My coffee maker sucks

ninjacoco

ninjacoco

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I just have a standard, boring drip coffee maker. I put beans in a grinder, put them in a paper filter, and stuff them in the stupid little cone thing. Lately, it keeps making more and more of a mess. Coffee grounds keep escaping the filter and ending up in my coffee even though I clean out the stupid little cone thing and tap down the grounds into the bottom of the filter. I've tried going with a cone filter instead since it's kind of a cone-shaped hole—that doesn't work. Maybe the filter shape was discontinued in the '90s, hell if I know. I usually just re-shape the flimsy little paper filter into the shape of the cone-hole and in the past, that's worked okay.

Today, about a fourth of my coffee was leaked all over the countertop, and I'm not sure why. The pot itself isn't leaking, so it's got to be cone thing messing up. I cleaned that stupid thing out before, but it's not helping, I guess. Maybe the spring-loaded nozzle thing that directs coffee into the pot wasn't aligned? There's a trail of ground beans and some brownish water spots up top. Either way, I have a crap-ton of grounds in the bottom of my pot, too. What the hell is going on?

I think my parents have had this thing since the '90s, but it's been working okay forever for "I just need some caffeine today" purposes. Is this how coffee makers wear out? I should be finishing my crap right now, not getting mad about spilled coffee.

If it's toast, any recommendations for what to look for in a new one are welcome. Keep in mind that I'm not going with anything much fancier—there's a good coffee shop mere blocks away for when I want to put pants on and care more.
 
ninjacoco said:
Maybe the spring-loaded nozzle thing that directs coffee into the pot wasn't aligned?
Click to expand...

That was my first thought. When that happens, less liquid (or none at all) will make it into the coffee pot. Once it has reached the top of the paper filter, it will spill over into the cone-shaped filter holder and that’s how the grounds get into the pot. After that, it will spill out of the holder itself.
 
What he said.

Cheap and cheerful alternative, which I run at the office*, in case you have a kettle to make hot water: french press. Since you mention you grind your beans anyway, this isn't much more involved than the drip machine. you just dump the ground coffee into the can, fill it with (near) boiling water, put the tamper/filter/sieve thing over top, wait for a few minutes, then push the plunger (lol) down to have good coffee.

* there's full-auto coffee makers everywhere at the office, which would lead me to have like 10 cups a day. with the french press, I have a manual grinder, so making a can (which is a small one, like 2 cups / 0.5 liters) actually involves annoying manual labor, so that automatically reduces my consumption to one per day and i then switch to tea because i'm lazy.
 
calvinhobbes said:
That was my first thought. When that happens, less liquid (or none at all) will make it into the coffee pot. Once it has reached the top of the paper filter, it will spill over into the cone-shaped filter holder and that’s how the grounds get into the pot. After that, it will spill out of the holder itself.
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Looks like that's what happened. Grumble.

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eizbaer said:
What he said.

Cheap and cheerful alternative, which I run at the office*, in case you have a kettle to make hot water: french press. Since you mention you grind your beans anyway, this isn't much more involved than the drip machine. you just dump the ground coffee into the can, fill it with (near) boiling water, put the tamper/filter/sieve thing over top, wait for a few minutes, then push the plunger (lol) down to have good coffee.

* there's full-auto coffee makers everywhere at the office, which would lead me to have like 10 cups a day. with the french press, I have a manual grinder, so making a can (which is a small one, like 2 cups / 0.5 liters) actually involves annoying manual labor, so that automatically reduces my consumption to one per day and i then switch to tea because i'm lazy.
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I've been considering the French press for a while. Hot liquid brown with a PLUNGER!
 
I must have had really bad luck with drip machines I've used, because I've always hated the resulting coffee. French press is great and I'm happy to drink premium instant coffee most of the time, I just find drip coffee to be tepid and tasteless. I suppose I've probably not had freshly ground beans because they've never been mine...

What you need is a second machine below that to filter out the grounds again. :LOL:
 
You need a Mokkamaster. Simple as that :)
 
Matt2000 said:
I must have had really bad luck with drip machines I've used, because I've always hated the resulting coffee. French press is great and I'm happy to drink premium instant coffee most of the time, I just find drip coffee to be tepid and tasteless. I suppose I've probably not had freshly ground beans because they've never been mine...

What you need is a second machine below that to filter out the grounds again. :LOL:
Click to expand...

A $10 Hario V60 Plastic Coffee Dripper is worth a try

View: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1oB1oDrDkHM
 
Coco complains about a possibly broken 90s drip machine. Inquires about “not anything much fancier“.
Thread gradually turns into grade A coffee snobbery, with recommendations for 200$ drip machines and multiple videos by the biggest coffee snob YouTube has to offer.

Just an observation :|
 
Dr_Grip said:
You need a Mokkamaster. Simple as that :)
Click to expand...

