Aillio

History

Two Danish twins, Jonas and Jacob Lillie, based in Taiwan: the design is done in Denmark, the manufacturing in Taiwan, and answering “Danish” or “Taiwanese” would be wrong in both cases. Even the founding year is not settled, 2013 or 2014 depending on the source, and the company does not publish it.

The Bullet R1 was presented at the SCAA show on April 14, 2015, for preorder at 1,500 dollars, with an idea nobody had pushed so far on such a small format: heating the drum by induction, with no flame or resistance, by a magnetic field. The R1 V2 followed, then on July 3, 2024 the R2 and R2 Pro. More than 16,000 Bullets in more than a hundred countries, according to the company.

What it makes

Induction drums of 1 to 1.2 kg, with an infrared bean temperature sensor that measures without contact, and the RoasTime and Roast.World software.

The models

• Bullet R1 V2: 1 kg, 1,550 W, nine steps
• Bullet R2: 1 kg, ten steps up to 1,750 W, 3,999 dollars
• Bullet R2 Pro: 1.2 kg, fourteen steps up to 2,300 W, 4,999 dollars

Twelve-speed fan, nine-speed drum, preheating from 160 to 310 °C

What you gain

Induction heats the mass of the drum directly: the response to a command is almost immediate, which gives a rare level of profile control at this size, and there is no gas or combustion to install. The infrared sensor gets around the classic flaw of the contact probe, whose reading depends on the load and on fouling. The software is open to Cropster and Artisan.

What you lose

Heat transfer is overwhelmingly conductive, the bean takes its heat from contact with the metal: this is the mode that produces tipping and scorching when the charge is small or the power pushed. The power, capped to stay on a household outlet, caps the capacity at 1.2 kg, and this is not a commercial choice but an electrical constraint. A machine for sampling and very small batches, not a shop machine for continuous production.