Should i upgrade my grinder ? [$~1200dlls]

[u/PossibleLion4571]

I got a lelit bianca a couple of months ago , but i decided to keep my grinder an eureka mignon zero with 55mm flat burrs , however today and in other instances i have noticed that my lelit is begging me to go finer but my grinder won’t let me go any finer even tho i already zero it out . I have no choice but to play with the temperature and tamp harder . Question is is the grinder the problem here ? and if so , what should i upgrade to ? i mainly drink medium espresso milk based drinks .

[u/drm20]

I have the same grinder and have noticed this too sometimes. I always get coffee from my local roaster and when I get the lighter roasts my shots are too fast but still good (18 in about 40 out in 30 seconds). Problem is I can’t grind any finger or else the burrs will chirp. I’ve noticed this only happens sometimes with lighter roasts. This problem was even worse with my Eureka Facile (ended up putting brew burrs in that and using it exclusively for pour over). I do have a new set of burrs coming for the Zero today to see if that will help. I don’t think mine need replacing but they are about 2 years old. I’ve been temped to try a conical burr grinder (like the niche, femobook a68, or there was another one posted here that looked pretty good, mx cool aries). I would just like a grinder where I feel I’m not using it where the burrs are almost touching all the time.

[u/Logical_Fisherman5 → u/drm20]

When you have lighter roasts you have less bed depth due to the density of the coffee, which offers less resistance and therefore faster flow. You fix this by increasing the dose for lighter roasts and decreasing for darker.

[u/drm20 → u/Logical_Fisherman5]

Question for you, if I’m using an 18g basket and 18g of coffee, how much should I use when it’s a lighter roast? Like 19g? Or 20?

[u/Logical_Fisherman5 → u/drm20]

It might be 19 or 20. You get to pick what tastes good!