Raptis Roaster

  We are building a coffee roaster.  We're not re-building a used one.  We're not taking old parts to make a new one.  We are building a coffee roaster from scratch.  This is a new beast of a roaster, a kind that has never been tried before.
  Roasting coffee is pretty simple, you take green coffee, add heat, and that's it.  Yes, there is more too it than that, but that is the basic idea.  You can roast coffee with a ceramic pot on your stove.  (don't stop stirring, and open a window, you will get a lot of smoke).  There are two main types of coffee roasters, the first, and oldest is the drum roaster.  This is simply a large rotating drum that turns the coffee as heat is applied.  There are many different types, some have a sold drum, others have perforation to let air flow through the beans.  Some use different types of heat, they can heat the air, or they can use radiant heat from the flame very close to the beans.
  We use the second type, a fluid bed roaster.  This basically uses a very high airflow to make the beans circulate in the roasting chamber.  The beans are heated by hot air.  There are some advantages to using this type.

• No tipping.  Tipping occurs when the green bean is sitting too long against a hot metal surface.  This causes one little tip of the bean to burn.  This adds a slight burnt flavor to the final cup of coffee.
• No chafe buildup.  Chafe is a very light coating to the bean that falls off during the roast.  Its from the inner part of the bean, and cannot come off before the roast.  Using high air flow, the chafe comes off, and is imminently blown off the bean and into our chafe collector.  With some types of drum roasters this chafe can get stuck on the metal drum and burn, eventually turning into a thick black tar.  This also effects the final cup of coffee.
• Very clean cup.  Fluid bed roasters are known for producing a very clean cup of coffee.  Green beans can become dusty, (something I am most unfortunately, allergic to).  Our roaster blows all of that, and any other particles off of the coffee.
• Precise control.  We monitor the temperature of the coffee and the hot air flowing into it.  We are able to control this with high accuracy so that we produce the same results roast after roast.

  We are very happy with our fluid bed roaster.  We do however have an idea on how to add more control to the roast.  We are designing a completely new roasting method, different from the two listed above.
  We have been building this for over a year now, I can't go into the specifics yet, but we did our first test today.  We are not finished yet, and still have a lot to do, but we have some very promising results!  I will keep this blog updated on our progress, I can't wait until I'm allowed to post pictures!