Are they actually better or just look neat? How I see them is a nicer looking american Diner style machine where hot water is dumped in the back with no stop, and it just runs through onto the filter and grounds. The hot plate heats everything up.
 
eizbaer said:
Coco complains about a possibly broken 90s drip machine. Inquires about “not anything much fancier“.
Thread gradually turns into grade A coffee snobbery, with recommendations for 200$ drip machines and multiple videos by the biggest coffee snob YouTube has to offer.

Just an observation :|
Click to expand...

You knew what was going to happen the moment you read Coco’s original post. 😜
 
eizbaer said:
Coco complains about a possibly broken 90s drip machine. Inquires about “not anything much fancier“.
Thread gradually turns into grade A coffee snobbery, with recommendations for 200$ drip machines and multiple videos by the biggest coffee snob YouTube has to offer.

Just an observation :|
Click to expand...

It includes a review of previously mentioned....

All the cheap coffee makers I've had, were crap and ended in the bin.

In the long run a good one , is probably cheaper, or just get a cheap dripper.
 
ninjacoco said:
View attachment 3571577
Click to expand...

That’s what you really, really don’t want to do. Every one of those folds reduces the space for the water on the inside of the filter and if the coffee doesn’t get through the filter fast enough, it’s going to go on the outside once the combined volume of the grounds and the water is too large.

The plastic cone should have the filter size on it. Let me know what it is and I’ll see if I can find it for you. Those things are cheap and I can USPS snail-mail them to you next time I’m in the States, probably the week after next.

Or just fold your oversized filter on one of the diagonal sides and cut off the excess at the top. Not ideal, but it’ll do… hopefully.
 
calvinhobbes said:
That’s what you really, really don’t want to do. Every one of those folds reduces the space for the water on the inside of the filter and if the coffee doesn’t get through the filter fast enough, it’s going to go on the outside once the combined volume of the grounds and the water is too large.

The plastic cone should have the filter size on it. Let me know what it is and I’ll see if I can find it for you. Those things are cheap and I can USPS snail-mail them to you next time I’m in the States, probably the week after next.

Or just fold your oversized filter on one of the diagonal sides and cut off the excess at the top. Not ideal, but it’ll do… hopefully.
Click to expand...
Screenshot 2024-01-25 214316.jpg
 
eizbaer said:
Coco complains about a possibly broken 90s drip machine. Inquires about “not anything much fancier“.
Thread gradually turns into grade A coffee snobbery, with recommendations for 200$ drip machines and multiple videos by the biggest coffee snob YouTube has to offer.

Just an observation :|
Click to expand...
*Ding* FinalGear
 
93Flareside said:
Are they actually better or just look neat? How I see them is a nicer looking american Diner style machine where hot water is dumped in the back with no stop, and it just runs through onto the filter and grounds. The hot plate heats everything up.
Click to expand...
Exactly to the contrary, the Mokkamaster's status as the least unacceptable drip coffeemaker of coffee snobs is based on the fact that it actually heats the water more than cheap drip coffee makers, meaning it hits the coffee at the optimal temperature to unlock aromas.

But yeah, that it looks quite nice probably helps.
 
What is a human but a cone shaped hole?

Anyway, we've had sub-100 eur coffee makers with thermos jugs now. First a Tefal, now an Electrolux. They're pretty great, I can brew a pot at 7:00 and still have the rest of the perfectly fine, non-burned, drinking temperature coffee at 9:30.
 
Dr_Grip said:
the least unacceptable drip coffeemaker
Click to expand...
very nicely put.

Dr_Grip said:
But yeah, that it looks quite nice probably helps.
Click to expand...
eye of the beholder and everything? i'll admit it looks... fancier? than the usual drip machines, but "quite nice" is a bit of a stretch imo :p

my office-french-press is actually a stainless steel doulbe-walled semi-thermos half liter affair. hence me calling it CAN in my post up top. it keeps the coffee hot for about an hour... after that, both temperature as well as the whole aroma deteriorate pretty steeply.
public said:
They're pretty great, I can brew a pot at 7:00 and still have the rest of the perfectly fine, non-burned, drinking temperature coffee at 9:30.
Click to expand...
don't let a coffee connoisseur read that or they'll probably want to stone you to death :|
then again, I can't really talk, since the hand-crank-grinder I run is really rather poor and I brew aldi espresso beans through the thing...

still think something like a french press or the manual style filter carrier drip thing like posted here are probably the cheapest way to acceptable coffee. or, you know, the horror that is capsule-style single serve machines (that, at least over here, are regularly on sale with a voucher for a ridiculous number of capsules) - but those should be unacceptable for other reasons :|
 
yeah, sounds like the spring for the Seak a Cup©️Funktion is fucked. I’m sure you can get a tiny spring from whatever the equivilant to Ace Hardware is down there.
 
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