Pilot Production
over 5 years ago – Tue, May 14, 2019 at 02:46:20 AM

Hello Kelvin Community, 

This is a quick update today to keep you posted on our progress. While we continue to work with our manufacturer to finalize the electronics firmware/software and functionality, we have been finalizing the mechanical components for the pilot run and initial reviews with UL. We officially have a project file open with UL and construction, mechanical and material reviews are underway with our assigned project engineer. The next step will be the functional testing, which will be completed with samples from our pilot production run.

Pilot Production

We’ve recently reviewed samples of the main housing’s exterior finish, exterior packaging, color finishes, and lists of parts as they are gathered for the pilot run. Nearly all parts are done and you can see the range of production parts in the image above. Our team is now working to ensure all parts are matched to the specs provided earlier in the process.

The pilot run of 50 units allows the team to ensure the tools and production line are running smoothly and gives us an opportunity to add in helpful fixtures and steps to make production assembly more efficient. Most importantly, it is an early opportunity to build in any necessary quality controls for the full production run.

Our Chicago, USA based team will be headed back to Dongguan, China in the coming weeks while the pilot assembly is underway to help the team review assembly procedures, inspect parts, test finished roasters and oversee details as the 50 units roll off the line. 

Process Detail: User Interface Refinement

In addition to reviewing and finalizing the samples of mechanical and electrical component parts, we are finalizing the details of the LED display interactions and user flows. This is an important process of testing the software that controls the roaster and all the potential paths to ensure that everything is as intuitive as possible and functioning as it should be. You can see in the image above that we’re exploring the use of our 4 digits to create animations and guidance to keep you informed of the roasting/cooling process status. Finalizing the roaster software is our last step to complete our pilot production units to provide to UL for functional testing.

The pilot production process is a huge milestone for the Kelvin team and we couldn’t have gotten this far without the patience and support of you - our backer community. We will continue to keep you updated as we have more news to share!

Best, 

The Kelvin Team

PRODUCTION UPDATE
over 5 years ago – Wed, Mar 27, 2019 at 07:55:44 PM

Hello Kelvin Community,

We’re coming to you with a quick update today to cover a few items - safety testing schedule, CMF (color, material and finish) progress and the process for handling shipping address updates.

Product Safety Testing Timeline Update

Our first key update is that we have not yet been able to begin our product safety testing. We had written before about how seriously we take the safety testing process and that we won’t take any shortcuts on product safety or quality, so we wanted to be completely transparent and give you a bit more background on what we’ve been working through the past few weeks…

Specifications are an important part of the product development and manufacturing process. Sometimes you specify a component by source, sometimes you specify attributes of a component, but don’t control the source, thus allowing your manufacturing team some flexibility to hit cost and lead time targets by looking at alternate sources. Regardless of your component specifications, you also specify performance requirements so you can test to confirm how your product works in delivering its required functionality. While doing some final performance testing, to select the production heating elements and finalize the electronics before handing over samples to UL for testing, we noticed some differences in the performance of our roasters relative to the labels and specifications relayed to us by our manufacturer.

Our tests were specifically around the heater power and trying to find the sweet spot for our roaster. Too much power and the beans will roast too quickly and unevenly – over-roasting some beans while leaving others lightly roasted. Too little power and it will take far too long for the beans to get roasted- or they might not get roasted at all! After testing several variations, we had narrowed in on the configuration we wanted. However, upon receiving a second prototype with that same configuration for final verification, it was discovered that somewhere along the way, some components had been mis-labeled, requiring further testing and analysis to determine the exact specifications of our preferred configuration. 

Our contract manufacturer worked quickly to determine the source of the error and determine what components are in our preferred configuration. We are currently awaiting the revised prototypes for final testing and approval. Once we have this resolved and have finalized all the components, we can move into the next stage of development - UL Safety Testing! This is a fluid process, but once we are in the queue for UL Testing, we will be able to give a more accurate update on the timeline for production.

