Cuprajake It’s getting a hell of a push from most people on YouTube, I think what most are worried about is it never coming to light, like the failed chess board and that money pledged is being spent elsewhere.
You can understand someone like Dave who works with manufacturers in the industry having doubts when he know how hard it is for established businesses to make products..
Raja123 are you part of the meticulous team?
No.
Wouldn’t get so wound up about it then 👍
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Raja123 Lets be clear, they have some influencers on the payroll and a massive team. As for beta testers being paid…I never said anything about beta testers?
A lot of the money is going to disappear in wages, premises, exhibitions, design, prototyping CNC work, trying to set up a proper production line, support desk etc.. etc.. and various other payments for people who don’t come cheap.
Much of the money raised is going to disappear in that black hole and the longer the project runs over time, the more of that initial Kickstarter money will be sucked away. They stated dec 23 to deliver a product, I will be speechless and have to find a hat to eat if they deliver on time. I suspect it could be at least Dec24 and backers almost certainly wont get the product they have dreamt up in their own minds.
Plus they have all those stretch goals and Meticulous Milk and goodness knows what next to deliver, that takes time away from the main product, or they need to hire more people.
The machine “looks” all modern minimalist and interesting…but really I can see it being a novelty for a while before it turns into a major PITA to use. Imagine a 2 mates drop round and are offered a coffee.
Kettles, small drip tray, and a long time between shots from everything I have seen so far. I tried to imagineer myself using something like that and realised quickly it’s not going to be fun and I think that could be true for a lot of backers.
I think right now, is going to be an acid test for crowdfunding. Naming two projects, Timemore and Meticulous, they really do seem to have caught the backers eyes and there is so much fervour, passion, stupidity and guff flying around, that where project meets reality, Unicorns have been brought back to life. For me, you have to be able to view any project and work out good points and bad points, work out what chance there is of success. It seems that the younger person, instead of sifting through the available material just believes and wants to believe, whatever is claimed by the host is true.
Look at the Odyssey Argos. The idea is brilliant. The project is not massively late but the months are adding up. An update released yesterday with 3 changes (Heating element seal, Fill tube alignment, CE / EMI compliance). The first two are relatively easy to fix but the third could see ping pong being played for some time. I really do hope that they resolve all issues very quickly. They have 50+ units ready to roll when the green light turns. They have been 100% transparent with their problems and answers and I personally think that is why the public have been so forgiving.
I think my wallet will stay firmly shut for the foreseeable future. If Timemore and Meticulous both make it, then perhaps that will restore some confidence, to myself anyway. meanwhile, I sit and watch and wait.
DavecUK Lets be clear, they have some influencers on the payroll and a massive team. As for beta testers being paid…I never said anything about beta testers?
Hi Dave,
I asked because I’d mentioned whether you were interested in beta testing the Meticulous. Other posts I’d made also mentioned that Meticulus did indeed have beta testers that aren’t influencers in the context of the discussions in this thread. Those beta testers can provide good feedback, and from what I have experienced from them thus far, they are not jaded or inclined to dress things up. I couldn’t see how sampling influencers and having employees equates to relegating the need for genuine beta testers, so I pulled that thread when you presented it.
I decided not to back the Met because of the kettle workflow. But, I still appreciate some of the innovation and how it may drive the industry forward. As with all Kickstarter campaigns, risks are involved, and there will likely be delays in achieving targets. However, I can’t be strident about things I don’t know as reasonable facts. I’m also not overly fixated on continually stating the obvious or encouraging people to be balanced, so I’ll bow out of the discussion.
-Raja
Raja123 I asked because I’d mentioned whether you were interested in beta testing the Meticulous. Other posts I’d made also mentioned that Meticulus did indeed have beta testers that aren’t influencers in the context of the discussions in this thread.
I am not interested in Beta testing, I don’t have the time with other things I have on. Also sounds as if they have plenty of people testing and doing whatever. As you correctly state, with Kickstarter projects there are risks. I am a little perturbed by their potential customers inventiveness in providing answers features and facilities that are not actually in the project description. From some the support even seems almost too much?
There is also not much factual evidence being presented, for me that’s a little worrying, but perhaps I simply haven’t seen it.
e.g. how long exactly does it take to heat room temperature water to shot temp…does the portafilter have to be warmed?
If you use a kettle, how long does it take exactly to be ready for a shot?
These are exactly the same type of questions I have for the Timemore Kickstarter project.
Watched lance vid from the live stream.
The principal of the machine is very good, he’s version 8 and said they are on 10 now,
What worries me is his machine was set to 89 for espresso his scace showed 83/84 out the pf.
There are still a tonne of changes to make and it’s due for release in Dec
He did address the whole failed kick starter thing.
