Chaff Removal

[JohnA]

How hard do you work to remove chaff, and how do you do it?

I don’t know if it makes much of a difference to the final cup, but I seem to have more than commercial beans. I have a Fresh Roast, for reference.

 

[redrocker652002]

In my Behmor I use a shop vac to get it out of the main area then use the shop vac to get the tray cleaned up. I then take the drum outside and shake it out and roll it until I get most of the stuff out of it. I can usually get about 99% of the chaff out with no issues.

 

[JohnA]

Out of the roaster or out of the beans? Or both? The roaster hasn’t been a problem for me, just the beans. Easier to see it after grinding.

 

[ba-brewer]

Stand in the wind or in front of fan, then transfer beans between two container until you are happy. Some beans require a little agitation between transfers to loosen the chaff.

I dont know if it really makes a difference but I do it as the chaff seems to be what makes a mess in my grinder.

 

[redrocker652002]

I have thought about the fan idea but then thought that the beans might fly away as well

 

[ba-brewer]

It does not take much wind or air, set the fan on low or step back some.

On windless days I just move the two bowls forward as I pour and that creates enough wind to get the chaff to fall behind the catch bowl.

 

[corkybstewart]

I have thought about the fan idea but then thought that the beans might fly away as well

Because I live at the top of a ridge in windy New Mexico, I let the wind do my cleanup. I pour the beans from one pitcher into another, several times until I don't see any flying chaff. I lose a few beans if it's really blowing hard, but I just pick them up and put them back in the pitcher.

 

[Closet Fermenter]

I dump my beans into a colander from the roaster. I stir the beans around and around and most of the chaff just falls through the holes in my colander, but the beans are too large to go through. This also helps knock some of the chaff off that’s still clinging to a few beans. I stir until I see no more chaff falling out.

 

[JohnA]

I’ll definitely try some of these ideas, thanks! Especially the colander. The SR800 does a pretty good job of collecting all the loose stuff, but apparently there’s still quite a bit stuck on which really shows up at grinding.

 

[jwill911]

How hard do you work to remove chaff, and how do you do it?

I don’t know if it makes much of a difference to the final cup, but I seem to have more than commercial beans. I have a Fresh Roast, for reference.

With my Behmor I used a ShopVac Hangup to deal with chaff. I bought an Aillio Bullet R2, and chaff is no longer an issue. Here’s a picture of a Sumatra Dry process I roasted yesterday City+, these beans are not uniform in color, but makes a wonderful Sumatra espresso.