Color, Material, and Finish (CMF) Specifications

As you all know, the copper accents are one of the defining characteristics of the Kelvin Roaster. In our industrial design models, we used real copper with a clear-coat sealant to prevent tarnishing. For both cost and performance considerations, we can’t use pure copper for these components in production. Instead, we are using aluminum with a food-safe coating that will be able to withstand the high temperatures of the roaster without degrading (like paint)  or tarnishing (like pure copper). Our contract manufacturer has been working diligently on matching both the color and texture of our original materials. After several rounds of formula development (a few of which are shown in the image above), we have finally developed a copper color that closely matches our specifications. We’re confident you will all be pleased with the results

One of the other things we need to consider for the aesthetics of Kelvin is the texture applied to the final product. A few observant backers have noted that the prototypes we have been showing over the past few months have not had any texture applied, so they have a glossy finish. This is because adding texture to the mold is the final step in the mold-making process, so we don’t want to add that while we are still making even minor modifications. The texture selection process involves evaluating texture sample plates for both look and feel. Examples of some of these texture plates are shown above, including the texture we’ve settled on, marked with the yellow dot.

Updating Addresses

Several backers have asked about updating their shipping addresses. If you need to change your shipping address for any reason, please send us your updated information in a direct message on Kickstarter, or email us email at [email protected] we will update your address for you. As we get closer to the final ship date, we will send a reminder to make sure your shipping address is up to date.

Thanks again for your support of our project. We’ll continue to post information as we have it – especially as it relates to the timeline.

Best, 

Team Kelvin

Happy Lunar New Year!
over 5 years ago – Wed, Feb 20, 2019 at 12:50:00 AM

Hello Backers!

We have several updates for you today...Starting with a topic we know many of you are very interested in….

Update #1/ Critical Path Timing

We’re sure that many of you share the desire to know the answer to a common question: “when will I receive my roaster?” As you know, we are laser-focused on bringing Kelvin to you. We are as eager to provide a shipping date as you are to receive it! That said, there are several factors/critical path events that must occur in order for us to be highly confident in setting the date, but right now the critical path item is completing the UL safety testing. There are other campaigns that have skipped safety testing to expedite a ship date. We won’t do that. We had some delays with getting on the UL testing schedule due to Chinese New Year (also known as the Lunar New Year) and other factors, but should have a finalized date later this week or early next. We’ll post a short update to let you know the status as soon as we get that news.

After the safety testing is completed, we’ll either be off and running to production, or we’ll have to make some tweaks based on the testing results. We’ve already done multiple preliminary reviews with UL and we’re confident we’re on the right track, but you just don’t know 100% until you do the formal testing.

Update #2/ Making Use of Downtime - Functionality Optimization Testing

Speaking of Chinese New Year...Similar to other consumer electronics companies - our manufacturer has been off the last few weeks for the Chinese New Year Holiday. This is just one of the many considerations we’re working with in a global manufacturing landscape. Instead putting our project on pause, we wanted to make the most of that time. Before they shut down for the holiday, we asked that they send us the most up to date production samples for testing and continued optimization. As more individual parts are optimized and put into the assembly, the thermal characteristics of the roaster change - which means that the heating and cooling of the roaster change. With each new optimization, we’re continuing to conduct more roasting tests to see how the roasting and cooling are affected by these improvements. We do this testing to review variables such as heater power and temperature, fan speed, and the corresponding changes to the roast length and cooling cycle length. All of this ensures we are providing our backers with the most intuitive, consistent and high quality roasting experience that we can.

Update #3/ Global Backer Community

As we prepare for the upcoming fulfillment process, we ran some analysis on our backer community and wanted to share a visual of where our backers live! We are thrilled to see such a truly global community, united by our love of fresh coffee. We’re still looking for a customer from Antarctica to have every continent covered! Thank you for your continued support and patience as we ensure that Kelvin is safety-tested, highly-functional and the best new addition to your home coffee routine. 

