1 00:00:03,801 --> 00:00:04,668 [sigh] 2 00:00:04,668 --> 00:00:07,108 So I guess we gotta talk about coffee makers now. 3 00:00:07,108 --> 00:00:07,909 Hi. 4 00:00:07,909 --> 00:00:13,040 You might have seen a video of mine on the mysterious lack of electric kettles in the United States. 5 00:00:13,040 --> 00:00:16,423 I made that video mainly because there’s this pervasive idea 6 00:00:16,423 --> 00:00:18,828 that electric kettles don’t make any sense here 7 00:00:18,828 --> 00:00:24,661 because our weedy little plugs are too little and weedy which makes them slow at the whole water boily business. 8 00:00:24,661 --> 00:00:28,140 But the fact is, unless you’ve got an induction stove 9 00:00:28,140 --> 00:00:31,783 (which aren’t yet anywhere near what I would call “common” ‘round these parts) 10 00:00:31,783 --> 00:00:36,198 an electric kettle remains the fastest and certainly most convenient way to boil water, 11 00:00:36,198 --> 00:00:37,922 especially for beverages. 12 00:00:38,450 --> 00:00:43,250 So, I don’t think it’s fair to blame the electrical system on our ambivalence towards kettles. 13 00:00:43,250 --> 00:00:44,664 Instead, 14 00:00:44,664 --> 00:00:47,618 I said that’s it’s just because we don’t drink tea all that much. 15 00:00:47,618 --> 00:00:51,046 Yes, there are other reasons you might want to use a kettle, 16 00:00:51,046 --> 00:00:55,125 as a matter of fact tea is pretty far down the list of reasons I use mine, 17 00:00:55,125 --> 00:01:00,408 but for the record I grew up calling this thing a tea kettle and I’m not alone! 18 00:01:00,408 --> 00:01:01,917 Just take a look at this poll - 19 00:01:02,414 --> 00:01:05,238 oh c’mon I was hoping for a better showing than that… 20 00:01:05,238 --> 00:01:07,877 Actually, I just realized something. 21 00:01:07,877 --> 00:01:11,419 The American children’s song “I’m a Little Teapot” 22 00:01:11,419 --> 00:01:13,766 is actually a song about a kettle! 23 00:01:13,766 --> 00:01:18,265 Teapots are for steeping the tea - they don’t get all steamed up and shout. 24 00:01:18,265 --> 00:01:19,996 That’s what a kettle does. 25 00:01:19,996 --> 00:01:25,682 See, we’re really confused by this whole "tea" business and it seems we have been since at least 1939. 26 00:01:25,682 --> 00:01:28,946 Oh, relatedly, I’ve heard from lots of Canadians 27 00:01:28,946 --> 00:01:33,022 who politely informed me that nearly everybody up there has an electric kettle 28 00:01:33,022 --> 00:01:37,207 and in case you didn’t know they have essentially the exact same electrical system we do 29 00:01:37,207 --> 00:01:39,677 so again - the plugs aren’t the answer. 30 00:01:40,702 --> 00:01:45,981 Anyway, in that video, I had originally planned to talk about coffee makers and explain that, 31 00:01:45,981 --> 00:01:48,432 since we’re addicted to *that* hot brown, 32 00:01:48,432 --> 00:01:52,288 a huge portion of us use some kind of coffee maker. 33 00:01:52,288 --> 00:01:55,719 But I removed that bit before making the video for flow reasons, 34 00:01:55,719 --> 00:01:59,563 and thanks to that omission an interesting pattern emerged in the comments. 35 00:01:59,563 --> 00:02:02,939 Lots of you wondered how we make coffee without a kettle. 36 00:02:02,939 --> 00:02:09,005 And another, but different, lots of you thought we must all be using bougie espresso machines or something like that. 37 00:02:09,005 --> 00:02:13,205 Some of us are, yeah, but the humble and cheap drip brewer 38 00:02:13,205 --> 00:02:17,137 remains a countertop staple in many millions of American homes. 39 00:02:17,137 --> 00:02:19,789 And that’s what this video is about. 40 00:02:20,067 --> 00:02:22,681 But first, let's get the obvious thing out of the way. 41 00:02:22,681 --> 00:02:25,472 Why don’t kettles make our coffee? 42 00:02:25,472 --> 00:02:29,700 Well a big part of that comes from the fact that most of us here... 43 00:02:29,700 --> 00:02:32,309 intensely dislike instant coffee. 44 00:02:32,309 --> 00:02:36,618 You can get it, sure, but the bulk of our instant options just… 45 00:02:37,146 --> 00:02:38,454 aren’t great. 46 00:02:38,454 --> 00:02:42,095 Your typical grocery store might have maybe four options to choose from, 47 00:02:42,095 --> 00:02:44,202 and Folgers is probably three of them. 48 00:02:45,288 --> 00:02:47,085 That was hyperbole, for the record. 49 00:02:47,085 --> 00:02:51,547 Instant coffee is brewed coffee which has then been freeze-dried into crystals. 50 00:02:51,547 --> 00:02:54,901 Add that stuff to hot water and you’ve got 51 00:02:54,901 --> 00:02:55,824 “coffee”. 52 00:02:55,824 --> 00:03:00,348 Trouble is that most of our instant options are brewed in industrial-sized percolators 53 00:03:00,348 --> 00:03:02,489 and probably don’t even use arabica beans, 54 00:03:02,489 --> 00:03:06,089 so with few exceptions it’s just not great. 55 00:03:06,089 --> 00:03:09,875 Plus, like, have you ever smelled it as it’s mixed with water? 56 00:03:09,875 --> 00:03:11,876 That is not a pleasant aroma, 57 00:03:11,876 --> 00:03:15,393 and the smell of coffee as it brews is one of the best parts! 58 00:03:15,393 --> 00:03:20,473 Thanks to this, the vast majority of the coffee sold here is, ya know, 59 00:03:20,473 --> 00:03:21,653 real! 60 00:03:21,653 --> 00:03:23,059 Yeah, I said it. 61 00:03:23,059 --> 00:03:26,290 You can either buy your beans as beans and grind ‘em yourself, 62 00:03:26,290 --> 00:03:28,457 or you can get pre-ground coffee. 63 00:03:28,457 --> 00:03:33,828 And you can get it in big ol’ tubs because some families will absolutely get through it in a month. 64 00:03:33,828 --> 00:03:38,734 Now, there are some methods for brewing actual coffee which involve a kettle, 65 00:03:38,734 --> 00:03:42,460 most prominently the French press or a pour-over filter cone, 66 00:03:42,460 --> 00:03:46,651 and some people choose to go that route for taste or hipster reasons. 67 00:03:46,651 --> 00:03:52,329 But Mr. Coffee and his offspring have been the kings of the brew for something like half a century. 68 00:03:52,329 --> 00:03:55,854 At least until Keurigs came along. 69 00:03:55,950 --> 00:03:59,567 As it happens, I’ve already made a video about the drip brewer’s predecessor; 70 00:03:59,567 --> 00:04:01,158 coffee percolators. 71 00:04:01,344 --> 00:04:04,449 Those are old-fashioned devices for brewing ground coffee 72 00:04:04,449 --> 00:04:06,641 which you can still buy for some reason. 73 00:04:06,641 --> 00:04:10,027 And they are how we would have been making coffee in 1939, 74 00:04:10,027 --> 00:04:12,083 and in fact long before then. 75 00:04:12,083 --> 00:04:14,595 Stovetop percolators went atop a stove, 76 00:04:14,595 --> 00:04:18,825 and they were invented in the 19th century (when exactly is disputed). 