I've just finished watching the latest Brian Quan video where he spends time with the owner of kafatek. I found these videos fascinating yet a little frustrating and I'm not sure whether if it's just me or not. Whilst I can't knock Brian for his passion or enthusiasm I feel like these kafatek videos have slightly missed the mark from a technical standpoint. I'm not an engineer, nor do I have an engineering background so I might be way off but it irritated me slightly that Brian doesn't have this background or that way of thinking either so he kind of comes across as a bit of a fan boy in my opinion . I would have loved to have seen Brian take someone with him with an actual engineering background who would have been able to allow Dennis to flow into full "geek mode" to pardon the phrase. An example I can give is with the lelit Elizabeth review and videos done by Dave. Nowhere else have I seen a review to that technical standard by anyone else in the coffee community that I've come across. So much so that I've been researching my first proper espresso machine purchase as an Xmas present to myself and I'm 99% sure now that I'm going to go with the Elizabeth because of Dave. So many reviews and videos that I've come across are all the same and pretty uninteresting but I learnt a ton from Dave's reviews and write ups. I also found it a little amusing that Dave's review was the only one to highlight how setting a timer for a shot to run is a little pointless but it's a good feature if you use it as a failsafe incase something happens as you start to pull a shot and you are not there to stop it. As I said previously, I might be way off with my take here and I'm not trying to cause controversy but I'm interested to know what you guys think and whether any of you feel certain lines of questioning was missed or not fully explored in the videos?

> @"EddieMoonshine"#p71436 As I said previously, I might be way off with my take here and I’m not trying to cause controversy but I’m interested to know what you guys think and whether any of you feel certain lines of questioning was missed or not fully explored in the videos? I didn't listen to the interviewer….I tried to listen to everything Denis said and watch the video and background stuff very carefully. Clearly Brian knows very little and understands less about engineering, so adds no value.

@"DavecUK"#p71439 We need a "Dave meets Denis" podcast special.

> @"EddieMoonshine"#p71440 We need a “Dave meets Denis” podcast special. That, I would enjoy doing.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=D2tIZ_xBnKw&t=30s Prepare to be triggered more oh rescuers of humanity….

@"Raja123"#p71464 I hope Denis had some decent tunes playin' through his air pods 😂

@"Cuprajake"#p71469 Works for X Bloom too?

Brian Quan's Kafatek video series

EddieMoonshine

Raja123 I hope Denis had some decent tunes playin’ through his air pods 😂

Cuprajake

Sure Brian quan is something to do with fellow, and also has a part in a coffee roasting business..

MWJB

Cuprajake Works for X Bloom too?

DavecUK

Well none of them are doing it out of the goodness of their heart.

EddieMoonshine

Fair play to Brian and I really don’t want to start a pile on because he’s obviously very passionate about coffee and is doing well for himself. It’s just that the series of Kafatek videos seem to me to be a massive missed opportunity.

Raja123

It takes Brian’s level of passion to arrange or push for a visit. People commenting negatively often don’t have the drive to do these things. We shouldn’t beat up on him for not doing “what I’d do if it were me”.

Platypus

There’s obviously trust in the relationship between Denis and Brian, I imagine Denis doesn’t suffer fools and wouldn’t give this sort of interview to just anyone.

I enjoyed the interviews between Brian and Denis , it hit the right note for me. Anything too technical would have seemed a bit dry and less enjoyable to watch.

I appreciated seeing the human side of Denis , hearing about his background and respect his well earned success with Kafatek. .

Systemic

As someone with a Flat Max on order, I was pleased to see Denis is shipping Max’s with blind burrs which is a real bonus point for me.

dfk41

Systemic Explain what a blind burr is for the un-initiated!

Systemic

Blind burrs don’t have screw holes drilled into them as the retaining bolts screw into the back. The plus side is there is a decent increase in grind surface area. I’m surprised Brian didn’t make more of Kafatek’s shift to blind burrs. I had to replay the segment a couple of times to make sure I’d heard it right especially the the release date when Flat Maxs would be shipped with them.

Cuprajake

no screw holes increases extraction by 100000000%

Systemic

Cuprajake

100000010%

Cuprajake

im not sure how much it matters as screw holes are genrally in the pre break area, not the finishing, good job lance can now use a particle anyliser to show us

Systemic

I’m expecting to hit extractions in the 30% plus margin even though the coffee soluble content in a bean maxes out at 30%. That’s how much faith I have in science and blind burrs.

Systemic

I would have liked Brian to ask Denis why he has switched to blind burrs - an opportunity missed.

mykm

Systemic I’m a little late to this discussion but if you have watched how the Monolith grinders have evolved, most of the newly added features have been customer or community driven. Blind burrs are on most people’s checklist of must have features when shopping for a new grinder. It’s a box ticking exercise. There’s little to no conclusive taste benefits reported of any blind burr but if you don’t listen to what customers are wanting and make the effort to give them what they want then you’re narrowing you’re audience in an already narrow niche of the market. I can appreciate a manufacturer who steers their products based off changing trends and is not rigid in thinking it’s not required especially at the expense of what it takes to implement those changes just to make people happier with the purchase. These videos really showed off the difference in my opinion of what a small business invests in competing with large more mass production companies. I have a Monolith MC5 and was happy to see where and how it was made.

MWJB

Marco’s Ubergrinder had blind burrs 14 years ago…no one seems to mention the Ubergrinder any more?

Systemic

Until you mentioned them, I’d never heard of the Ubergrinder.

Petre

I like the idea of not having old grounds stuck in screw holes and released at random time.

dfk41

Petre Once compacted they are very unlikely to release…..even if they did, the minute amounts we are talking about, could you taste them?

Systemic

I can
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