I pre-ordered the 63mm conical variant of these from https://gorillagear.coffee/products/gorilla-gear-roblack-burrs-71mm-conical?_pos=1&_sid=de7841d97&_ss=r&variant=40171553259608 which are made to fit the Niche Zero and other grinders that use the Mazzer Kony burrs that the Niche uses. Made by John Gordon in New Zealand and now supplying the likes of high end grinder manufacturer Titus. [URL=https://i.imgur.com/Yzh1dWi.jpg][IMG]https://i.imgur.com/Yzh1dWi.jpg[/IMG][/URL] The burrs arrived late last week and I've just had my first three pours after putting a kilo of beans through for seasoning followed by a couple of sinkers while I sorted the grind size out. I'm impressed. From a Kenya AA bean medium/dark I detected more origin flavors than with the original burrs. The difference is more distinct than I dared hope for. The trade off is the very small loss of viscosity. Bear in mind that this is not a side by side comparison because I don't have two Niche grinders. But when my sons Niche arrives in a few weeks I'll ask him to bring it with him and run some side by sides with some Medium and Medium Light beans and will report back. The jury is out until then. Interested to know if anyone else has tried GG burrs.

Looking forward to a side by side comparison from you, I think it will be interesting and I'm sure more people will look at buying the burrs when they are more readily available. But for the price I guess people will have to see how well they work so I'm glad someone can do some testing for us

@"tompoland"#p34172 I'll be interested in the results Tom.

Appreciate its too early to say, Tom , but interested indeed your experience of these in a niche (which i have) vs olympia moca sd (whch i might buy…) Would be a lot cheaper to buy new burrs! Thanks

Very promising! Look forward to hearing about the results, conscious these will be primarily for espresso but any pour over comparisons would also be appreciated as I know people gave the Niche a hard time for the fines it created especially on lighter roasts.

I also ordered the Gorilla burrs. WEEKS ago! After numerous delays and extremely poor communication from Gorilla I'm expecting delivery tomorrow. So a week or so I'll have drawn some conclusions. I'm very interested to know your thoughts, @"tompoland"#121 !

@"tompoland"#121 Thanks for offering to complete the side by side tests, Tom. And looking forward to learning of your impressions, @"Grahamsphillips"#p34213 And anyone else.

@"TomR"#p34196 Tom I have poured a few shots from each grinder over the last two days, simply for when I have an espresso each morning. Bearing in mind that means an hour or two in between each grind so it's not a side by side comparison which I find is the best method for taste comparisons. So take this with a pinch of salt but at this stage it's a surprisingly close call to between them. I don't know what miracles John Gordon has worked with his GG conical burrs, but they are mighty impressive. As you know, I'm still to do side by side comparisons with another Niche so I'll add side by side comparisons with the Moca SD to the queue. Thanks for the idea, not sure why I didn't think of it. In the interests of setting a realistic time frame expectation, the Niche GG burrs to Niche Kony burrs comparison is still a few weeks away because I need to wait for my son's Niche to arrive (ETA two weeks) and then for him to come for a visit. But it will happen. For the Niche GG burrs to Moca SD, I can do that early next week when the beans I have resting are ready to go. I'll post back here.

> @"FadedFrontiers"#p34202 any pour over comparisons would also be appreciated sorry FF but I can't help you with that, I have not the faintest idea how to do a pour over or even what it should taste like. I could do something with the Gevi 4-1 that is collecting dust at the moment but to be quite honest, I'm the last person you should listen to on pour over. re pour over: @"lancehedrick"#742 are you in the building? You gotta gotta gotta try the John Gordon burrs.