77 00:04:18,825 --> 00:04:23,263 Later you could get electric percolators which are percolators that are electric, 78 00:04:23,263 --> 00:04:25,812 giving them their own water-heating ability. 79 00:04:25,812 --> 00:04:29,639 You can check out that video if you want to learn more about our coffee making past, 80 00:04:29,639 --> 00:04:37,313 but they’re coming up here to illustrate that we’ve been brewing actual coffee here in the US for a very, VERY long time 81 00:04:37,313 --> 00:04:42,240 and we have been using dedicated coffee-making thingamajigs for over a century. 82 00:04:42,240 --> 00:04:45,654 Get used to a thing which makes coffee all by itself, 83 00:04:45,654 --> 00:04:47,262 don’t drink tea all that much, 84 00:04:47,262 --> 00:04:49,164 and an electric kettle becomes a niche item - 85 00:04:49,164 --> 00:04:51,559 wait I thought this video was about coffee makers. 86 00:04:51,559 --> 00:04:53,319 Anyway, in 1968, 87 00:04:53,319 --> 00:04:57,281 Paul Simon and Art Garfunkel asked where Joe DiMaggio had gone, 88 00:04:57,281 --> 00:05:00,350 and although Joltin’ Joe had left and gone away, 89 00:05:00,350 --> 00:05:01,462 hey hey hey, 90 00:05:01,462 --> 00:05:05,619 he’d show up again in 1973 to hawk Mr. Coffee. 91 00:05:05,619 --> 00:05:09,508 Mr. Coffee promised restaurant-quality filter coffee at home. 92 00:05:09,508 --> 00:05:11,818 [Never knew coffee could taste SO great!] 93 00:05:11,818 --> 00:05:13,912 [or brew so FAST!] 94 00:05:14,191 --> 00:05:18,553 See, for over a decade, the foodservice industry had been moving away from percolators 95 00:05:18,553 --> 00:05:22,707 and towards basket-type brewers like the Bunn-O-Matic. 96 00:05:22,707 --> 00:05:26,275 People really liked the taste of this new, smoother brew, 97 00:05:26,275 --> 00:05:30,361 but until North American Systems Inc. created Mr. Coffee, 98 00:05:30,361 --> 00:05:33,466 there wasn’t a convenient way to have it at home. 99 00:05:33,466 --> 00:05:38,254 I mean, if you were one of those weirdos who had a kettle you might be using a Melitta filter brewer, 100 00:05:38,254 --> 00:05:42,782 and there were also plenty of other coffee gadgets on the market because of course there were. 101 00:05:42,782 --> 00:05:48,732 But none of them would disrupt the dominance of the percolator until Mr. Coffee. 102 00:05:48,732 --> 00:05:54,999 Here we have a modern drip brewer, one of Mr. Coffee’s many great great great great grandchildren. 103 00:05:54,999 --> 00:05:58,096 Although it’s much newer and refined in its design, 104 00:05:58,096 --> 00:06:02,000 it brews coffee in the same way as the original Mr. Coffee. 105 00:06:02,000 --> 00:06:07,909 To use it, ground coffee is placed in a paper filter which sits in a brew basket above a carafe. 106 00:06:07,909 --> 00:06:10,762 Water is placed in the reservoir at the back of the machine, 107 00:06:10,762 --> 00:06:16,555 and when switched on that water is automatically heated and slowly deposited on top of that coffee. 108 00:06:16,555 --> 00:06:20,931 It will then seep through, absorb all that caffeine (and flavors, I guess), 109 00:06:20,931 --> 00:06:26,020 and finally make its way to the bottom of the basket where it will emerge a lovely shade of brown, 110 00:06:26,020 --> 00:06:28,438 while the filter leaves the grounds behind. 111 00:06:28,438 --> 00:06:34,627 No longer recirculating brewed and increasingly-hot coffee through the same grounds again and again, 112 00:06:34,627 --> 00:06:40,668 a much smoother, more consistent, and less burnt brew could be made with this java marvel. 113 00:06:40,884 --> 00:06:45,426 Cleanup was also a breeze; the slide-out (or later lift-out) brew basket 114 00:06:45,426 --> 00:06:48,906 was much less fiddly than dealing with the guts of a percolator, 115 00:06:48,906 --> 00:06:54,334 and after disposing of the grounds a simple rinse of carafe and basket was all that’s needed. 116 00:06:54,334 --> 00:07:00,143 Mr. Coffee sold like hot cakes and before long companies were copying it right and left. 117 00:07:00,143 --> 00:07:03,874 The Mr. Coffee coffeemaker didn’t invent the concept of filter coffee, 118 00:07:03,874 --> 00:07:06,580 and it wasn’t even the first electric drip brewer. 119 00:07:06,580 --> 00:07:10,580 That would be the Wagomat of Germany, patented in 1954. 120 00:07:10,580 --> 00:07:14,081 But Mr. Coffee popularized this brewing method in the US, 121 00:07:14,081 --> 00:07:16,639 and it more or less killed the percolator. 122 00:07:16,980 --> 00:07:22,960 However, a common feature of electric percolators would live on; the keep warm function. 123 00:07:22,960 --> 00:07:26,281 Drip machines almost as a rule have a hot plate below the carafe 124 00:07:26,591 --> 00:07:32,201 so that you can brew a full pot of coffee when you wake up and keep groggily coming back to it throughout the morning. 125 00:07:32,201 --> 00:07:37,585 This does not do good things for the flavor of your coffee, but we’ll get back to that later. 126 00:07:37,740 --> 00:07:42,389 The original Mr. Coffee featured separate power switches for the brewer and the hot plate, 127 00:07:42,389 --> 00:07:48,134 but later versions (like this) would ditch that thanks to a very clever design refinement. 128 00:07:48,134 --> 00:07:51,729 And here, dear viewer, is where the script went off the rails. 129 00:07:51,977 --> 00:07:55,743 See, I was going to simply talk about those old Mr. Coffee machines 130 00:07:55,743 --> 00:07:59,280 because obviously they must work just like these new ones. 131 00:07:59,280 --> 00:08:05,601 But a quick search for them revealed they operate at a significantly higher power level than modern designs. 132 00:08:06,414 --> 00:08:08,790 This intrigued me, so, uh, 133 00:08:09,752 --> 00:08:10,830 well… 134 00:08:12,599 --> 00:08:14,015 yeah. 135 00:08:14,015 --> 00:08:21,741 This Mr. Coffee machine is from 1979, and the joltin’ joe it’ll brew for you is still endorsed by Joltin’ Joe. 136 00:08:21,741 --> 00:08:26,849 As you can see it has two chonky and wonderfully illuminated power switches 137 00:08:26,849 --> 00:08:31,081 surrounded by a beautifully-executed faux woodgrain decal. 138 00:08:31,081 --> 00:08:34,119 And in case you had any doubt this was a product of the seventies, 139 00:08:34,119 --> 00:08:37,819 one look at the carafe is all you need to know for sure. 140 00:08:37,819 --> 00:08:44,528 When I first took a look at this coffee maker it was immediately clear that it's nothing like a modern drip machine. 141 00:08:44,528 --> 00:08:49,665 The back of it is completely empty and the power cord runs up to the top, 142 00:08:49,665 --> 00:08:52,812 revealing that all of the brewy-bits are up there. 