Today I received an interesting link to a Brasilia sales brochure. Two things stuck out about it.
First, the Brasilia marketing people have taken a "if you can't beat 'em, join 'em" attitude towards the flat-line temperature discussion. They display a time vs. temperature graph that David Schomer would be proud of.
The next round of WBC machine qualification trials will be hotly contested indeed....
Second, and much more puzzling, is the claim that their machine extracts a higher percentage of coffee solids compared to competing machines. Jim Schulman and I recently did a bunch of testing on this, and I must say I'm real skeptical after looking at the Brasilia graphs. I'd love to be able to play with one of those new machines!
Their graph of 'grades Brix' vs. 'grams of coffee' is a perfect example of the category ‘absolutely meaningless pseudo-scientific graphs’. mainly because it doesn't even indicates units!
ReplyDeleteIf they used at least the prevalent orientation of the axes (left to right = rising x; bottom up = rising y), it claims that the density of the brew rises in line with rising coffee quantity. Assumed that it contains shots with constant volume and time, this is the exact opposite of what yours and jims results suggest.
Based on their performance in publish useful graphs, it seems doubtful that they did much better job in handling the experimental data statistically..
And all this still leaves aside whether they chose experimental conditions (pressure, baskets etc.) with the different machine types, which are comparable in the first place.
By claiming to outperform the existing machines and simultaneously writing that their own machine has a temp stability of 1deg F (0.5deg C), they just demonstrate once more that their brochure is in short: abysmal
"pseudo-scientific graphs"
ReplyDeleteYes, for sure the graphs were last edited in the marketing dept, not the engineering dept.
"it claims that the density of the brew rises in line with rising coffee quantity....this is the exact opposite of what yours and jim's results suggest"
No, my results suggested, given certain other conditions, that the DENSITY OF THE BREW is proportional to the dose of dry coffee. OTOH, Jim showed, given certain other conditions, that the PERCENTAGE OF THE PUCK EXTRACTED is inversely proportional to the dose.
"their brochure is in short: abysmal"
But still, I'd like to try the machine! I believe the Brasilia people are way too competent to put out a bad one, and this thermal performance is very nice to see in a HX machine. Of course, there's a lot more to a great espresso machine besides stable brew temps.
states that it has been approved by the "WBC" to be used in official competition - which I believe is quite FALSE.
ReplyDeleteFirst rule of marketing: never let FACTS stand in the way of a good advertisement! :)
ReplyDeleteSounds like the Bull-one is Bull-oney or even worse..Bull-s---.
ReplyDeleteisn't that an e-61 grouphead with a red screw on top?
ReplyDeleteThe pour looks like it's been photoshopped into the picture. I could be wrong, but it seems a little off.
ReplyDelete>Bull-one is Bull-oney
ReplyDeleteThat's clever! :)
>isn't that an e-61 grouphead with a red screw on top?
Probably the red cap covers some engineering trickery that improves the temperature stability.
i noticed they're using a picotech datalogger.
ReplyDelete--barry
I love this article.
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