I believe they discontinued the shipment of the CK as part of their pre-order. Due to many complaints from customers regarding roller alignment. I called and as was offered an upgrade to the Barley Crusher for $20.
t3e871 said:I have used it for 5 batches now and it's a decent performer. I can't compare to anything else because this is my first and only grain mill. First thing is the rubber O-rings they installed on the drive roller (to provide friction and drive the second roller) disintegrated after 2 uses. I found the rubber o-rings mutilated in my mash tun. It still works fine but you have to make sure your drill is going in the proper direction to pull the grain through and drive the second roller. I'm not sure how other mills work in this regard. Second my efficiency has increased almost 20% from crushing my own grain. This thing can turn grain into flour and I get dough-balls in the mash tun now. I never had a problem with dough balls using the home brew-store crushed grain - but I consider this a good problem.
Well I ordered one of the "new improved" Cereal Killer grain mills a couple weeks ago, Guess they started Shipping yesterday,7/9/12 not sure where I'm at on the order list, Looking forward to trying it out,
I went for one also, will be moving from my corona mill in a bucket. Mine will be here friday. forgot to pull the trigger, had it in my cart for 89, ended up paying 99.
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a link to a couple pics....https://www.homebrewtalk.com/f11/just-got-new-cereal-killer-grain-mill-341900/
I just posted a tear down in the thread as well.
This is probably a stupid question, but how do you run this with a drill?
you shouldn't need a bit. just close the drill head directly on the mill's shaft.
Thanks for the help!
Just milled a handful of grain and trying to get the right spacing in the rollers. What do you guys use to measure the gap between the rollers? I'm thinking one of those little discs from autozone that are meant to measure spark plug gaps might work? Or do you folks just go by eye and see how the grain looks after the crush?
Feeler gauges. They are a collection of sheet metal rectangles usually riveted together so they look like a pocket knife. They fan out and you select the plate that you want, they are all marked. You can find them in any auto parts store and will work easier that a spark plug gapping disk, if those are the ones with all the loops. They measure in the wrong direction, inside the loops.
Does anyone run the grain though twice? Be using it for the first time soon and wondering if one pass is good?
I only do one pass. Just set right. I have mine at 35.
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Used mine for the first time last Monday. It seems solid, but not as precise as it could be. The bearings are not as smooth as a new bearing should be. I also noticed that the rollers are not drilled perfectly centered for the bearings. Upon setting the gap to.037 I found that while spinning the rollers the gap changed from .037 to .035. At 66% the cost of other crushers I can accept these quality issues. It is unfortunate though... it wouldn't take much for a machinist to get a hole centered or put a blank on a lathe after the holes were drilled.
It all seems solid though, and overall I am happy with my purchase. I am sure I will get plenty of use out of it.
Sent from my SCH-R970 using Home Brew mobile app
Does anyone run the grain though twice? Be using it for the first time soon and wondering if one pass is good?
I have done single and multiple passes, set to 0.040" and the last two batches I got a stuck sparge (toilet screen in a cooler) and I ran it through twice. I think from now on I am going to stick with one pass on my new brewtus style setup and may try to recirculate my mash to ramp up efficiency.I only do one pass. Just set right. I have mine at 35.
Sent from my Galaxy Nexus using Home Brew mobile app
Used mine for the first time last Monday. It seems solid, but not as precise as it could be. The bearings are not as smooth as a new bearing should be. I also noticed that the rollers are not drilled perfectly centered for the bearings. Upon setting the gap to.037 I found that while spinning the rollers the gap changed from .037 to .035. At 66% the cost of other crushers I can accept these quality issues. It is unfortunate though... it wouldn't take much for a machinist to get a hole centered or put a blank on a lathe after the holes were drilled.
It all seems solid though, and overall I am happy with my purchase. I am sure I will get plenty of use out of it.
Sent from my SCH-R970 using Home Brew mobile app
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