143 00:08:52,812 --> 00:08:56,418 There are of course two power leads going down to the hot plate, 144 00:08:56,418 --> 00:08:58,574 and they’re surprisingly thin. 145 00:08:58,574 --> 00:09:01,578 I mean, sure, the hot plate only consumes about 80 watts, 146 00:09:01,578 --> 00:09:05,434 so it’s not like these need to carry even an amp, but still. 147 00:09:05,434 --> 00:09:07,862 That's mains voltage going through here. 148 00:09:08,390 --> 00:09:13,959 Anyway, the next clue that this was nothing like a modern machine came when I first tried to use it. 149 00:09:13,959 --> 00:09:18,848 I poured cold water in the top expecting nothing to happen until I switched it on, 150 00:09:18,848 --> 00:09:22,627 but almost immediately water started coming through the brew basket 151 00:09:22,627 --> 00:09:24,831 and falling onto the hot plate. 152 00:09:24,831 --> 00:09:27,727 It wasn’t much, though, and once I hurriedly put the carafe back 153 00:09:27,727 --> 00:09:31,069 and switched it on, the flow rate increased. 154 00:09:31,069 --> 00:09:37,062 Intrigued, the next order of business was obviously to get the guts out so we could get a good look at ‘em. 155 00:09:37,062 --> 00:09:40,864 That was all too easy - for being such a revolutionary product 156 00:09:40,864 --> 00:09:46,441 that commanded nearly $300 adjusted for inflation when it first came out, 157 00:09:46,441 --> 00:09:49,233 this is made incredibly cheaply. 158 00:09:49,233 --> 00:09:52,768 Two fasteners barely hold this flimsy cover on the back, 159 00:09:52,768 --> 00:10:00,285 and once removed we can see that the entire chassis is held in by these clips that are simply friction-fit to the plastic body. 160 00:10:00,285 --> 00:10:02,298 I needed to undo the connection to the warmer 161 00:10:02,298 --> 00:10:07,212 and also unfasten its little support / wire chase / grounding strap 162 00:10:07,212 --> 00:10:14,360 before I could slide it out, though, but once that was done it’s a simple matter of pushing up the tabs and yanking gingerly. 163 00:10:14,360 --> 00:10:17,472 What I eventually got hold of surprised me. 164 00:10:17,472 --> 00:10:18,938 This is it, folks. 165 00:10:18,938 --> 00:10:23,856 These two hunks of metal, one of ‘em with a big ol’ heating element sitting in the bottom, 166 00:10:23,856 --> 00:10:25,784 are all there is to it. 167 00:10:25,784 --> 00:10:30,358 The water inlet at the top of the machine simply dumps water into this upper pan 168 00:10:30,358 --> 00:10:33,887 which is vaguely funnel-shaped down to this point here. 169 00:10:33,887 --> 00:10:36,682 That pan sits atop the main chassis. 170 00:10:36,682 --> 00:10:40,106 Here, electrical connections are at a terminal block in the back, 171 00:10:40,106 --> 00:10:42,919 and power is sent up to the switches at the front. 172 00:10:42,919 --> 00:10:47,342 In the middle of the chassis is a second shallow pan with a hole in its middle 173 00:10:47,342 --> 00:10:51,652 and a big curly-q heating element spiraling inward towards that hole. 174 00:10:52,925 --> 00:10:55,688 When I saw this, I thought 175 00:10:55,688 --> 00:10:57,525 “this doesn’t make any sense.” 176 00:10:57,525 --> 00:11:02,453 See, one of the things that the father of the Mr. Coffee, Mr. Coffee Senior - I mean, 177 00:11:02,453 --> 00:11:07,186 Vincent Marotta was frightfully concerned with was the brewing temperature. 178 00:11:07,186 --> 00:11:11,079 He thought boiling water was much too hot for good coffee, 179 00:11:11,079 --> 00:11:15,197 and since stovetop percolators percolated as a result of boiling, 180 00:11:15,197 --> 00:11:18,310 well you couldn’t get decent coffee out of ‘em. 181 00:11:18,310 --> 00:11:24,719 He was convinced the water reaching the coffee should be 200 degrees Fahrenheit, or about 93 Celsius; 182 00:11:24,719 --> 00:11:27,684 and no hotter, and no colder. 183 00:11:27,684 --> 00:11:34,812 He obsessed over this, devising handmade prototypes which would automatically heat water to that precise temperature, 184 00:11:34,812 --> 00:11:40,037 and with his business partner Samuel Glazer and the help of engineer Edmund Abel Jr, 185 00:11:40,037 --> 00:11:43,434 a functional, mass-producible Mr. Coffee was born. 186 00:11:44,534 --> 00:11:48,431 And I’m holding the patented mechanism right here. 187 00:11:48,431 --> 00:11:51,668 How in the heck is this thing controlling the water temperature‽ 188 00:11:51,935 --> 00:11:56,935 I didn’t have a clue so I looked at the original patent and what I found was a stroke of genius 189 00:11:56,935 --> 00:11:59,722 that I honestly can’t believe works. 190 00:11:59,722 --> 00:12:05,598 Consider that this heating element has an output power of a hair over 1500 watts. 191 00:12:05,598 --> 00:12:13,252 We could control it with some sort of thermostat but that’s getting pretty involved for early 1970’s consumer goods. 192 00:12:13,252 --> 00:12:19,789 In operation this thing is just gonna run at full power, so how else could you control the water temperature? 193 00:12:19,789 --> 00:12:26,042 I suppose the size of this hole could be calibrated to let water through at precisely the right rate, 194 00:12:26,042 --> 00:12:29,739 but that would only work with a specified inlet water temp, 195 00:12:29,739 --> 00:12:33,108 and there’s too much variation in the real world for that to work. 196 00:12:33,108 --> 00:12:38,666 Well, the answer was staring me in the face this whole time but I just didn’t see it; 197 00:12:38,666 --> 00:12:41,301 see what that hole is punched in? 198 00:12:41,301 --> 00:12:43,781 Why, it’s a strip of metal. 199 00:12:43,781 --> 00:12:46,198 And what are strips of metal sometimes? 200 00:12:46,198 --> 00:12:47,538 Bi. 201 00:12:47,538 --> 00:12:51,284 That’s right, this is a bimetallic strip. 202 00:12:51,284 --> 00:12:54,194 If I use a torch lighter and throw some heat at it, 203 00:12:54,194 --> 00:12:57,272 you can see it bend away from the pan. 204 00:12:57,272 --> 00:13:05,184 This dead simple arrangement of a bimetallic strip and hole in pan is forming a thermostatic valve. 205 00:13:05,184 --> 00:13:10,758 In operation, the heat from the heating element will cause this strip to bend away from the pan, 206 00:13:10,758 --> 00:13:13,759 which lets water through more quickly. 207 00:13:13,759 --> 00:13:20,597 That water, though, is cold and cools the strip back down so it begins to close again. 208 00:13:20,597 --> 00:13:28,291 These two counteracting forces combine to keep the water leaving the brewer at whatever our desired temperature happens to be. 209 00:13:28,291 --> 00:13:33,729 You can actually see this valve opening and closing as coffee is brewed through the water inlet. 