Mueller HyperGrind Precision Review

While the Mueller HyperGrind Precision generally functions like most other blade grinders on the market, some extra annoyances with its cleanliness and ease of use dropped it to the bottom of our scoresheets.

Performance Comparison

Credit: Jenna Ammerman

Likes

The most pleasing thing (or, more accurately, the least displeasing) thing about the HyperGrind Precision is the noise that it emits. One generally expects a blade grinder to sound a bit like a plane propellor crashing through a jungle canopy, but the HyperGrind manages to keep its noise relatively innocuous and at a fairly low-medium pitch. Still, it does create quite a cacophony for a few seconds before the beans break down a bit.

The HyperGrind often spills grinds when you remove the cap.

Credit: Jenna Ammerman

Apart from not sounding as grating as some other blade models, our only accolade for the HyperGrind is its price. It is a lot cheaper than all of the burr models we tested, and is on the lower end of the price spectrum when it comes to blade grinders as well.

Dislikes

Unfortunately, our list of dislikes for this machine is longer than our list of likes.

First off, like all of the blade grinders on the market, the HyperGrind fails to create a consistent grind size. This is because its blades are pretty much randomly slicing through a pile of beans with no way to control the actual size of the particles it produces. This results in a different amount of large and small grinds everytime you make coffee, and is likely going to result in a different taste and sub-optimal extraction everytime. This is just the big sacrifice you make with a blade grinder, with the only other option being spending likely orders of magnitude more on a burr grinder.

A good amount of coffee gunk sticks to the hard to clean grinding chamber.

Credit: Jenna Ammerman

Our biggest gripe with the HyperGrindis the mess that it makes when you use it. This comes from the large amount of fine coffee dust that is produced, which sticks all over the grind cup and generally must be cleaned off with a brush or rag. That stuck coffee also makes pouring the grinds into your coffee maker less than predictable, as sometimes the grinds pour slowly and smoothly and sometimes you get a sudden coffee avalanche. This resulted in us dumping a good amount of grinds onto the counter while using this machine.

The common aftermath of using the HyperGrind.

Credit: Jenna Ammerman

This problem with small grinds that gunk up the machine is made worse by the fact that the cup with the actual blades in it cannot be removed from the machine. This makes it nearly impossible to get the blades fully clean, as you can't run them under a faucet or put them in the dishwasher.

Value

The Mueller HyperGrind Precision is quite inexpensive. However, we've found similarly inexpensive blade grinders that we've liked slightly better. In general we've found the differences between blade grinders to be small, but if we're splitting hairs we would say there are better values to be found in other blade grinders.

Conclusion