Does Burr Shape Matter? | Flat vs Conical vs Block 

do you have a monolith yet? =]

I got one of those when I lost a part for my old conical grinder, and it produced a wide variety of grind sizes, all at once. I wound up ordering a replacement part for my old grinder. I'll stick with conical grinders for reasonable consistency and minimal hassle.

Retention is more an issue of the design of the grinder, not the burr type. See, Niche Zero has a large conical burr that of Mazzer Kony.

Update: I find I prefer flat burr grinders, maybe because I am more used to them, but it seems like flat burrs give a more balanced taste, there's some bitterness, sweetness, acidity and fruit notes in a light roast as there should be, and some roasty / chocolatey notes depending on the coffee and how you extract it as well. With conical burrs I seem to be getting more acidity and reduced bitterness, some people may think less bitter is better, but to me it seems off balance, and when you're doing milk drinks it makes the coffee seam weaker to me.

Why would there be any difference? If both are crushing the bean to a specific diameter ground, why would there be any difference in flavor? Unless 1 machine heats the coffee bean up during the process? But that is doubtful. It seems to me that the desired result is 100% consistency in grounded beans.

@@j0shll0yd lots of different factors burr geometry such as the prebreaker area, the angle size, shape and length of the teeth, and grinder rpm even burr coating and material can make a difference In how the coffee particle distribution ends up. Sometimes its enough to be apparent to the naked eye other times it might look the same but grind distribution being different will affect your espresso shot timing and extraction / taste. Apparently conical burrs also produce a differently shaped particle.

Here's my take on it, from what I can extrapolate based on what I've heard. Let me first say, espresso quality grinders are expensive, so the difference may not be very drastic due to the high cost, making the end product very reliable, and consistent regardless of burr design used. But that is due to them being well over 200$ for a true espresso quality grinder that will have absolutely no issues. Now for your questions directly. Both are, technically, but it's your grinder's capabilities that make it suitable or not. A lower end may not have that fine a grain at the finest setting sufficient enough for espresso, but I would say that they would work very properly for medium to coarse grinds. Conical versus flat is a good question, I would say conical is better for consistency, and the difference between ceramic and stainless is not that big a deal. I would say go with stainless, but I think either would not be any different from the other. For drip coffee, rather than espresso, you're using medium grinds, medium fine- medium coarse, so you're in a zone where a lower end grinder will work where espresso needs much pricier grinders to be sufficient consistently. I recommend any kind of burr grinder, I am partial to the cappresso infinity, but I'm strapped for cash, so I went for a Cappresso 559, dunno how it'll do, I'm waiting on it, but truth be told, any burr grinder is going to work about the same as another, and for a normal cup of coffee not focus on pure perfection, just go for what you think will work in your price range, and frankly, as long as it's a burr, what kind isn't as big of a deal as blade versus burr versus pre-ground.

Flat burrs are the best for consistancy and even grind for espresso so flat burrs are the best

Excellent point

A lot of people seem to prefer the taste of flat burrs, and flat may have less variation despite the fines. But I heard flat burrs are also more prone to alignment issues, so... lots of pro's and cons to each. I think the specific grinder and the construction / design of the burr is the most important thing, there are good connical grinders, and bad ones, good flat ones and bad ones.

Alignment and materials. Conical grinders are harder to make perfectly aligned than flat.

@@cybernessful that makes sense. thanks

Steel rusting is not a problem as long as you regularly clean your grinder and never expose it to water. Ceramics are not very common, but tend to be slightly harder/long lasting than plain steel; more common are surface coated steel burrs (e.g. TiN or Tungsten), which are based on steel, but have ultra-hard surface treatments that increase their lifetime massively. Grind quality may vary a small amount depending on the burr material, but it should be mostly negligible in a home environment, and it depends much more on the size, type, and geometry of the burr.

This. An older Clive Coffee video for a conical grinder (Macap?) notes bright flavors. Lance H. has noted "random" brightness in shots from conicals like Niche Z. that he says doesn't fit in the shot flavors (disharmony) and in one person's comparison video of Niche Zero to Cast burr the taster noted the Zero was dominant of green apple citrus flavor while the flat burr-Cast had some; more chocolate taste that was lacking from Niche but then so many YT vids point out body and dominant or prevailing chocolate notes from Niche Z. Even with light roasts so many says Niche-that type conical "pushes" flavor to chocolate. Seems the burr is biggest factor in sense people have to try a lot of different beans-roasts on flat burr and conical burr then discover for themselves then go and buy a better grinder that will last years and years versus going w/conventional wisdom. Old posts on H-B talk about great clarity from larger conicals like Robur or even that they 'eked' out great results when the Niche Zero was released. Maybe people just need to get better at 1:1 or lower dosing etc.. along with 1:2, 1:3 'turbo' to really get best result from any good grinder-burr. Regards

Conical most likely.

Both the flat and the conicle are considered Burr grinders. Also, rpm entirely depends upon the manufacturer and motor they used.

Should spin faster as the cones look a little narrower.

"Con-ical"

Come-ical.

The encore will work well for ur application

Hand grinders! You can get some good results with those even for espresso.

@@BensCoffeeRants I ended up doing just that! Thanks.

Encores will do a good enough job and are well priced. The super expensive grinders are really for espresso.

QuickQuips thanks for the recommendation, heard lots of great reviews about it, Encore it is

then what will you say about Ode Grinder that uses Flat burr and is only dedicated to Drip type coffee !!!