Hi @"tompoland"#121 I believe @"lancehedrick"#742 is indeed expecting some of the GG burrs so it’ll be interesting to see his take esp as he’s not a fan of the NICHE with the stock burrs

@"Grahamsphillips"#p34236 good to know thanks GP. From memory (not always a good idea) Lance's main point in his "one year on" review was that the NZ was not the all rounder be-all-and-end-all grinder that some were making it out to be. The Kony burrs in the NZ are certainly proven performers for medium-dark and dark roasts. And when people add milk to those type of beans, they excell even more. But yes, it will be interesting to see his review. I'm loving the GG burrs but their arrival coincided with a new batch of beans so the beans may be a part of the difference I'm tasting. So I'm looking forward to getting a second NZ to run the side by side comparison with the same beans.

Gorilla Gear burrs in a Niche Zero

Cuprajake

MattH yeah join simplelogin easy as peas

JHCCoffee

DavecUK You don’t have a disposable email in your signature. Use simplelogin or whatever it is to make one.

Thanks and just set one up. Feel free to give it a test DavecUK

Grahamsphillips

@tompoland so I now have my espresso machine up and running again. The Vesuvius is in store ATM so I’m solely using the Londinium L1. Whenever I grind fine enough for espresso, it chokes the NICHE. Bizarre.. I’m vaguely aware that someone on HomeBarista had the same experience. You clearly haven’t so why me? Does your NICHE have the anti-popcorn disc? I’m wondering if I remove the disk will that solve the problem? I also tried the other trick of feeding the beans slowly into the grinder and starting the grinder BEFORE adding beans. That seemed to work but its a real faff when one of the best things about the NICHE is the workflow…

Anyways I’ve emailed John (he of GG fame) for his views. Honestly if its going to be that much hassle I’ll maybe return the burrs, sell me NICHE and consider a DF83 or maybe even your beloved MOCHA SD!

FIRST WORLD PROBLEMS….

MediumRoastSteam

Grahamsphillips I also tried the other trick of feeding the beans slowly into the grinder and starting the grinder BEFORE adding beans

My general experience (with the stock Niche burrs) is that, if you use the disk, or feed one bean at a time, you have to grind finer than if you were to just dump your dose of beans on the Niche hopper and grind away.

Try that: remove the disk and grind away. Does that work?

Cuprajake

Grahamsphillips what beans?

Platypus

Grahamsphillips just a thought, probably completely wrong but I had this happen with my stock burrs. It turned out the motor had become unseated off the pins and when I tried grinding for a light bean it constantly stalled.
James sent me this : think the issue is the motor gearbox may have become unseated in transit.
Please see instructions to reseat the motor gearbox which should only take a few minutes.
The sweeper maybe a bit stiff to get out, but with force and a bit of jiggling it should come out.
I disassembled, popped it back on and not had a problem since.

tompoland

Grahamsphillips I’ve not had that problem with either burr sets on the Niche. Yes I have the anti popcorning disk and I pour all the beans in at once, then start. I do RDT when I remember but I have not had any choking with or without.

Have you tried a deep clean? Just wondering if there is some clogging?

I’ve been using the Niche with GG burrs for a Full City roast (Medium-Dark) so a little oil on the outside. Three times a day for the last 5 days. No issues at all.

Sorry I can’t shed any light on your issue.

tompoland

Platypus - worth investigating.

@Grahamsphillips I guess that begs the question if something went wrong when you swapped the burrs out. You could therefore also try putting the original burrs back in and seeing if the issue is unique to the GG burrs. But please persist because they produce very nice espresso.

Grahamsphillips

tompoland I did a really deep clean before installing the GG burrs prior to which the NICHE had never missed a beat. It actually wasn’t particularly dirty inside. I like medium to medium light roasts. There no obvious surface oil so maybe that’s the difference. With a great deal of faffing I can get an espresso grind and yes it does taste good but way too much faff. John Gordon says there’s more announcements to come next week on alignment and stalling issues so let’s see where that leads. I’ve not given up YET!

tompoland

@Grahamsphillips you may have also just received an email from John Gordon as follows:

For those with stalling issues and unable to grind fine enough, this will be a combination of things, too light or underdeveloped roasts for espresso grinding, miss alignment, or needing more seasoning.
As mentioned previously we are looking into producing parts for the Niche to eliminate alignment, we are also looking into other areas of this issue.
We will update everyone more on the spare parts to be produced next week as well as some alignment tips.

