The Fresh Loaf

A Community of Amateur Bakers and Artisan Bread Enthusiasts.

DLX assistent mixer

gary.turner's picture
gary.turner

Lately I've been trying to codify the variables of mixing and kneading dough in my DLX. Since it seems to act as a spiral mixer would, I used that as my base. Spiral mixers run at   about 100RPM in first speed, and 200RPM in second; that's the hook rotational speed. Bowl speed is more on the order of 15RPM. Commercial spiral mixers that I've checked use separate motors for each.

The DLX has a spiral pattern roller that depends on the bowl's rotation to drive it. The  bowl's speed is adjustable from ~45 to 135RPM. The ratio of the roller's and the bowl's radii acts as a step-up gear to raise the roller's speed.

Depending on the amount of flour, a proxy for the total dough, the roller runs at ~95 to 135RPM with the bowl running its dead slowest. So, speed 1 is decided for you.

For speed 2, the effective ratio is computed and the desired bowl speed is set to drive the roller at 200RPM. The bowl's effective radius is reduced by the amount of spacing between the roller and the bowl's rim.

The speed setting dial has eight little blocks. My nomenclature is simply the number of complete blocks, starting below the first, at zero, i.e. dead slow. Thus, a speed of 4 means turned up through the first four blocks, right into the space between the fourth and fifth blocks. Speed 3½ would be in the center of the fourth block.

Here is the chart of my speed settings and mixing times.

Flour weightRoller spacingBowl speed dial settingMix time @ speed 1Knead time @ speed 2
Speed 1Speed 2LightImprovedIntensive
560g or less½ in0½2 to 3 min3 to 4 min5min8+ min
561g to 980g1 in2
981g to 1960g1½ in4
1961g to 3220g2 in6

I am hoping other DLX users will give these values a test run or three, and add your findings to the conversation. I have found the times and speeds to be very close to values described by Hamelman, Suas, et al. For users of other mixers, do yours have a similar pattern?

I look forward to some input on this.

cheers,

gary

Subscribe to RSS - DLX assistent mixer