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Cuprajake What worries me is his machine was set to 89 for espresso his scace showed 83/84 out the pf
Why set to 89C if traditionally for a medium/light the temperature is around 92-94C?
Maybe the machine can’t keep up? Would be interesting to see a future version if this is addressed.
DavecUK The machine “looks” all modern minimalist and interesting…but really I can see it being a novelty for a while before it turns into a major PITA to use. Imagine a 2 mates drop round and are offered a coffee.
Latte please (sorry, doesn’t steam milk)
Americano then, OK I’ll put on the kettle
7-10 minutes later, what would you like, oh I’ll have an expresso
7- 10 minutes later, you make your own coffee
Clean up, and your left thinking, that was a ball acheKettles, small drip tray, and a long time between shots from everything I have seen so far. I tried to imagineer myself using something like that and realised quickly it’s not going to be fun and I think that could be true for a lot of backers.
Those problems aren’t unique to Meticulous, the Flair isn’t good for back to back drinks but people still like and buy them.
Exactly. It would be a perfect machine for me. I could even pair it with an nano foamer or whatever. No one drinks coffee in my house but me, and guests can have coffee from a Moka pot, for example.
But for $1,500 or whatever it is… I’ll keep my Elizabeth thanks!
I do like the idea of being able to just pour water from a kettle into the group. This would mean I could just use tap water or from a Brita Filter, but not need to go thought lengths to make my own water so it’s boiler safe.
Temperature stability might be a problem though, as shown.
Think I’m batting 4 wins and 2 losses with KS now. Assuming the xBloom is delivered, which seems likely.
One loss was for the x-bar espresso device. $200 maybe? Reviews by influencers were positive but then they simply disappeared and all we got was radio silence. That one appeared to stumble in going from prototype to production. Covid probably did not help.
The second was due to me being dumb and basing my pledge on images rather than seeing a video of a working prototype. Not coffee related. $180 maybe. Turned out that one was a blatant rip off.
The latter type of loss is my concern with crowd sourcing.
The goal is reached, pledges collected and then presumably the money, minus KS fees, is deposited into the private bank account of the project owner.
In the case of a proven manufacturer with many shareholders and board governance, that’s a safer bet. Although such companies normally raise capital privately.
But where we have one individual who relatively quickly finds $5 million (?) dollars in his bank account, I have to confess to having concerns.
In the case of Meticulous, concern #1 is the Chess KS project that raised $2 million (?) and years later has not been delivered.
Concern #2 is the temptation to take the money and simply fudge a failure by stretching out excuses over a few years while living the high life. I’m not aware of any federal requirement for transparency or accountability with KS projects. And even if there was, the power to prosecute based on one country’s laws weakens considerably once the money and the owner relocate to another country.
But assuming the above two concerns are not an issue i.e. the project owners are ethical people, concern #3 is putting $5 million (?) into the hands of someone who is not experienced in bringing thousands of machines to market from a prototype that is clearly not yet fully sorted.
The extraordinay success of the Timemore and Meticulous KS projects have magnified what were minor concerns before, to what are now major concerns, as least in my mind.
It was different when the individual pledge amounts and the total amounts raised were smaller. I may not be concerned about a firecracker going off on my front doorstep, but I would be very concerned about a bomb going off.
The KS game has changed.
Re Kickstarter, I saw a post today saying timemore will not be shipping to some countries because of the cost. But they are not going to release this list till the deadline has passed ..not sure if true.
I just don’t like a platform were you have no comeback. There’s no distance selling laws, they could send you anything 😔
Think it preys on everyone wanting a bargain.
I’ve bought used most my life and have been burnt some times, so I’ve always looked at if it’s less than 25% saving buy new, get a warranty.
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With regards to timemore… aren’t they a stablished company? Would they really risk of “doing a runner” or upsetting a very large customer base? Or maybe I’m too naïve.
Nah they wouldn’t do a runner, I’d say they probably underestimated how many backers they would get lol.
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MediumRoastSteam based on my post? If so, then aplogies for any ambiguity. No, I wasn’t referring to Timemore in my list of concerns. I mentioned them only to illustrate the sheer size of recent KS pledges.
Sorry be me mixing stuff up lol as I mentioned TM in the meticulous thread 👍
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tompoland - No, not your post :-) 👍
Just watched the most recent video from LH on the Met where the ubiquitous failure of the temperature was once again glossed over with “that doesn’t matter because Carlos said he’s changing it”.
That’s the 4th time I’ve heard a comment like that from a reviewer.
That is a concern. And this is coming from me, the guy who can normally be relied on to keep his rose coloured spectacles firmly in place.
live streaming his last comments on the timemore today, then said hes done, probably distancing himself as timemore have just changed there tune around shipping world wide and paying fees..
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Cuprajake live streaming his last comments on the timemore today, then said hes done, probably distancing himself as timemore have just changed there tune around shipping world wide and paying fees..
