with a steady temperature so I can restart the machine anytime. I have the 230 volt model.
javaorelse Senior Member Joined: 9 Sep 2006 Posts: 4 Location: California Expertise: Pro Roaster
Espresso: Bialetti/Also French Press Grinder: KitchAid burr Roaster: Bravi
Posted Fri May 13, 2011, 4:22pm Subject: Re: iRoast 2 Home Coffee Roaster
We had bought the Gene Roaster in 2006 when it was still known as version 2 of the Alpenroast. Our heating element final went out and we did two things, bought the iRoast2 and did a repair on the long loved Gene. It was possible to remove the heating element, find the broken wire and do a poorly twisted reconnection of the wiring. Surprisingly, it went back together with only a few screws left over and again roasts beans. In the meantime, the iRoast2 arrived. In some ways it reminds me of the Freshroast we once had. Faster than the Gene with a tendency to dark roasts. We're not about to discuss the technicalities of this roaster, others have done so many times. Only our opinion counts. It is not so noisy that it drowns out all other sound. I will say that we roast in our garage, we always have. That being the case, perhaps we aren't bothered by any noise. Another shortcoming others complain about is the quantity of beans it produces. Well, it provides more well roasted beans than any other product on the market costing less than $500.00, save the Behmore Unlike the other roasters we have owned, it gives us the ability to set different roast settings, 10 to be exact. Each of the 10 settings allows control over temperature and roasting time at that temperature. Once we decide how we like our Kenya, our Colombian, etc., we program the setting for that particular bean and walk away. Not as fast as the Freshroast, it sure beans the Gene in producing a batch of beans to brew. We are not commercial roasters and there are only two of us and frequently a guest. We aren't looking for a rugged product to roast batch after batch of large roasts. This machine fits our desires perfectly. I will also say, and I'll probably find many to disagree with me, it does a better job with the darker roasts. Once the Gene hit Full City+, it went from French to Italian, to charcoal in an amazing short time. This roaster allows us to hit dark and lower the temperature to slowly add to the roast. Except for being mainly plastic (like the Gene), and requiring a good cleaning daily, this roaster is perfect. We now have two working roasters, the Gene and the iRoast. I have a feeling that the iRoast will get the most use. In addition, my wife can use it without a problem. All shes has to do is punch the setting for her favorite bean, hit start, and walk away. By the way, we are in our late 60's and find this roaster easier to use than our TV remote. We also prefer the beans to those made in the Gene. One more thing about quality of construction, we've not owned a Behmore, it may be as strong as a bull, but it looks like the old microwave we took to the dump last year. The iRost is small and quite handsome.
Nice! (Funnily enough: I'm in my late 30's and I usually don't have too many problems with tech yet I find the i-Roast's settings a bit convoluted. Still, operating the i-Roast 2 is fairly straightforward.) Sounds like you're happy campers, and that's really nice to hear. Which isn't to say that the i-Roast 2 couldn't be improved. What can we expect from i-Roast 3? Will it come out any time soon?
A number of people have had durability issues with the i-Roast 2. Bought mine slightly used and been using it on a somewhat regular basis for a year. Some people haven't had much luck getting it to last much longer than this. What might make a difference is in terms of waiting between batches. IIRC, the instruction recommend waiting four hours between roast batches. It's quite possible that insufficient wait time between roasts could significantly decrease the machine's lifespan. My main basis for comparison was from hot air corn poppers. And while the i-Roast 2 is an improvement over these, I'd still recommend popcorn machines for new homeroasters. Not that they're very durable, but they're inexpensive and easy to replace. I was usually roasting three batches in a row, doing post-roast blends. I kind of miss that part. Obviously, the i-Roast 2 has advantages over a popcorn machine. The most obvious is control over the overall roast profile. But because these profiles can't be changed during the roast, I end up using just a few profiles. The results aren't amazingly different from what I used to get with popcorn machines. And it took quite a bit of experimentation to get these roast profiles how I wanted them. The cooling cycle is also an advantage over popcorn machines. But, with the amount of beans roasted with either method (120–150g, in my case), it's rather easy to cool down the beans in a colander. In fact, I used to spray the freshly-roasted beans with cold water and I still think it enhanced the coffee, in some respects. In terms of smoke, the i-Roast does expel less than a popcorn machine, but I never really had problems with smoke, even though I usually roast indoors. (That part probably has to do with the fact that I rarely roast beyond Vienna.) And chaff collection is pretty much a non-issue, with either method.
What I would like the i-Roast 3 to have:
Durability.
Continuous temperature display.
Continuously-adjustable profiles.
Computer connection of some kind, to monitor the roasting process (temperature I/O, voltage…) and even to control it.
The last one may sound strange, but I think it could have a major impact on homeroasting. One thing which would be exceedingly neat about controlling the roast profile from a computer is that profiles could be associated with roast data, including information about the varietal, room temperature, etc. I know some people have been developing hacks to do something like this but a key advantage of having it as a standard part of the device is that people would be able to share roasting data.
Having said all this, I'm glad I have an i-Roast 2. But there's a lot of potential for a new homeroasting device. Making coffee at home is entering a new phase, so there's an emerging market to tap and expand, with homeroasting devices.
javaorelse Senior Member Joined: 9 Sep 2006 Posts: 4 Location: California Expertise: Pro Roaster
Espresso: Bialetti/Also French Press Grinder: KitchAid burr Roaster: Bravi
Posted Fri May 27, 2011, 10:00am Subject: Re: iRoast 2 Home Coffee Roaster
Only thing I could see IRoast doing for #3 would be to eliminate the stage settings and then provide built in settings based on coffee type. A fool proof method for each type bean. Then it could be called IRoaster for Dummies. Boy, would there be complaints then. I must admit, it would be nice for a list of suggested roast temps and times for a particular roast, for a specific bean. I hate hitting cool when I think the roast is dark enough. Makes you wonder why have stage 5 at all. I've noticed that stage 5 preset can either be cooler or hotter than #4. A paragraph or 2 from IRoast explaining it's inten for the final stage would be nice
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