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List Price: $59.99
Sale Price: $39.99
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This urn is supremely functional, with no bells and whistles. It advertises brewing times of 45 seconds per cup, but I've found that it's closer to the minute per cup advertised by other models: you'll buy back very little setup time with this model (heating 2 gallons of water took 35 minutes for example). Plus, like all other coffee urns, this one sings its moany little song while brewing, so if there's a chance it might be a distraction, you'll need to plug it in ahead of time so it's done brewing by the time the main event occurs, or you'll need to brew in another room and move it to the buffet table once it's hot. The one-handed dispensing works fine if the cup being dispensed into is solid, like a coffee mug, but common sense is confirmed that paper cups are not sturdy enough to depress the button without collapsing. In order to dispense one-handed with a paper cup, you have to push the button with your knuckles, which puts your fingers in the path of potentially hot liquids. Finally, and this is something that there's no way to know before reading the owner's manual, there's a little strainer right above where the liquid comes out. The owner's manual warns not to tip the urn while dispensing in order to prevent clogging of this strainer with coffee grounds. That's all well and good, except that due to the placement of the dispensing nozzle, the coffee becomes inaccessible when the level goes below about 10 cups--that's 1/4 of the total brew for a full pot!! It's this waste factor that resulted in the 4 stars instead of 5. For its price, it's a tidy little machine--the nozzle is particularly good at preventing drips. However, I'd rather clean up dribble from a lower-placed nozzle than have to find a way to decant 10 cups of coffee.
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I just made delicious coffee for a crowd with this. I have never made percolator coffee. I think I put in too much coffee but it came out very well. I got a 13 oz can of some sort of smooth & mellow decaf coffee from Trader Joe's and I got it very coarse ground. I used the whole can for a full urn of water (up to the 40 mark). I read that you use 1 pound for 2 gallons of water as a catering standard. The urn is about 80% of 2 gallons, so 13 oz seemed right. It was more than the directions for the urn, but I decided to wing it. I'm really glad that I did! It was excellent, even a couple of hours later. The keep warm setting is great and the coffee is nice and hot and NOT overdone. I would recommend that you get a light-medium roasted coffee and grind it coarsely in the store.
My husband asked me to save the rest, which he never does when I get the Peet's catered coffee, so it is sitting in the fridge ready to make iced coffee!
Buy Hamilton Beach 40540 Brew Station 40-Cup Coffee Urn, Silver Now
We purchased this unit from Bed Bath & Beyond as a replacement to the Hamilton Beach 40515 (HB) coffee urn (which was better in our opinion).
This unit looks pretty, and it holds >40 cups of water just as the HB did, but instead of being tall and slim, it is a short and fat unit.
The cup dispenser uses a pressure-release mechanism rather than a lift valve which at first glance seemed better because we can just put pressure on it with the coffee cup in hand rather than lifting a latch, but we were mistaken. The unit's pressure dispenser is placed at an angle, so it only dispenses full force when the bottom of the dispenser is pressed; when placing the coffee against the top of the unit, nothing comes out.
The problem with this is that the unit is so short, nothing larger than the small coffee cups will fit under the unit to allow it to dispense. This is a problem since most of our coffee cups are not the small ones. If you can fit the coffee cup under the dispenser to get it to dispense, you also have to be careful because unlike the spout-type dispensers, if you're not careful and there is not a sufficient amount of water in the unit, you'll knock it over and burn everyone around you including yourself when you reach to touch the burning hot unit with your bare hands to prevent it from falling and spilling.
Other than that, there is no way to see how much water is left in the unit, and the first day after using it with guests, it ran out of water and burned the bottom. Were there an indicator, we would have seen that we were running low on water and the bottom wouldn't have burned, possibly damaging the unit. Other units have either an indicator where you can see the water level, and others even have an automatic shut-off when the water level gets low and this unit has none of these features.
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We sell organic coffee at the local farmer's market on Saturday morning, so I bought two of these so I would not have to brew continuously with my small coffee makers. They started out great, I agree with the other reviewers that the finish on this could be better and it does get scratched up and discolored. I also agree that the dispenser is not that great and causes many people to struggle to get their cup of coffee. The pots do heat up quickly, and it does take about a minute per cup for the pot to brew which is not as quick as Hamilton Beach boasts, but it makes a decent cup of coffee.
My main complaint is that after about 8 uses, one of my pots suddenly stopped perking. It would keep the coffee warm, but it would not perk (make) the coffee. I called Hamilton Beach and they replaced the pot (and charged me $7.95 to ship it back to me!) and I thought GREAT! Back to two pots we're in business again! Not for long because I swear (NO JOKE!) the Saturday after my new pot arrived back from Hamilton Beach, the OTHER coffee urn went out! I am back down to working with one coffee pot and quite frankly due to my past experiences I have NO idea when this new pot will decide to give out! I have decided that I am going to replace the pots with a different brand because I depend on those pots working, and these are anything but dependable.
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Functions well, heats quickly, but I don't care for the aluminum, the inside discolors. Stainless steel would be better but would jack up the price substantially. I only bought it for holidays so its fine, but if I were going to use it more frequently, I'd opt for a better quality stainless.
