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Is there any way to reduce the effects of static electricity on the grounds in a Capresso conical burr stainless steel grinder? The grounds appear to be charged and tend to stick to the plastic when emptying the container.

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Try putting a couple of drops of water in your coffee beans before putting them in the grinder's hopper. Known as the Ross Droplet Technique.

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  • Wow - I will try this out!
    – Peter H
    Commented Mar 5, 2016 at 0:20
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As an electrical engineer for any kind of such problems I can advise proper ground. I mean the electrical one this time. :) Anti static gloves may help (Google it). However, the static electricity always occurs by friction, it's natural and you cannot get rid of it completely.

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I have the same grinder, and I find that the static builds up more with the amount you grind. For everyday AeroPress use, I don't grind enough per use for it to build up static, but when I cold brew a whole 12oz of coffee, I grind the whole bag in batches. This builds up a lot of static due the the bin being plastic, and it's annoying to clean as it flies all over the counter.

I wouldn't recommend using water on the beans before grinding because even though the burr grinder is stainless steel, it is not rust-proof. So thinking long term, I would simply recommend keeping the batch size lower than the max line on the plastic bin. I wouldn't use water to clean the steel grinder either. Only use a brush and you can even pre-grind a tiny amount of throw-away grounds to clear the old grounds out.

A clean up is usually in the cards for when I make coffee anyways, and a little bit of grounds isn't going to trip me up, but I share your frustration.

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    agreed about the corrosion; the droplets of water have solved the static problem but I don't think it is worth getting the burrs rusted.
    – Peter H
    Commented Mar 25, 2016 at 3:21
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After running about 50kg of decafe through my Capresso, here's my technique:

  1. Get a water spray bottle and set it on mist

  2. Lightly mist the insides of the bean hopper and the ground coffee bin; install the bin

  3. Pour the coffee into the hopper, briefly misting the beans 3-4 times as you fill it

  4. Stick a chopstick or some other thin stirrer into the beans

  5. Grind a batch (one full turn of the timer). You'll find that, multiple times per batch, the coffee will stop flowing due to the moisture; stir the beans to resume grinding each time.

  6. When the batch is done, dump the ground coffee bin into your ground coffee container, re-mist the inside of the bin, and then reinstall the bin

  7. Grind the next batch

  8. When done, remove the bean hopper, bin, and upper burr, and stack them so everything can dry out.

Is this a pain in the tuchus? You bet. But, better that than ground coffee leaping out of the bin and all over the counter.

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  • Why would you grind more coffee than you intend to use right away? I'd be worried the coffee and moisture could cause mold, both in the grinder and in the ground coffee container.
    – JJJ ♦
    Commented Nov 25, 2020 at 15:03
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    I drink a whole lot of (decafe) coffee at my office, but my grinder is at home. I'll grind about a pound and a half of beans for the week and bring them in. I'm more worried about the effects of moisture of the (steel, but not stainless) burrs; hence my leaving everything disassembled.
    – Daniel Griscom
    Commented Nov 25, 2020 at 16:26

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