Cuprajake

I’m still not sure I buy the alignment thing

Some one mentioned a marker test on the Facebook group. When I asked how you do that on a conical I got ghosted.

I’m wondering if the gg are too aggressive of a cut that the niche can’t turn them?

Be interesting to chuck then in a kony and see

dfk41

A couple of folks, including John Gordon have mentioned alignment on the Niche. Does anyone know what this refers to as I thought (possibly wrongly) that there was no method of alignment on the Niche. Can folks confirm they are not using very light, Nordic style roasts? If it is the case and you are not, and your Niche is seasoned then it looks like the possible cause is something else?
@Grahamsphillips perhaps when Dave is back from Rimini he light be able to have a think about it?

DavecUK

Grahamsphillips Put a plug in power meter in line with the Niche, tell me how much power it’s drawing and the profile, when using those burrs.

Cuprajake

Will be interesting to see

Grahamsphillips

DavecUK Hi Dave: So I did as you suggested. When the GG burrs are running set to espresso fine, its consistently around 25watts (no coffee). Adding coffee it rises to 40-50watts but it did spike briefly to 70 (once). That’s feeding the beans in slowly, no choking

Grahamsphillips

I don’t have a power meter. Not sure it’s worth buying one just for this. I definitely prefer the taste for pour over with the GG burrs and in fairness they’re not even broken in yet. Let’s see what John Gordon comes up with

DavecUK

Grahamsphillips I was just curious…

ajohn

Grahamsphillips I don’t have a power meter. Not sure it’s worth buying one just for this. I

It might be of interest and they needn’t cost much eg

;) Might encourage you to switch some items off on standby at night.

The anti popcorn disk. No harm in removing it. It’s addition didn’t cause any general comments from users and those were happy before it was introduced. It was a subject bought up by some one on youtube who has a large following. I have toyed with the idea of feeding one bean at a time in with the disk on to see if the grinder setting remains the same but decided to not waste my time - it might need different grinder setting. Either way it doesn’t get round the fact that the Niche is a good grinder as it comes.

HanceLedrick

Attempting to summarize, but essentially I’m reading that the GG burrs on the niche produce better pour over but don’t go quite fine enough for espresso. Correct?

Grahamsphillips

HanceLedrick not necessarily. @tompoland "#p36113 not necessarily. @tompoland is having success with espresso too. Me not so much

tompoland

HanceLedrick gotta say I’m loving the GG for espresso. Just working through a Full City (medium/dark) then I’ll try some City (medium/light) but so far the taste is exceptionally delicious.

FWIW, I had my son visit this morning and he normally drinks flat whites so I pulled in a spresso from the GG burrs and gave him a sip of it while I was preparing the milk. He said he didn’t want or need the milk because the espresso was so well balanced and had such a refined flavor. That particular son has quite a refined palate, unlike me or his brother.

Tjyven

tompoland Curious if there will be some sort of comparison between the Niche GG and Moca SD?

tompoland

Tjyven only done two “side by side” tests between the two grinders and only with a medium/dark bean. There was little to separate the two in terms of flavor or viscosity. The Moca may be a tiny bit brighter but I need to do some more serious side by side tests this weekend when I have more time (I have a five day weekend coming up) because I want to post here in more details rather than jump to conclusions prematurely.

I need to decide which one to keep for pairing with the Nurri so that’s the other reason for being careful about it.

But it’s not going a ‘night and day’ difference like it was between the Moca SD and the EG-1. The difference there was stark enough over many side by side shots to sell the EG-1 and order a second Moca SD.

The difference between the Niche with GG burrs and the Moca SD is much more subtle.

Personally, I think John Gordon is on to something pretty big with these burrs. He’s also done a 71mm version and I’d be very tempted to try those too.

(And given Lance Hedrick’s recent OTT comments on social media about this forum, I am going to take his criticism of John Gordon with a rather large pinch of salt.)

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