Hamilton Beach 12 Cup Coffee Maker

Model #46290

★★★⯪☆

A simple drip coffee maker on a fake-granite countertop. The base is flared and has a handful of buttons on either side of a small LCD display. The coffee pot is round, glass, tapered at the top, with a black plastic handle and lid. It's filled up to about the 6-cup line. Above the pot there's a cylindrical holder for the coffee filter. Most of the case is black plastic, same as the handle and lid, with metal veneer wrapped around the filter basket and plated around the buttons on the base. There's a plastic gauge on the side, lines marked in Sharpie with two of them labeled 10 and 6. A cylindrical metal coffee grinder stands just behind it on the counter. It makes coffee. Without any kind of bells and whistles. The plastic lid and tank feel flimsier than they actually are. They’ve held up just fine for almost four years now.

The fill gauge on the side of the reservoir can be hard to read depending on lighting. I recommend going over the lines with a permanent marker. And checking how the numbers line up between the gauge and the coffee pot. I usually fill it to at least one past the number I want to make.

Gurgling sounds are normal, but steaming sounds are not. If you hear it making steaming sounds from the other room, check the position of the coffee pot immediately. If it’s off-center, it holds the stopper open, but the coffee flows over the lid, down the side, onto the hot plate and onto the counter.

After about three years the auto shut-off stopped working. Unplugging it and plugging it back in fixed the problem.