210 00:13:33,729 --> 00:13:35,179 Pretty neat. 211 00:13:35,520 --> 00:13:40,880 This set screw puts a bit of pressure on the bimetallic strip allowing it to be calibrated, 212 00:13:40,880 --> 00:13:43,810 which was presumably done at the factory before being boxed up. 213 00:13:44,267 --> 00:13:50,000 Now, I did some testing to see just how close to 200 degrees Fahrenheit this thing was getting. 214 00:13:50,000 --> 00:13:53,195 Not surprisingly, it’s not that close. 215 00:13:53,195 --> 00:13:57,085 Actually towards the very end of the brew it was nearly spot on, 216 00:13:57,085 --> 00:14:02,843 but for the bulk of the brew it was wavering between about 170 and 190. 217 00:14:02,843 --> 00:14:05,232 The thermostatic valve works… 218 00:14:05,449 --> 00:14:09,105 OK, but it’s not able to achieve a steady equilibrium 219 00:14:09,105 --> 00:14:13,509 as evidenced by the fact that it repeatedly opens and closes throughout the brew 220 00:14:13,509 --> 00:14:17,263 rather than settling in at a somewhat fixed position. 221 00:14:17,263 --> 00:14:21,367 Each time the valve opened the output temperature would start to drop, 222 00:14:21,367 --> 00:14:24,593 and once it closed the temperature rose again. 223 00:14:24,593 --> 00:14:29,668 But the world works in averages so I’m happy to call a 20 degree range 224 00:14:29,668 --> 00:14:31,228 “pretty good.” 225 00:14:31,228 --> 00:14:34,699 If you’re wondering why the valve has that little hole in it, 226 00:14:34,699 --> 00:14:40,187 well that’s simply there to keep water from pooling inside the machine and getting… 227 00:14:40,187 --> 00:14:41,661 nasty. 228 00:14:41,661 --> 00:14:46,253 A clever solution, but which requires some quick starting action since, 229 00:14:46,253 --> 00:14:48,108 as I learned the hard way, 230 00:14:48,108 --> 00:14:50,947 water will always flow through this. 231 00:14:50,947 --> 00:14:56,544 The instructions actually say that the coffee should be prepared in the basket and the machine switched on 232 00:14:56,544 --> 00:14:58,607 before you pour in the water. 233 00:14:58,607 --> 00:15:03,652 Then you need to pour it in quickly, and return the carafe to the base *at once.* 234 00:15:03,652 --> 00:15:09,251 Basically, the coffee buys you some time as it absorbs the little bit of water that comes out first, 235 00:15:09,251 --> 00:15:15,601 but you don’t have much before it’s saturated and the brewed coffee falls out the hole in the bottom of the brew basket. 236 00:15:15,601 --> 00:15:16,955 So hurry up! 237 00:15:16,955 --> 00:15:21,541 Calling this automatic is quite a stretch if you ask me. 238 00:15:21,541 --> 00:15:25,244 If you’re thinking that the average consumer probably shouldn’t be trusted 239 00:15:25,244 --> 00:15:29,377 with a 1500W heating element sealed inside of a plastic shell, 240 00:15:29,377 --> 00:15:34,726 well so were the designers of this as there is in fact a thermostat for the heating element. 241 00:15:34,726 --> 00:15:38,498 But it’s simply there to cut power to it when it runs dry. 242 00:15:38,498 --> 00:15:42,122 And that was also implemented quite cleverly! 243 00:15:42,122 --> 00:15:47,127 The thermostat lives here, right below the hole in the water reservoir. 244 00:15:47,127 --> 00:15:54,219 As the machine brews, cold water keeps landing on the thermostat, ensuring the switch stays closed. 245 00:15:54,219 --> 00:15:58,205 But once it’s out of water, well that cooling action no longer works 246 00:15:58,205 --> 00:16:01,365 and the heating element, through this bonding clip here, 247 00:16:01,365 --> 00:16:08,450 will quickly heat up the thermostat so it trips, cutting power and ensuring the coffee maker doesn’t melt. 248 00:16:08,450 --> 00:16:13,760 Putting the thermostat right below the water inlet also helps ensure the thermostat resets quickly 249 00:16:13,760 --> 00:16:19,365 if you want to brew another pot immediately after one just finished - pretty clever thinking. 250 00:16:19,365 --> 00:16:24,970 So now let’s move onto the design refinement that would lead us to coffee makers like this one. 251 00:16:24,970 --> 00:16:29,556 At some point in the ‘80s, Mr. Coffee would ditch the thermostatic valve design 252 00:16:29,556 --> 00:16:32,480 in favor of a much simpler one. 253 00:16:32,480 --> 00:16:36,540 At first glance this modern brewer may look more complicated. 254 00:16:36,540 --> 00:16:39,435 Now the water is at the back of the machine 255 00:16:39,435 --> 00:16:43,594 and it needs to be pumped up to the top to reach the coffee grounds. 256 00:16:43,594 --> 00:16:45,735 Pump sounds expensive. 257 00:16:45,922 --> 00:16:50,877 But as it turns out, one method of pumping water requires just two things: 258 00:16:50,877 --> 00:16:54,503 a one-way valve and a tube that gets hot. 259 00:16:54,503 --> 00:16:58,373 This arrangement is called a bubble pump and it’s almost devilishly simple, 260 00:16:58,373 --> 00:17:00,910 as longtime viewers of The Engineer Guy will know. 261 00:17:01,376 --> 00:17:03,775 That’s two mentions in as many videos! 262 00:17:03,775 --> 00:17:05,335 We miss you, Bill! 263 00:17:05,335 --> 00:17:09,238 At the bottom of the water reservoir, at the intake, is a check valve. 264 00:17:09,238 --> 00:17:11,354 Water can flow downward through it, 265 00:17:11,354 --> 00:17:14,517 but the valve prevents flow in the opposite direction. 266 00:17:14,517 --> 00:17:20,459 After passing through the valve it ends up in this metal tube which contains the heating element. 267 00:17:20,459 --> 00:17:22,988 At the other end of that tube is some more tubing 268 00:17:22,988 --> 00:17:28,935 which leads up the back of the coffee maker and into the sprayer, where it will then fall onto the coffee. 269 00:17:28,935 --> 00:17:31,187 Passing electric current through the heating element, 270 00:17:31,187 --> 00:17:34,587 and thus making the tube containing the water frightfully hot, 271 00:17:34,587 --> 00:17:38,986 will quite quickly cause the small amount of water in there to boil. 272 00:17:38,986 --> 00:17:42,157 Once it does, well some of the water vaporizes 273 00:17:42,157 --> 00:17:45,488 and bubbles of water vapor form inside the tube. 274 00:17:45,488 --> 00:17:50,480 That increase in volume also increases the pressure inside the tube. 275 00:17:50,480 --> 00:17:53,934 The tube isn’t sealed so it’s not like it’s gonna explode or anything, 276 00:17:53,934 --> 00:17:57,047 but the bubbles of water vapor need to go somewhere! 277 00:17:57,047 --> 00:18:00,172 And since they’re confined in a narrow tube, 278 00:18:00,172 --> 00:18:03,680 they can only move by pushing water out of their way. 279 00:18:03,680 --> 00:18:08,911 However, the check valve prevents the water from moving back into the reservoir. 