justoffal
Diamond Member
- Jun 29, 2013
- 33,612
- 26,337
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Like many before me I was beguiled at the thought of a cup of coffee on demand with the help of the Amazing new Coffee Machine when it first hit the markets. I held out for quite some time but finally broke down and got one. Big Mistake. My house drinks gallons of coffee so we use whatever coffee machine we have A LOT. This is not a good fit for the Keurig which has an awful tendency to scale up inside even with regular descaling.
Now I work with water chemistry as part of my job so I understand a little bit more about scaling than most and even I was confused by the way this machine claims to work out this problem. It claims that if you descale regularly based on total usage it will not be a problem. WRONG..... Turns out that even with normal earth salts content in local drinking water supplies you can't descale enough to keep the darn thing working. The Calcium and magnesium deposits get harder and harder and more removal resistant in some of the smaller grooves and channels on the interior of the machine where the heat sensors and flow sensors are located. Once this happens no amount of descaling will work. You can try disassembling it and manually scaping it out....but that is a massive task with no guarantee of getting it back together correctly.
Tried to use demineralized water to compensate but get this.... If the machine detects demineralized water it will shut down...lol... It depends on the conductivity of the mineral ppm to make certain adjustments to its running conditions. Sooooo...... conclusion:
The $19.99 Mr coffee maker that I have always depended on that usually lasts about two years Even in my house costs about 20% of the K cup Klunker...is much less expensive to own. Have you seen the prices on the damn K cups lately? Also many of the k cup firms purposely underfill the units to cut on overhead. Not worth it at all. Back to Mr Coffee or to the electric tea kettle and NesCafe....
The Keurig may be useful for households that use it sparingly over the course of the year or so it seems to be good for....but definitely not for heavy usage and it definitely needs a clean out redesign to be worth the trouble.
Now I work with water chemistry as part of my job so I understand a little bit more about scaling than most and even I was confused by the way this machine claims to work out this problem. It claims that if you descale regularly based on total usage it will not be a problem. WRONG..... Turns out that even with normal earth salts content in local drinking water supplies you can't descale enough to keep the darn thing working. The Calcium and magnesium deposits get harder and harder and more removal resistant in some of the smaller grooves and channels on the interior of the machine where the heat sensors and flow sensors are located. Once this happens no amount of descaling will work. You can try disassembling it and manually scaping it out....but that is a massive task with no guarantee of getting it back together correctly.
Tried to use demineralized water to compensate but get this.... If the machine detects demineralized water it will shut down...lol... It depends on the conductivity of the mineral ppm to make certain adjustments to its running conditions. Sooooo...... conclusion:
The $19.99 Mr coffee maker that I have always depended on that usually lasts about two years Even in my house costs about 20% of the K cup Klunker...is much less expensive to own. Have you seen the prices on the damn K cups lately? Also many of the k cup firms purposely underfill the units to cut on overhead. Not worth it at all. Back to Mr Coffee or to the electric tea kettle and NesCafe....
The Keurig may be useful for households that use it sparingly over the course of the year or so it seems to be good for....but definitely not for heavy usage and it definitely needs a clean out redesign to be worth the trouble.