A Coffee Mill

Loosely based on a design from the book "Woodworking Projects For the Home Workshop" by Rosario Capotosto, here's a view of my completed coffee mill[1].

The grinder is Busy Bee's No. B3962, antique style side crank coffee grinder. Busy Bee also offers a top crank model for less money, but I thought that the side crank version is the superior design.

Dimensions

The base is 6 5/8" square with 3/4" corner radii. The box is 5 1/4" square with a 4 3/8" height. Overall height with the grinder attached is 12 3/16".

Material

I was determined to make the thing out of whatever I had on hand, so aesthetics took a back seat to the limitations of reality.

The base with its radiused corners is 3/4" firply. The firply edges are veneered with birch hot-melt edge veneer (the only item I had no choice but to buy). The firply base contrasts mightily with the pine box and the birch edge veneer, but as I said, aesthetics took a back seat.

The box is made of 1/2" thick pine, as is the drawer front. I had to thickness plane 3/4" material to get the 1/2" material. The drawer's body is made from 1/4" thick poplar plywood (subflooring plywood).

Fasteners

Supplied with the grinder are two 8-32 x 1 1/2" black pan head screws and two 5/16" A/F hex nuts. I added two No. 8 SAE flat washers, and two No. 8 split lockwashers for under the hex nuts. The screws' threads are slightly undersize from true No. 8 stud diameter for some reason. The hex nuts are undersize as well -- standard 8-32 hex nuts are 11/32" A/F.

The drawer front is fastened to the drawer sides with 3/4" finishing nails. 1/2" finishing nails are used throughout the remainder of the drawer's construction.

The base is fastened to the box from underneath with nine No. 6 x 1 1/4" flathead wood screws. Attaching the box to the base is a tricky operation.

The Drawer Pull

It's an antiquey, oddball item I had lying around. Most anything would suffice.

Finish

One application of tung oil.

Grinder Action

The mill works as advertised, producing quite a fine grind.

It took a lot of cranking to produce the little heap of ground coffee in the above photograph.

In Conclusion

It's a satisfying little woodworking project that delivers the expected result. Be warned that you'll have to enjoy turning a crank if you expect to grind a lot of coffee.

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Note:

[1] The terms 'coffee mill' and 'coffee grinder' seem to be used interchangeably. I consider a coffee mill to be a complete unit with grinder and catch vessel; a coffee grinder to be the grinder mechanism only.

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