280 00:18:08,911 --> 00:18:12,357 That leaves the water with only one path to relieve the pressure, 281 00:18:12,357 --> 00:18:15,942 which is up this tube and out the sprayer. 282 00:18:15,942 --> 00:18:21,242 Each little burst of water that leaves the sprayer was pushed out by bubbles of water vapor, 283 00:18:21,242 --> 00:18:25,250 and once that slug of water is out, the pressure in the tube is relieved 284 00:18:25,250 --> 00:18:32,534 so cold water from the reservoir will now fall into the tube through the check valve and replace the water that just left. 285 00:18:32,534 --> 00:18:34,607 That water then gets hot enough to boil, 286 00:18:34,607 --> 00:18:37,264 bubbles form, pressure increases, the valve closes, 287 00:18:37,264 --> 00:18:40,783 and another slug of hot water comes out the sprayer. 288 00:18:40,783 --> 00:18:43,545 This process repeats over and over again, 289 00:18:43,545 --> 00:18:49,193 bubbles gurgling and the check-valve clicking with each ingestion and expulsion of water. 290 00:18:49,193 --> 00:18:52,924 Since the heating element is in contact with such a small amount of water, 291 00:18:52,924 --> 00:18:56,233 the pumping action begins almost immediately. 292 00:18:56,233 --> 00:19:00,482 Even with ice-cold water in the tank, there’s only about a 20 second delay 293 00:19:00,482 --> 00:19:04,569 between switching the coffee maker on and hot water hitting the grounds. 294 00:19:04,569 --> 00:19:07,503 It’s only heating a few milliliters of water at a time, 295 00:19:07,503 --> 00:19:10,402 thus it nearly instantly starts to boil. 296 00:19:10,402 --> 00:19:14,509 And with a constant supply of new water entering the boiling tube, 297 00:19:14,509 --> 00:19:19,070 the coffee maker continuously moves water through itself as it heats it. 298 00:19:19,070 --> 00:19:22,015 The design just… works! 299 00:19:22,015 --> 00:19:25,534 It’s amazingly effective for how simple it is. 300 00:19:25,534 --> 00:19:28,713 Since it moves water through itself by boiling it, 301 00:19:28,713 --> 00:19:32,025 that may make you wonder about the exit temperature. 302 00:19:32,025 --> 00:19:37,839 If Vince Marotta was so concerned with brewing temp, why would he accept this design? 303 00:19:37,839 --> 00:19:42,661 Truthfully I don’t know that he did, maybe he hated this cost-cutting measure, 304 00:19:42,661 --> 00:19:47,048 but in practice, the water that leaves isn’t quite boiling. 305 00:19:47,048 --> 00:19:50,150 A number of factors influence the exit temperature. 306 00:19:50,150 --> 00:19:56,970 You’ll notice that in this machine the tube leaving the boily bit down below travels through the cold water reservoir. 307 00:19:56,970 --> 00:20:01,370 That cools the water that travels up through it before it reaches the sprayer. 308 00:20:01,370 --> 00:20:04,027 With my very definitely scientific testing equipment 309 00:20:04,027 --> 00:20:09,845 I found that the brew starts at about 170 Fahrenheit and slowly creeps up to about 190, 310 00:20:09,845 --> 00:20:16,931 probably as a result of the water level dropping and thus its cooling effect on the exit tube diminishing. 311 00:20:16,931 --> 00:20:20,165 There are probably other factors influencing this as well, 312 00:20:20,165 --> 00:20:23,114 such as the sprayer’s shape and tubing diameter, 313 00:20:23,114 --> 00:20:28,531 and I imagine these were at one point tinkered with to produce a more or less ideal brew - 314 00:20:28,531 --> 00:20:31,562 and you’ll see why I think that shortly. 315 00:20:31,562 --> 00:20:35,522 But regardless, the exit temperature never quite reaches boiling. 316 00:20:35,522 --> 00:20:40,928 Another interesting side-effect of pumping by boiling is that the speed at which it does so 317 00:20:40,928 --> 00:20:44,372 is a function of how powerful the heating element is. 318 00:20:44,372 --> 00:20:47,907 And since brewing coffee shouldn’t be done that fast anyway, 319 00:20:47,907 --> 00:20:51,367 we don’t actually want a very powerful heating element. 320 00:20:51,367 --> 00:20:54,466 If this were as powerful as one of those British kettles, 321 00:20:54,466 --> 00:21:00,384 it would push the 60 fluid ounces of a 12 cup coffee maker through in a little over three minutes - 322 00:21:00,384 --> 00:21:02,819 not enough time for a thorough brew. 323 00:21:02,819 --> 00:21:10,104 And yes, in coffee maker land, a cup is 5 fluid ounces, just to be extra confusing! 324 00:21:10,104 --> 00:21:17,353 Now, to attain a more thorough brew, a much more reasonable heating element in the neighborhood of 900 watts is used. 325 00:21:17,353 --> 00:21:20,568 This coffee maker runs at about 850 watts, 326 00:21:20,568 --> 00:21:25,680 which slows it down to just under an 11 minute brew when making a full pot. 327 00:21:25,680 --> 00:21:27,940 "Now wait," I hear you say. 328 00:21:27,940 --> 00:21:31,897 "Didn’t the original design pull 1,500 watts or so?" 329 00:21:31,897 --> 00:21:35,006 Yes, and that’s why I wanted to investigate it. 330 00:21:35,006 --> 00:21:40,161 As we've discussed previously, energy is energy and water is water. 331 00:21:40,161 --> 00:21:47,341 More power means faster heating, so in theory the old design should make coffee faster than the new one. 332 00:21:47,341 --> 00:21:54,610 And indeed this does brew coffee significantly faster than its great great great great grandson. 333 00:21:54,610 --> 00:21:59,630 It took the new machine 10 minutes and 10 seconds to power through 50 ounces of water, 334 00:21:59,630 --> 00:22:04,712 but Granpda Coffee only needed 5 minutes and 42 seconds to do the same. 335 00:22:04,712 --> 00:22:09,000 Could it be that the older Mr. Coffee models brewed better coffee? 336 00:22:09,000 --> 00:22:12,400 Or perhaps is the longer brew an improvement? 337 00:22:12,400 --> 00:22:16,694 Naturally I devised a taste test using otherwise identical setups - 338 00:22:16,694 --> 00:22:22,360 same water, same coffee, same amount - to the gram - same filters, and the same sweetening and creamening treatment 339 00:22:22,360 --> 00:22:24,320 between the same two mugs and… 340 00:22:25,067 --> 00:22:25,567 I hon… 341 00:22:25,567 --> 00:22:26,410 I can’t taste a difference. 342 00:22:26,910 --> 00:22:28,966 These taste exactly the same to me. 343 00:22:30,890 --> 00:22:33,130 It’s like I’m drinking two cups of the same coffee. 344 00:22:33,130 --> 00:22:35,718 Now I don’t claim to have the most phosisticated taste, 345 00:22:35,718 --> 00:22:38,710 but I also don’t want to sell myself too short, either. 346 00:22:38,710 --> 00:22:41,805 I start to notice a difference in my everyday coffee 347 00:22:41,805 --> 00:22:47,190 by about the third day after opening a new can, and it’s whole bean coffee. 