He is certainly flexible….
Now i wait the next video like a new episode of Breaking Bad😂
I was slightly confused when he was talking about the motor and its uses in the marine sector; submarine windows. I would say I’m no expert on submarines, however I do know a bit, and I don’t see many windows that open on them…
Linked video to the clip.
giampiero Now i wait the next video like a new episode of Breaking Bad😂
I just skipped through as LH video of the Timemore from 3 months ago….very difficult watching with many bold statements based on…guesswork? Not helpful when a Kickstarter is beginning. Looks like exactly the same thing is happening with the Meticulous, but this time from a designer and developer with no real prior experience of production, or coffee. Good at marketing though!
Del_UK <lol>, the word salad flows, this time with some honey mustard dressing. he could be talking about Chinese submarines, or Russian ones perhaps. So Carlos is using a marine military grade motor…this is really what he is implying.
Wow!
Words fail me! What a load of 💩
Why are you throwing with so much shit to Lance? at least he is making something public, without his videos what information would people have? Of course you need to do your own research and take everything as false from the 1st second and then research and get your information right: what you want to believe for yourself.
I know you had a “fight” with him for something (probably still sour taste from him saying the niche sucks) but Dave to be fair I just found out you are involved into the Niche business, and you are posting on home-barista on the niche topic while throwing shade into other manufacturer topics, isn’t that the same “problem” on what Lance is doing? You are getting into the ring when something bad is said about Niche and now and then you post smth about timemore making a bit of fun of them. From what I know on that forum people involved in a business by any kind should have 0 rights to post about that product. Maybe some time ago you said somewhere something about you being involved into the Niche (not talking here about testing the niche and giving them feedback but talking about owning something in the business) so now it makes sense why you were totally silent mode for the Duo and made no videos about it, but for some reason the Duo went mostly to UK people, no Eu people (some US).
It’s okay to have favorites, it’s okay to be oriented towards some products, each forum has that, but it should be made public, directly, so everyone can see it.
Lance is a cool guy, he is pasionate, he knows a lot of people and get’s a lot of information. He doesnt have the time to sit and research everything people tell me (Carlos for example) and the idea behind that motor is that it was used at one point into industrial machinery, meaning it must have some durability over time. It’s just an idea that the key points that are supposed to fail first are of a higher quality (these are just words at the moment).
I also talk to a lot of people and find out many things (i can’t check if all of them are true) but the one finding out you are involved with Niche after so many years it’s just fked up.
An to be clear here, I dont care about timemore, or niche or meticulous, not interested in gear anymore. I’m focusing only on beans and roasting, so i’m not bias towards a product or producer. I just dont like sneaky people, not in 2023, maybe 20 years ago, yes.
DenisS I know you had a “fight” with him for something
Nope I didn’t have a fight with him at all. He had a disagreement with a member, threw his dummy out of the pram, didn’t read the rules, didn’t contact one of the 3 moderators. Didn’t use the contact form to contact me, didn’t use my personal e-mail which he has and then used his social media to try and destroy the forum, badmouthing it, spinning a load of lies he had been fed by others from another forum and encouraging as many people as he could to not use this forum. All this without the common courtesy to contact me. He also felt he should tell me and others how to run and moderate a forum he had not read the rules for. It’s not great he used his social media presence like that. I lost a lot of respect for him that day.
DenisS (probably still sour taste from him saying the niche sucks) but Dave to be fair I just found out you are involved into the Niche business, and you are posting on home-barista on the niche topic while throwing shade into other manufacturer topics, isn’t that the same “problem” on what Lance is doing?
Not at all no sour taste from me. I consulted on the design and testing of the Duo and have been totally up front on that. ANY, comments I made on the Niche thread I made on HB, I have been super careful NOT, to offer any opinions. All I have offered is technical information and very little of that. I think I made 3 posts. In fact in my first post in that thread I stated the following and you can see the post at this link https://www.home-barista.com/grinders/niche-duo-83mm-flat-burr-grinder-t86589-260.html#p924458
Disclosure: I was involved in the design and testing of the product for more than 1 year, so I won’t comment on whether you should buy it, how good it is etc… For this people should ask reviewers, testers and real customers. I will, however, happily answer any technical questions which don’t breach any in confidence information.
DenisS not talking here about testing the niche and giving them feedback but talking about owning something in the business) so now it makes sense why you were totally silent mode for the Duo
I own nothing of the Niche business
DenisS It’s okay to have favorites, it’s okay to be oriented towards some products, each forum has that, but it should be made public, directly, so everyone can see it.
I have always been completely up front about my activities.
