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Show HN: A Digital Twin of my coffee roaster that runs in the browser

https://autoroaster.com/
52•jvkoch•4d ago
I built this website to host a data-driven model of my coffee sample roaster.

I realized after 20 or so batches on the machine that while the controls are intuitive (heat, fan, and drum speeds), the physics can be unintuitive. I wanted to use my historical roast data to create and tune a model that I could use to do roast planning, control, and to help me build my own intuition for roasting. This website lets you interact with my roaster in a virtual, risk-free setting!

The models are custom Machine Learning modules that honor roaster physics and bean physics (this is not GPT/transformer-based). Buncha math.

The models are trained on about a dozen real roasts. The default bean model is an Ethiopian Guji bean.

My next steps are to add other roasters and the ability to practice control/reference tracking.

Comments

nxobject•4h ago
This is extremely fun to play with – congrats!

If you ever did a writeup on how your ML modelling worked and what real-life data you needed, I'd learn so much point of view of someone who's applied a little bit of control theory to robotics and aquarium controllers, but with traditional models. (Hell, I'd even pay $CUP_OF_COFFEE_PRICE for it, since I'd get that much learning time out of it.)

Also: you advertise custom models for roasters. But can you make a digital twin of my toaster?

skylurk•2h ago
I too am curious about the modelling methodology.
rshanreddy•3h ago
super cool
simlevesque•3h ago
I'd like to see you tackle the problem of figuring the opposite, let the user draw the curves and generate the inputs. Then I could replay with Artisan.

Cool website !

jvkoch•1h ago
Working on it! In fact, this was my original goal; Model Predictive Control for my roasters. I've been able to get this working on a fluid bed roaster but I've yet to try it for my drum roaster. Stay tuned! I'm hoping to have a control demo posted on the site soon.
captainregex•3h ago
this is nuts! beans? whatever, it’s super cool!
lukeinator42•3h ago
very cool. If you're looking for machines to add, it would be awesome to model a cheap roaster based on a popcorn popper since it is probably less reliable than commercial sample roasters (and might benefit from less trial-and-error). During my undergrad I made an arduino-controlled popcorn popper that connected to the open source artisan software: https://github.com/lukeinator42/coffee-roaster.
jvkoch•1h ago
100% agree - each roaster is slightly different, with different measurement schemes and other device peculiarities. This makes sharing coffee roasting profiles basically impossible!

I'm also working on letting people upload their roast profiles for training and serving their own models (including a "library" of bean models!).

lawlessone•2h ago
Did i win?

>Drum 745°C

jvkoch•1h ago
Keep going! Getting close to the melting point of Stainless 316 (1400C? I forget.)
LTL_FTC•2h ago
Gotta admit, when I read "digital twin" I though it was the kind that Nvidia likes to show off. Would be really awesome future work if you were able to pull that off. I mean, this already super cool! but you know, gaussian splatting...
jablongo•1h ago
I'm curious -- did you make the interface with Claude? I have a hunch you did, can you confirm/deny?
jvkoch•54m ago
Yes! Claude created nearly all of the interface.
sambo546•1h ago
If I understand this correctly, calling it a "digital model" would be more appropriate. Digital twins require sensor input from a real system as well as the ability to alter the real system, not just prediction.
glitchcrab•1h ago
This is correct.
jvkoch•55m ago
Yeah, as shown it's just a bunch of models. The real magic happens when this is connected to hardware and we can do things like data assimilation and control.
madamelic•1h ago
I overclocked the roaster and now the kitchen is gone: https://i.imgur.com/qRcGm64.png

(Nice work! This is really nifty. I wish I knew more about coffee so I could better understand the dynamics of the controls and how to achieve a perfect roast.)

westurner•11m ago
Coffee grounds are compostable. Re: collectd-python-plugins, LoRA, MontyHome BLE + a Pi: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=42200099#42201207

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Show HN: A Digital Twin of my coffee roaster that runs in the browser

https://autoroaster.com/
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