Update #4/ Packaging Sample

Lastly, we wanted to share another item we’re working on as we approach production. This is just an early packaging sample, but it’s too cool not to share. We still have a few more tweaks to get it perfect, from print adjustments to the optimizations of the interior support structure to protect the product in transit, but we’re definitely on the right track.

Thanks again to you, our passionate community, for your support on this journey to make Kelvin a reality. We remain as committed as ever in bringing this product to you. Expect further updates soon.

Best,

Team Kelvin

What a Year!
over 5 years ago – Sat, Dec 22, 2018 at 12:56:54 AM

Update #1: Holiday Promotion

For a limited time, you can buy a bag of raw coffee beans or a Kelvin for 10% off. Use the promotional code KELVIN10, until January 2 to save!

Update #2: Manufacturing and Testing

Things have been moving steadily on the manufacturing front. The process of creating tooling for mass production is a long one, where many seemingly inconsequential details can compound to create potentially major issues. One prime example of that is the mesh in the chamber cap. There is a fine mesh in the chamber cap that allows air to flow through but prevents the chaff from floating off into your kitchen. To reduce the number of components and potential places for bits of chaff to get caught, we decided to overmold the mesh- that is, make it an integrated part with the chamber cap. However, the mesh we are trying to use gets deformed by the pressure of the molten plastic flowing through the mold.

Testing Update
Now that we have the first production samples, we are learning a lot more about our design, how it will react in the real world, and changes we have to make to improve the design and also make it through the UL and CE safety testing. One example of this is the Top Handle. The Top Handle spends the roast cycle sitting in the hot air that is roasting your coffee beans. During our design reviews with the testing engineers at UL, it was brought to our attention that there is a maximum temperature that these external components are allowed to reach so users don’t burn themselves if they accidentally touch it. Our initial testing showed that the Top Handle is right at this temperature rise limit. In order to make sure that users are safe, we have added an additional part under the handle. This part is made of an engineering plastic that has high heat resistance, which will protect the metal top handle and make sure it doesn’t get too hot. You can see the difference in the comparison below.

 Our manufacturing partners are hard at work with this and other changes that we are implementing so that we can keep you, our backers safe while using the Kelvin Roaster.

Further Considerations
Now that we have the initial production samples, we are working on optimizing the airflow within the roast chamber. This involves everything from adjusting the air inlets in the chamber to tweaking the fan speed and optimizing the batch size to ensure we can get as even a roast as possible. We are also testing and improving the user interactions to make sure they are as intuitive as possible. It’s all part of the process of bringing our conceptual prototypes to life!

 
Our next update won’t be until after the new year and we’d like to wish all of backers and coffee roasting community a Happy Holiday and New Year!

Cheers,
-The Kelvin Team

Happy Holidays!
almost 6 years ago – Fri, Dec 07, 2018 at 10:08:48 PM

 Update #1: Holiday Card and Ornament 

As we enter the holiday season let your friends and family know that Kelvin is coming early next year! Browse and select your favorite holiday gift at Kelvinroaster.com/holiday for an easy and fun way to share Kelvin with your loved ones. Help us spread the word – you can still pre-order and be one of the recipients of a Kelvin!

Update #2: Updated Pre-Production Sample

We’re excited to share that we have received initial production samples of the Kelvin Roaster. These are made with the first parts off of the production tooling. There will inevitably be modifications that need to be made, but it's exciting for everyone to see how far we've come! In our Chicago shop this week, we are hard at work evaluating the samples: roasting beans, measuring temperatures, and evaluating the user interface. Stay tuned for a more detailed update on this soon.

Update #3: New Website Coming Soon

We’ll be launching our new website soon! The website will feature an improved user experience, additional details, and a shop with green coffee bean subscriptions. Users can continue to pre-order and we will share an exclusive discount to our backer community when we launch.

Your continued support and enthusiasm motivate our team everyday-cheers!
-The Kelvin Team