What is the asking price please. Also if you have more information, please let us know.
Sure, thanks for your interest, CoffeeJunky. The roaster is a 1 lb (.454 kg) roaster, but I find that keeping it slightly under 1 lb makes for a more evenly roasted batch. The design is fairly simple and would fit on most counter tops in your kitchen, though I always roasted on my covered porch because I never had ventilation installed in my place.
Regarding the simple design, there are basically 2 controls: a air control and a temperature control. As I mentioned before, the temperature control determines how many of the heating elements will be active. The elements are on/off, so the idea is that low is one element on, medium is two elements, high is three.
Since everything is electric with ceramic heating elements, there is a slower response time than what you would see with a gas roaster. I find that this makes the roasting more interesting because there is some finesse, but if you're used to roasting on the IR series or something with quick response time the roast profiles you have on the HR-1 won't carry over perfectly, obviously.
I hear a lot of people try to hit the 9-10 minute mark for first crack, but I usually tend to hit first crack a few minutes later. I think the roaster can get you there quicker if you like, but I find I stay in better control if I get a few more minutes in. The fan control determines where the fan will draw air from. The settings are "Cooling Bin", "Drum Air", and then a there's a 50/50 setting.
There is a sampler that you can use to monitor the beans and pull samples. I wish the sampler was a little bigger because I have to pull in a few times to get a reasonably sized sample. It's not a problem if you're in position and ready to pull quickly, but it would be nice to get 1-2 pulls for a sample instead of 3-4. You can view the beans from this little window on the front. The window was recently cleaned when I had it serviced.
The thermometer provides internal bean temperature. After talking with some professional roasters in town, it sounds like the thermometer is in line with the roasters they use as far as at which temperature certain roast events happen. For instance, I usually see first crack at about 375F degrees, and I drop a lot of my roasts just after 410F degrees.
It's blue!!! The roaster is nice and blue! Except for the paint coming off on the edge of the side panel. After each roast, I usually remove a side panel and blow away any loose chaff with a shop vac. I also remove the mesh strainer/tray and blow it out, too. I've heard you can roast nuts in this puppy, but I've never tried. The cooling bin gets pretty good air flow now that I've had the roaster services and the guy cleared out the inside a bit.
Oh man, I don't know what else to say about it. Sorry, I'm kind of all over the place trying to write this up in a hurry. Hopefully that's a good overview of the machine. As far as asking price goes, I saw that someone listed a "like new" HR-1 for $3,750 on these forums; however, mine does look fairly "seasoned" and it has the paint thing from heat damage (I assume). With that said, I did just have it serviced so you wouldn't need to worry about that for a while. I'm asking $2,700 OBO.