348 00:22:47,190 --> 00:22:50,955 By the time I’m at the end of the can it’s VERY different coffee - 349 00:22:50,955 --> 00:22:55,963 in fact opening the next one is always a delightful experience. It's just so much better. 350 00:22:56,584 --> 00:23:00,473 So while, yeah, I’m not above a cup of Folgers now and again, 351 00:23:00,473 --> 00:23:04,179 I’m pretty sure I could at least notice some difference. 352 00:23:04,707 --> 00:23:07,207 But between these two coffee makers, I couldn’t. 353 00:23:07,701 --> 00:23:11,245 Looking at some old Mr. Coffee models with the bubble pump design 354 00:23:11,245 --> 00:23:16,291 I can see that those were also slowed down to the neighborhood of 900 watts. 355 00:23:16,291 --> 00:23:19,941 This suggests to me that with the change to bubble pump technology 356 00:23:19,941 --> 00:23:26,560 it required a slower brew to get the same brewing characteristics as the thermostatic valve design. 357 00:23:26,560 --> 00:23:30,409 However, it may have also solved another problem. 358 00:23:30,688 --> 00:23:35,576 Eagle-eyed viewers may have noticed the “COFFEE SAVER” labeling on this brew basket. 359 00:23:36,476 --> 00:23:38,620 This also intrigued me! 360 00:23:38,620 --> 00:23:43,280 The box claimed that this revolutionary new technology allowed you to save coffee 361 00:23:43,280 --> 00:23:45,077 when brewing smaller amounts 362 00:23:45,077 --> 00:23:47,849 as it helped maintain a uniform stack height 363 00:23:47,849 --> 00:23:50,156 no matter how many cups you were making. 364 00:23:50,156 --> 00:23:54,810 See, changing the setting moves these little wing things into the center of the brew basket 365 00:23:54,810 --> 00:23:58,248 to keep the coffee stacked more vertically. 366 00:23:58,248 --> 00:23:59,440 Pretty clever. 367 00:23:59,440 --> 00:24:03,146 Apparently this feature was introduced during a coffee shortage. 368 00:24:03,146 --> 00:24:10,721 So I did another comparison, making four cups in both machines with the same otherwise identical setup as before 369 00:24:10,721 --> 00:24:15,096 save for this thing set to four cups and… 370 00:24:17,548 --> 00:24:20,114 I feel like there is a difference but it’s very small. 371 00:24:20,114 --> 00:24:22,002 Like, it’s still, there’s… 372 00:24:22,002 --> 00:24:25,241 to me hardly a perceptible difference between these two coffees. 373 00:24:26,731 --> 00:24:28,191 They both taste like Folgers. 374 00:24:28,191 --> 00:24:29,404 [laughs] 375 00:24:29,404 --> 00:24:32,136 If this pinching brew basket did anything 376 00:24:32,136 --> 00:24:37,253 I would have expected the older machine’s coffee to taste a little stronger but… 377 00:24:37,253 --> 00:24:38,111 nope. 378 00:24:38,111 --> 00:24:41,013 These were once again imperceptibly different to me, 379 00:24:41,013 --> 00:24:47,814 and as a matter of fact they seemed to taste exactly as they did when I brewed a larger quantity. 380 00:24:47,814 --> 00:24:53,318 However, it may still be the case that had I not pulled in the wing thingies here 381 00:24:53,318 --> 00:24:55,479 that this would have tasted weaker. 382 00:24:55,479 --> 00:25:01,798 Perhaps the speed of the brew in the original design required more coffee for smaller amounts - 383 00:25:01,798 --> 00:25:08,200 as a matter of fact the instructions seem to suggest that’s what the coffee saver feature was intending to fix. 384 00:25:08,200 --> 00:25:13,092 I’m still not ruling it out as nothing but a gimmick, but maybe there was something to it. 385 00:25:13,092 --> 00:25:18,108 And maybe it would turn out that simply slowing the brew down had the same effect. 386 00:25:18,108 --> 00:25:23,890 Honestly I’m more than a little surprised I couldn’t make out a difference between these two coffee makers. 387 00:25:23,890 --> 00:25:29,113 I was starting to doubt my senses quite frankly but I decided to do a third test - 388 00:25:29,113 --> 00:25:35,342 this time with a small, four-cup coffee maker pitted against the large 12 cup machine. 389 00:25:35,342 --> 00:25:38,663 This time there was a noticeable difference to me. 390 00:25:38,663 --> 00:25:42,970 This one might be a touch... stronger. 391 00:25:42,970 --> 00:25:45,809 Yeah this, I think this is very very slightly stronger. 392 00:25:45,809 --> 00:25:47,590 A little bit more bitter. 393 00:25:47,590 --> 00:25:49,510 Yeah I prefer this one, actually. 394 00:25:49,510 --> 00:25:51,990 This is a little bit better. 395 00:25:51,990 --> 00:25:56,402 The smaller machine had a slightly harsher brew with a stronger bite to it, 396 00:25:56,402 --> 00:25:58,925 perhaps extracting more acids. 397 00:25:58,925 --> 00:26:00,779 What caused that difference? 398 00:26:00,779 --> 00:26:05,890 I dunno, it could be that the water in this one hits the coffee at a different temperature from that one. 399 00:26:05,890 --> 00:26:08,831 It could be that the filter basket is smaller in this one. 400 00:26:08,831 --> 00:26:11,566 It could be that the small machine is slightly slower, 401 00:26:11,566 --> 00:26:17,935 or it may have been that its markings on the pot weren’t as accurate and the total water used was different. 402 00:26:17,935 --> 00:26:20,874 Yes I know I should have used a beaker or something but the important thing is 403 00:26:20,874 --> 00:26:22,704 I detected a difference! 404 00:26:22,704 --> 00:26:24,524 It was slight, but I detected it! 405 00:26:24,710 --> 00:26:31,010 So I think I can safely say these two large machines make practically identical coffee. 406 00:26:31,010 --> 00:26:34,511 Anyway, we got way off track, uh, 407 00:26:34,511 --> 00:26:36,864 let’s talk about the hot plate again. 408 00:26:36,864 --> 00:26:39,654 As we saw in the early Mr. Coffee machines, 409 00:26:39,654 --> 00:26:43,777 the hot plate was added-on separately from the core brewing function. 410 00:26:43,777 --> 00:26:47,804 But as competition heated up and costs demanded getting cut, 411 00:26:47,804 --> 00:26:50,312 a very elegant refinement was made. 412 00:26:50,312 --> 00:26:57,214 Modern designs use the same heating element for both the brewing part and the keeping warm part. 413 00:26:57,214 --> 00:26:59,818 The tube which heats the water for brewing 414 00:26:59,818 --> 00:27:04,347 just so happens to be bonded to the bottom of the hot plate. 415 00:27:04,347 --> 00:27:08,529 Since metal’s generally quite good at conducting heat through itself, 416 00:27:08,529 --> 00:27:14,149 a single heating element can perform both the brewing and the keeping warm functions. 417 00:27:14,149 --> 00:27:17,125 Now you might think this is a problem. 418 00:27:17,125 --> 00:27:24,751 850 watts is a lot of power for such a small surface, especially one surrounded by plastic. 