Coffee Grinder Static Electricity: 2 Tests

 My Mom gave me some birthday money.  She always gives me the number of years old I am.  So this year, I had a whopping $46.  I like to treat that money as a gift and not use it for bills or other practical things.  This year, I've had my eye on a very impractical manual coffee grinder (manufacturer is Heihox).

I was excited to buy this little dude.  It's manual, so it's super quiet.  It is small, and just perfect for a single serving.  It takes about 30 seconds to grind a dose.  It had pretty decent ratings on Amazon, so I bought it.

First use was an absolute mess.  Coffee grounds everywhere.  Static electricity was the culprit.  In fact, when I turned the little cup upside down, nothing fell out!  It's winter, and our house is pretty dry, but the static was off the charts!  The picture below is just a small portion of my mess.  I had grounds covering multiple square feet of my countertop.

There are 2 suggested fixes to help static:

1.  Wait a few minutes after grinding to allow the static to dissipate.  This sounds like a good solution.

2.  Wet a chopstick, and stir your unground beans to inject a little moisture to the beans.  This sounds a bit kookie.  

I wanted to test both methodologies, so I did.  First picture here is a freshly cleaned grinder with freshly cleaned catch-cup.  This is as clean as it gets:

First up is my control batch:  grinding beans without any of these static-control suggestions.  Let's see just how bad the static can be!  And yes, it's pretty bad as you see below.  Ground coffee is stuck on the bottom of the grinder, and it's coating the interior of the cup.

I cleaned all this up, and ground another batch of beans.  This time, I waited a full 3 minutes before I inspected the results.  I was surprised to see that the static did not dissipate at all.  In fact, I think it looks just as bad as not waiting.  See below:

Last test, and I'm skeptical about this one:  stir the unground beans with a wet chopstick.  I don't quite understand how this will fix things, but I was quite impressed with the results.  Not just impressed, but I was a bit shocked.  See below:

So there you have it.  Stir your beans with a wet chopstick prior to grinding to fix all your static electricity problems.  Who woulda' thought?

A Hat for a Buddy

Kiddo #1 whipped up a hat to give to my ol' buddy, Jerry.  We've been thinking about him quite a bit in the last many days, and wish him a speedy recovery!

Catching Up With Pictures

It's been awhile since I last posted, and we've had many good memories and events happen since then.  I thought I should attempt to catch things up with a few pictures.

Christmas Eve (part 1):  Family picture in front of the Christmas Tree.  We didn't dress up for the event - we just came as we were.

Christmas Eve (part 2):  With a maniacal face of terror, Kiddo #3 demonstrates how he uses a sword.  

Christmas Eve (part 3):  Kids wanted to include the 6 guinea pigs in the picture.  

It's a bit difficult to see all 6 of those guinea pigs in the previous picture, so here is a slightly better picture.  The stuffed tiger at the end of the line is just a stuffed tiger, and not a guinea pig.  Ha!

Christmas Morning (part 1):  Before the wrapping paper was flung.

Christmas Morning (part 2):  Once everything was done and over.

On Sunday morning, January 3 2021, we had a real beautiful snow overnight.  The temperatures were just above freezing, and there was no wind, so all the snow stuck to all the branches.  It was magical, but it melted very quickly.

Gingerbread Building

All 3 kids enjoyed an evening of building gingerbread houses.  This year, we didn't have to bake our own gingerbread - this was a kit from Grandma W.  Kids had a blast as you can easily see:

Clean hands.  Not tonight!

Have to stop midway through for a snack.

Also midway through, we got the call from the school that Kiddo #1 is quarantined due to close contact.  That means all 3 kids will be home tomorrow (Tuesday), but boys return to school from their quarantine the next day.

All in all, it was a real good night with kookie kids.

Bagels

 I whipped up some home-made bagels this morning to try something new.  Pretty amazing good taste.  Yes, they are ugly schmugly, but they are super tasty.

Box Spring Dissection

We have given our 9 year old boy a new box spring and mattress.  He has jumped on his old bed so much that he squashed it in half.  Springs were popping out all over the place.  When we took out the old bed, it actually jingled with all the broken parts inside.  

I did some math:  15 minutes of bouncing per night for the last couple of years yields about 11,000 hours of bounce time.  

From the top down, the old box spring doesn't look too bad, eh?

But, of course, it was bad.  I'm not expert in box springs, but I think the top should be flat.

I cut off the fabric to see what lies beneath.  I found an array of broken springs and wire mesh.  I can also see my previous repairs to the wood stringers are mostly in tact.

Here's another view

I removed all the broken and loose hardware and set it aside.  

It easily filled a 5 gallon bucket.

With all that loose junk removed, the remainder of the box spring looks pretty bare.

I removed all the repairs I did from 6 months ago (which was simply adding some 2x4s to beef up the broken slats), so after this there wasn't much left.  

The good news?  Our boy has strong legs from all this bouncing, and is the fastest runner in 3rd grade.

Next up - dissect the mattress.

Fine Woodworking? A first for me.

I have ventured into the realm of furniture making the past couple of weeks in an attempt to make a coat rack with shelf.  I've always been curious to see and learn more about pocket holes, and hidden joinery, so I splurged and bought a $30 Kreg pocket hole jig.  First impression - Why didn't I buy this gadget earlier?!  I really liked it, and it opens up a lot of potential for ideas.

So, I designed my own "mission style" coat rack for the front entryway.  This is a prototype for a larger style rack for the main shoe-room of the house.  I chose red oak hardwood, and stained it in a similar color.  All joints are pocket holes, of course.

I used keyhole brackets on the back to hide my mounting hardware, so there are no exposed screwheads that are visible.

Overall, I'm pretty pleased, but I would do a few things differently.  I found that pocket holes get a little dicey depending on the grain of the wood.  I should either use an undersized screw, or drill a pilot hole into the piece to be joined.  I ended up clamping the joints in nearly all the axis to prevent splitting.  I don't think that is normal - it just so happens because of my design.

Phase 2 - take what I learned on my prototype, and apply it to a new design that is slightly larger for the main house entrance.  And, I need to find a better (cheaper) source of lumber.  All in all, a good first project and good learning experience.