The Key - A $2000 Coffee Grinder | Review

The Weber Workshop Key Coffee Grinder in depth Review.

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[weberworkshops]

Thanks for the detailed review, Kyle! Watching this while preparing a midnight Cortado =) Here are our thoughts/comments:

Dial Stiffness - this will get easier with time. We use very fine toothed threads with virtually no gap/play. It will wear in nice and smooth.

Low RPM Stalling with light roast: A brushless motor will inherently have less torque at lower RPMs, but the grinder should be able to grind any drinkable coffee at any grind size from the mid RPM range. ‘Stalling’ actually acts as a protection mechanism so your motor doesn’t burn out — part of our way of ensuring it lasts decades. We could limit the lower end of RPMs, but that would mean that medium roasts and pour-overs wouldn’t be able to explore the super-slow grind profiles that we think is interesting and unexplored territory. We think it makes it more powerful as a tool, even if it requires a little more ‘gas’ to grind through harder beans.

Overall great review. I think you'll love it even more as the months pass and the burrs continue to settle in.

[KyleRowsell]

What's your favourite milk based beverage? Truly Curious!
Also, sorry about the glitch in colour at 9:48 for about 20 seconds. This was a mistake I made while exporting this video.

[michael_smith]

I’ve now got mine and have the following comments when using mine:

- stalling shouldn’t be an issue if you pour coffee into the chamber with the grinder running, I have to do this with my Monolith as well.

- I’m not 100% sold on the distribution wire, I think it’s not close enough to the grind catcher so also WDT as well

- pouring coffee into the grinder could be improved as well as pop-corning

- I want to do an burr alignment check with a DTI

Other than that it produces some amazing coffee, and is a joy to use.

[macmutant]

Major Keys: Love the objectivity of this review. I was looking at this grinder, but decided to go with the MC4 instead, because of the negative comments from early owners. Looking forward to the upgrade from my Baratza Encore.

[darylgrunau]

EG-1 owner here, interesting to see how the Key functionality is compared to mine. My dial was also stiff from day one but with use it’s smooth like butter. EG-1 has similar RPM adjustment, and light roast espresso has a limit to how slow it can go before it might lose torque and produce the stalling in similar way as the Key.
Ha. Forgot to add Major Keys

[tristansmith]

Just watched your review after watching Spromethus's review. It was interesting to hear how you both had such different experiences. Overall, I love the review! keep it up Kyle

[Indramardian]

thank you for giving me information and inspiration about coffee, I'm from Indonesia, after watching this video a lot I'm learning more and more to develop my content

[KristianMortensen]

You produce better and better content.
Thanks dude

[optikalblitz]

Major Keys.
I appreciate that you’ve grounded the hype I’ve been experiencing about this grinder. It still may find its way to my bar one day but I feel less FOMO after watching this. Thanks, Kyle 🗝

[everhopefulalways]

I have had my Key for about the same amount of time as yourself!As an EG1 user also I am a convert! I am very pleased with the Key and note your very slight niggles as similar to my own.

I am on a 240 volt electricity supply. Touch wood, I have never had a lockup, stutter or shudder at the lowest speed setting when grinding Cinnamon and light roasts at either espresso or filter settings. (Agtron Gourmet2 scale)
I wonder if the voltage difference is significant? Or perhaps I introduce the beans more slowly to a hot start and that avoids the problem?

[zeropuckprep]

Key Owner here - if you’re struggling with popcorning beans as I was try an empty roll of Duct Tape. Worked for me. Just cut the carboard in half slide it under the funnel and around the rod. Worked like a charm for me. Don’t need to chaperone beans anymore or use the bean cover thing that never worked to begin with. Seems my whole dose gets ground these days. I’m actually enjoying using this grinder a lot more since doing this. Workflow is so much more enjoyable but changing settings is still challenging need hand strength 😂.

[muhannadalahmadi]

What do you recommend.. how is the best key or Lagom P64 ؟

[crossen]

Thanks for sharing! I ordered mine shortly after watching your initial impressions video. I went from a 270WI to an Atom 75 and boy is there a big difference between conical and flat burrs. I've grown to enjoy the flats but I couldn't help myself from ordering another conical grinder. Makes me feel better that many people have multiple grinders on their coffee bars 😁

[LittleBear]

I know this is nit-picking, but when you were making the espresso at 4:30 you were using a dual-spout portafilter, but for the B-roll footage the portafilter is bottomless. Little bit of continuity break there 🤓 other than that loved the video! Been watching a lot of your videos recently and love learning about coffee and espresso. Keep up the good work!

[radoslavkrouchev]

Thanks for another great review!
I’ll be sticking to the Niche Zero but this is one good looking grinder!
The ease of workflow on the Niche is quite enjoyable

[danieldurling]

Major Key. If not this what would your preferred grinder be for filter coffee?

[CelaMayne]

Cortado. I bought my first hand grinder based off your videos. Normcore ~$90. It works perfectly for me and my v60 needs. Thanks for the content

[brandonhoeg]

Kyle - great video. This is coming from someone who is a filter coffee hand grinder type person (not currently poised to spend $2000 on a grinder), but I wanted to pop in for a few of my thoughts just from watching the video. The lid being removable to prevent popcorning seems kind of smart to me, because as you pointed out the dosing bin barely fits to pour ur coffee beans into the grinder, and I feel like a loose bean could fly out and hit the edges. Almost makes more sense to me to just make a full encompassing anti pop-corning lit with no hole to remove when pouring beans and place back on to remove popcorning entirely. That way no loose beans into the grinder, no pop corning, but also many people are used to a similar mechanic (removing a lid and replacing a lid) from single dosing bin covers etc etc so it is not like its an additional burden. Maybe this is a piece of advice you can pass along to the makers of this grinder. Making that a high quality piece seems to do away with a few of your most ‘quirky’ critiques with the grinder system. Okay that’s all hope you are well.

[CWChandler]

Major keys! Love your stuff. I am looking to build a new bar and continue to struggle to pick where to put my budget. Breville DB and 2k grinder. Or Decent and $700 grinder.

[TalLikesThat]

Another great video! Also, Good job on having subtitles, that's important. Thank you, Kyle!