DenisS Lance is a cool guy, he is pasionate, he knows a lot of people and get’s a lot of information. He doesnt have the time to sit and research everything people tell me (Carlos for example)
No, what he tried to do to our forum wasn’t cool and the misinformation that comes from him, intentionally or unintentionally isn’t cool. I find his videos uninformative, misleading and difficult to watch. As an influencer I think he has a position of responsibility, which isn’t executed well.
DenisS I also talk to a lot of people and find out many things (i can’t check if all of them are true) but the one finding out you are involved with Niche after so many years it’s just fked up.
The first involvement with Niche (the Zero), they donated £150 to a guinea pig sanctuary and the request of my then spouse. I was not paid a penny for all the work I did, or given any stake in the company. What’s fked up is the BS you are coming out with, who has been feeding you this ****
DenisS . I just dont like sneaky people, not in 2023, maybe 20 years ago, yes.
If you think that of me…and willing to state it along with the other unsavoury personal stuff which isn’t true. Then this isn’t the forum for you. I don’t take kindly to that sort of statement when I have never monetised my YouTube, any online activities, used referral links, Patreon, or kick backs for sales of products. This is a non commercial forum where all products are welcome.
You think you “know” a lot, but trust me, you know nothing about the things you are talking about. @Raja123 , I’m glad you liked his post, allows me to tell you; you might be too easily influenced.
@DenisS I have decided you would be happier elsewhere to spout your 2nd hand and distasteful comments, I am sure you will find platforms where these are welcomed.
I’m not wanting to wade in on any disagreement but just hope that this can be resolved by @DavecUK and @DenisS offline so we continue to have a diversity of voices and opinions on the forum.
DavecUK I can understand why you took personal offense at this accusation when you strive for impartiality, transparency and you reject opportunities to monetise the forum and your YouTube.
What I’m going to point out next is not an attack on anyone or an attempt to rekindle any arguements, I just want to raise the point in the hope that this will be handled in a similar way. Very similar comments were levelled at Lance Hedrick multiple times when he was briefly a member, and these did not result in any bans. This was handled privately with a warning and I think many will agree it resolved a difficult situation, although many admittedly have issue with the way Lance left and that’s a totally different matter.
I hope this can be resolved in a similar way because as mentioned I appreciate the experience and range of voices that post on here - but also because it’s important to apply rules consistently and fairly, and to not favour certain members because they are friends or whatever reason, nor to come down against harder others because their accusations are against you over other members of the forum.
Again not a criticism, just a post to say I hope the dust settles and this is worked out behind closed doors. Thanks
FadedFrontiers Again not a criticism, just a post to say I hope the dust settles and this is worked out behind closed doors. Thanks
He slandered me in a pretty awful way and I wont have it, I put up with those sorts of accusations for years and years on CFUK…no more. I don’t put myself out there as an influencer and haven’t done the stuff he suggested I have. So I banned him, I suspect he doesn’t care or he wouldn’t have posted like that.
I’m sure you will read his opinion elsewhere, I suspect he might be keen to post the same lies on other forums.
To know who and what Lance is, all you have to do is watch one or more (if you have the stamina) of his videos. I prefer facts and demonstrable performance. Dave C provides both of these, it’s a shame most of the ‘influencers’ don’t.
I’m not on anyone’s payroll and I have no axe to grind here. I spent 20 years reviewing pro-audio equipment and the rule there was, if the device has serious flaws, we told the manufacturer and didn’t review it. Yes, there was an element of reviewing stuff in order to get advertising for the mag but we would never compromise on the facts. Dave C doesn’t even have that pressure. I know whose opinions I trust.
I’ve got a pair of D13’s if Lance and Carlos need a power source for their machine. Marine tech, so very robust!
DavecUK According to their own marketing blurb its producing 2000 Newtons
“The way Meticulous handles pressure is what sets the machine apart. Instead of boiling water to generate mechanical energy, our 2,000-Newton digital motor pushes water directly over the coffee puck while making over 150 pressure adjustments per second. Whether it is keeping pressure constant at 9 bars or replicating sophisticated pressure profiles, Meticulous offers an unprecedented level of control”
I’m no coffee expert, but that doesn’t seem right to me. If it’s a 58mm basket, 2000 newtons will only give 7.97 bars of pressure.
Sorry but…i could not resist🤭
capuchin I’m no coffee expert, but that doesn’t seem right to me. If it’s a 58mm basket, 2000 newtons will only give 7.97 bars of pressure.
My calculations say it could probably produce about 10.2 bar, so I don’t believe there is a problem with the pressure it can produce. I do however wonder what the lifespan of the motor is going to be like. There is a lot of basic information that’s totally absent for example you’re having to assume it has a 58 millimeter basket, I really don’t know what size filter basket it uses?
DavecUK Assuming they are using a “standard” Matrix screen shower, i deduct that the basket is a 58mm,
A screen shot from the Meticulous kickstarter page FAQ