419 00:27:24,751 --> 00:27:30,954 However, while brewing, the heat produced by that element gets absorbed into the water. 420 00:27:30,954 --> 00:27:34,510 If you’ve seen, oh I dunno, any of my videos 421 00:27:34,510 --> 00:27:39,924 you may remember that it takes a lot of energy to boil a liquid which we call the, 422 00:27:39,924 --> 00:27:41,329 say it with me now! 423 00:27:41,329 --> 00:27:43,990 Latent heat of vaporization. 424 00:27:43,990 --> 00:27:50,181 So long as there’s water in this tube, the tube can’t get any hotter than the boiling point of water. 425 00:27:50,181 --> 00:27:52,620 It’s not physically possible. 426 00:27:52,620 --> 00:27:57,200 Once it’s done brewing and there’s no more water in that tube, though, 427 00:27:57,200 --> 00:27:59,558 well now we have a problem. 428 00:27:59,558 --> 00:28:03,944 After boiling off what little water remains in a nice loud steamfest, 429 00:28:03,944 --> 00:28:10,000 the hot plate will quickly become a way-too-hot plate unless we cut the power to it. 430 00:28:10,000 --> 00:28:11,161 So that’s what we do. 431 00:28:11,161 --> 00:28:15,012 A thermostat set just a wee bit higher than the boiling point of water 432 00:28:15,012 --> 00:28:19,296 is bonded to the hot plate right here and wired in with the heating element. 433 00:28:19,296 --> 00:28:23,388 Once it’s out of water and the hot plate eeks too far beyond the boiling point 434 00:28:23,388 --> 00:28:30,010 the thermostat will open with a click, breaking the connection and keeping the hot plate from melting the coffee maker. 435 00:28:30,010 --> 00:28:35,393 This thermostat has essentially the same job as the safety thermostat in the old design, 436 00:28:35,393 --> 00:28:37,453 but by incorporating it in this way, 437 00:28:37,453 --> 00:28:41,918 it can do double duty as a temperature regulator for the hot plate. 438 00:28:41,918 --> 00:28:45,258 Once it cools off, the circuit will close again for a brief while, 439 00:28:45,258 --> 00:28:48,957 bringing the hot plate back into the territory of hot. 440 00:28:48,957 --> 00:28:51,766 That clicking and heating and heating and clicking will repeat 441 00:28:51,766 --> 00:28:53,720 again and again and again and again. 442 00:28:53,720 --> 00:28:59,301 That is until you shut off the coffee maker, or its auto-off feature kicks in if it has one. 443 00:28:59,301 --> 00:29:03,136 Now you may have already noticed something about this design. 444 00:29:03,136 --> 00:29:04,990 It’s absurdly simple. 445 00:29:04,990 --> 00:29:08,490 And that means it’s absurdly cheap to manufacture. 446 00:29:08,490 --> 00:29:11,622 The original Mr. Coffee, without all these cost refinements, 447 00:29:11,622 --> 00:29:18,723 retailed for $39.99 in 1972, which is equivalent to nearly three hundred bucks today. 448 00:29:18,723 --> 00:29:23,301 But people were gladly willing to pay that much because percolators were slow 449 00:29:23,301 --> 00:29:25,082 and made terrible coffee. 450 00:29:25,082 --> 00:29:27,396 It's the fastest coffee maker you can buy. 451 00:29:27,396 --> 00:29:31,544 With a patented system that gives you perfectly brewed coffee in seconds. 452 00:29:31,544 --> 00:29:34,043 Coffee that tastes better than percolated. 453 00:29:34,043 --> 00:29:37,441 This was at one point very fancy. 454 00:29:37,441 --> 00:29:39,695 Once you taste this.... 455 00:29:41,526 --> 00:29:45,626 You'll know why Mr. Coffee is the #1 selling drip coffee maker. 456 00:29:45,626 --> 00:29:51,132 However, as the design was refined over the years and manufacturing got cheaper for… 457 00:29:51,132 --> 00:29:55,574 reasons, well drip machines got cheap pretty fast. 458 00:29:55,574 --> 00:29:59,227 These days, a basic one like this will set you back a whole, 459 00:29:59,227 --> 00:30:00,761 like $20. 460 00:30:00,761 --> 00:30:06,145 And if you’re willing to stoop to Walmart store brand, you can get one for slightly less than $10. 461 00:30:06,145 --> 00:30:09,574 Well, OK, $13 if you want a full-size 12 cup machine. 462 00:30:09,574 --> 00:30:11,951 But this one is still under ten bucks. 463 00:30:11,951 --> 00:30:15,622 This is an older Rival-branded model but it's clearly the same machine 464 00:30:15,622 --> 00:30:19,959 and I actually use this here at the studio and wouldn’t ya know it, 465 00:30:19,959 --> 00:30:21,966 it makes pretty good coffee! 466 00:30:21,966 --> 00:30:24,813 Is it an excellent cup of coffee? 467 00:30:24,813 --> 00:30:26,643 No! Far from it. 468 00:30:26,643 --> 00:30:30,875 But there are only so many things I’m willing to become an enthusiast for, 469 00:30:30,875 --> 00:30:33,475 and coffee ain’t one of ‘em. 470 00:30:33,475 --> 00:30:38,046 There are hacks and techniques some people will go through to make these machines better, 471 00:30:38,046 --> 00:30:42,416 and there are plenty of people who would never ever stoop to this level. 472 00:30:42,416 --> 00:30:46,020 But taste is among the most subjective things. 473 00:30:46,020 --> 00:30:51,567 I have gone through the rigmarole and spent many hours experimenting with different gadgets, 474 00:30:51,567 --> 00:30:58,534 among them the Aeropress, a French press, manual pour-over cones, two different percolators (yuck) 475 00:30:58,534 --> 00:31:01,339 a few K-cup and other single-serve machines, 476 00:31:01,339 --> 00:31:06,726 and several other drip machines across as wide a cost spectrum as a Midwesterner will tolerate, 477 00:31:06,726 --> 00:31:09,986 but I keep coming back to the same conclusion. 478 00:31:09,986 --> 00:31:12,167 I’ve found a coffee I really like, 479 00:31:12,167 --> 00:31:14,128 I grind it the same every day, 480 00:31:14,128 --> 00:31:19,558 and it goes in this cheap bit of plastic without any fiddling or mental anguish and the result is to me 481 00:31:19,558 --> 00:31:21,487 a fine cup of joe. 482 00:31:21,487 --> 00:31:25,679 However, the one piece of advice I will give regarding these coffee makers, 483 00:31:25,679 --> 00:31:27,079 and I’ve said this before, 484 00:31:27,079 --> 00:31:30,711 is that if you’re leaving it on to keep the coffee warm 485 00:31:30,711 --> 00:31:35,259 you are ruining the coffee in the carafe! Don’t do that. 486 00:31:35,259 --> 00:31:39,453 I know it’s tempting and after all that’s what it’s designed to do, 487 00:31:39,453 --> 00:31:42,595 but you really oughta shut it off when it’s done brewing. 