Common questions
We are proud to be part of making every day a little easier for the small roasterys that we love. How does KaffePak work?
Find answers to the most common questions here!
Question:
What do you mean by volumetric dispensing? Is that something different from how other packaging machines work?
Answer:
Yes, it is different. Most machines operate on a weight basis whereas our machine uses the assumption of an even discharge rate of assigned material (coffee beans) to help the user get a portion of the right volume every time. This means we aim to get a consistent volume in every bag and you as the operator just have to make sure that volume equals the weight you need. This requires you to initially perform a short calibration procedure to adjust the set volume as the density may change with bean type, water content, roast profile etc.
Question:
That seems more complicated than just weighing, or?
Answer:
Yes, that is right, and a well calibrated and carefully adjusted weight machine may get a more consistent outcome, but there are a number of benefits with our way of working as well. Getting rid of weiging give a much more robust machine which does not need calibration, has no load cells that are expensive and prone to break down, and also the process can be significantly speeded up without the lack of accuracy which is something all weighing machine suffers of; the compromise between speed and accuracy.
Question:
So how good is the accuracy?
Answer:
To be honest, that can be a little bit tricky to say for sure but we’ll try (but we would like to mention that the accuracy number stated for all weighing machines is also a simplification of reality, again coming down to calibration, maintenance and desired speed):
Our accuracy is best described by the natural distribution chart below. Read this chart as 95% of your bags will be within a nominal value +/- 4 grams. Even at 2kg bags we can achieve this. If you look for 99% of the bags the interval may be +/- 6 or 7 or something. (This shall also be put in relation to a standard weigh filling machine that may promise an accuracy of +/- 1%. But do realize that 1% of 2kg is 20g). Every once in a while there will be a bag that is outside this interval as well, which is exactly what a “distribution” means. But most bags will be very close to the set nominal value, in this case 500g.
Question:
So how should I set and operate the machine?
Answer:
The intended use of this machine is to set the nominal value to 5 or 10 grams more than what your customer would expect (say 510g for a 500g bag) and then you’ll have all your bags filled to something around 503-517g, with the absolute majority of them around 507-513g. Or you do as some of our customer and set the output to something slightly lower and manually top up to desired value, weighing every bag.
Question:
This was a lot of complicated stuff. Do I need an engineering degree to operate this machine?
Answer:
No! We understand this sounded complicated, but the above is just the to give an honest answer to how the machine works (and the physics of real world processes). The actual use of the machine is magnitudes simpler than operating a standard weighing machine. This is actually one of the core features of our machine. There are no calibrations, a minimum of settings or adjustments to get started, all in all a learning curve/period of 5 minutes to get up running.
Question:
Still I’m not sure I understand how you can guarantee a specific weight of beans in my bags if the device does not weight anything?
Answer:
You will need to have an external simple scale (20€ from wallmart) to do the initial setting to find and set a volume which corresponds to the weight you do want. This process takes a minute or two and is super simple.
Question:
What about maintenance and service of the machine?
Answer:
This is one of the really good things: The lack of sensors (such as scales) means we do not have anything in the machine that needs adjustment, calibration and is likely to break down. This means that there is absolutely no need for period maintenance at all. Also the lack of sensors and other measurements makes the machine very robust and we guarantee there will be significantly less problems and broken parts that needs replacement and service.