488 00:31:42,595 --> 00:31:44,687 If you’re late to your second 489 00:31:44,687 --> 00:31:46,136 (or third) 490 00:31:46,136 --> 00:31:49,860 (or fourth) cup, I promise it’s gonna taste so much better 491 00:31:49,860 --> 00:31:53,677 if you just throw it in the microwave for a bit to warm it back up. 492 00:31:53,677 --> 00:31:58,173 I’m of the belief that a lot of the bad feelings towards these coffee makers 493 00:31:58,173 --> 00:32:05,357 come from the terribly burnt flavor the coffee will develop within just a few minutes of being left on. 494 00:32:05,357 --> 00:32:07,794 Again. Don't do it! 495 00:32:07,880 --> 00:32:10,669 I also value how easy these are to use. 496 00:32:10,669 --> 00:32:13,680 It’s just get a filter, put it in the brew basket 497 00:32:13,680 --> 00:32:16,920 (or cone, some drip machines use cone-style filters), 498 00:32:16,920 --> 00:32:21,151 then add your coffee, put water in the thing, and turn it on. 499 00:32:21,151 --> 00:32:23,725 Just wait a few minutes and coffee happens! 500 00:32:23,725 --> 00:32:27,973 I do care enough to measure the amount of coffee I use with a scale, 501 00:32:27,973 --> 00:32:33,619 and even then it only takes about 90 seconds, including grinding beans, to get the coffee started. 502 00:32:33,619 --> 00:32:38,626 I could probably do it in less than a minute if I weren’t, ya know, waiting for coffee. 503 00:32:38,626 --> 00:32:44,467 You might not think this is the best way to make coffee, but these sure are consistent at least. 504 00:32:44,467 --> 00:32:48,669 Because this process is so simple it’s hard to screw it up. 505 00:32:48,669 --> 00:32:51,754 There might be subtle differences from machine to machine, 506 00:32:51,754 --> 00:32:55,882 particularly with how hot the water reaching the grounds actually is. 507 00:32:55,882 --> 00:33:00,010 Depending on the shape and size of the heating tube, and of course the rest of the tubing, 508 00:33:00,010 --> 00:33:04,224 the exit temperature could be different between models and that will affect taste. 509 00:33:05,093 --> 00:33:09,102 I can’t say I’ve noticed too much variation myself, quite honestly, but again 510 00:33:09,102 --> 00:33:12,199 I don’t claim to have very phosisticated taste. 511 00:33:12,199 --> 00:33:17,651 Another benefit of the simplicity here is that these machines tend to be quite reliable, 512 00:33:17,651 --> 00:33:20,750 typically only needing a descaling every now and then. 513 00:33:20,750 --> 00:33:23,202 I just run vinegar through it as needed. 514 00:33:23,202 --> 00:33:28,202 However I have noticed an increasingly common problem as these age. 515 00:33:28,202 --> 00:33:34,313 The thermostats controlling the hot plate seemingly drift with time and start getting too sensitive, 516 00:33:34,313 --> 00:33:36,706 tripping in the middle of a brew. 517 00:33:36,706 --> 00:33:41,313 This doesn’t mean it won’t make coffee but it can slow it down tremendously. 518 00:33:41,313 --> 00:33:47,304 When working properly, the thermostat should keep the heating element switched on until it’s completely out of water, 519 00:33:47,304 --> 00:33:53,684 but if it becomes a little too sensitive it’ll start clicking off during the brew, periodically pausing the process. 520 00:33:53,684 --> 00:33:58,463 That can easily double the time it takes to make the pot, which is annoying. 521 00:33:58,463 --> 00:34:03,738 It might also result in an over-extracted brew but frankly I’ve never noticed that. 522 00:34:03,738 --> 00:34:09,918 I have solved this by descaling the machine, suggesting a layer of calcium deposits within the tube 523 00:34:09,918 --> 00:34:14,780 insulated the water a bit from the heating element’s heat so the thermostat got too hot. 524 00:34:14,780 --> 00:34:22,079 But getting rid of that layer of scale hasn't always worked, and I’ve gotten rid of a couple of slow coffee makers in the past. 525 00:34:22,079 --> 00:34:25,054 So far though, they've always been four cup machines. 526 00:34:25,054 --> 00:34:26,848 It's never happened to a big one. 527 00:34:26,848 --> 00:34:30,312 Anyway, I think I’ve gone on long enough. 528 00:34:30,312 --> 00:34:33,769 I am a vociferous defender of the humble drip brewer 529 00:34:33,769 --> 00:34:40,903 because it’s simple, it’s effective, it’s cheap, it’s reliable, and it’s fairly good at what it does. 530 00:34:40,903 --> 00:34:46,273 As with most things, yeah you can optimize your experience to your heart’s content. 531 00:34:46,273 --> 00:34:50,248 And if you have fun doing that - by all means! Have some fun! 532 00:34:50,248 --> 00:34:51,210 That’s important. 533 00:34:51,885 --> 00:34:57,325 But, uh, well what I’m optimizing for is the effort to flavor ratio, 534 00:34:57,325 --> 00:35:02,550 and there’s a strong bias towards keeping the effort part *low*. 535 00:35:02,550 --> 00:35:05,606 I really liked the coffee I got from my Aeropress 536 00:35:05,606 --> 00:35:09,668 and I will happily admit it was better than what these can make, 537 00:35:09,668 --> 00:35:12,053 but that thing was just way too fiddly. 538 00:35:12,053 --> 00:35:16,110 I found my sweet spot with these things and I’m stickin’ to 'em. 539 00:35:16,700 --> 00:35:19,777 I do eventually need to try a Moka pot, though. 540 00:35:19,777 --> 00:35:22,233 I wonder where I can find one of those… 541 00:35:23,133 --> 00:35:25,633 ♫ drip-brewedly smooth jazz ♫ 542 00:35:26,201 --> 00:35:29,676 ...available at a typical grocery store... just 543 00:35:29,676 --> 00:35:31,557 Woah. I completely - What? 544 00:35:31,557 --> 00:35:35,940 Your typical grocery store might have maybe four options to choose [phone makes noise] from 545 00:35:35,940 --> 00:35:37,920 I thought I put you on silent! 546 00:35:37,920 --> 00:35:39,730 Thanks to… heh! 547 00:35:39,730 --> 00:35:41,859 Are all there is to it. 548 00:35:41,859 --> 00:35:43,490 The water inlet at the top of 549 00:35:43,490 --> 00:35:45,612 ovv ov the machine 550 00:35:45,612 --> 00:35:49,512 Which is vaguely funnel shaped down to the th the the bleugh 551 00:35:50,660 --> 00:35:51,967 That.. is that still in there? 552 00:35:51,967 --> 00:35:55,627 Oh shoot. That may be why it was making noises. 553 00:35:55,627 --> 00:35:57,510 OK, well we’re gonna hide you there. 554 00:35:57,510 --> 00:36:00,000 Are probably other factors influing this as well. 555 00:36:00,000 --> 00:36:00,628 Influing? 556 00:36:01,125 --> 00:36:01,846 Influing? 557 00:36:02,560 --> 00:36:05,680 Apparently this feature was introduced during a coffee shortage. 558 00:36:06,456 --> 00:36:07,200 This is really wet. 559 00:36:08,473 --> 00:36:11,163 Why don’t we just get all the water out of here. 560 00:36:12,777 --> 00:36:16,556 Look, I just want repeatable, reliable coffee which isn't too hard to make. 561 00:36:16,556 --> 00:36:20,707 I know, I know, lots of y'all are gonna be like "I don't understand how you can use such a terrible method for making coffee" 562 00:36:20,707 --> 00:36:22,868 but like, we've been over this. 563 00:36:22,868 --> 00:36:24,732 I'm a Midwesterner. 564 00:36:24,732 --> 00:36:26,869 Our standards are low and we're proud of it!