Finally, a grinder you’ll fall in love with!

Grinders are great for vapes and elevate our sessions, but they kind of suck to use. They get messy and sticky and can quickly jam up and be hard to use and clean. But not anymore! The Old Mate Grinder spins like butter and never jams. It’s a fidget spinner and a weed grinder! We’ve never been in love with a grinder like this before.

My Aroma-3 grinder above is battle worn!

What is the Aroma-3 grinder from Old Mate Designs?

The Aroma-3 fidget spinner grinder (use code “troyandjerry” to save $10) is made from durable stainless steel and features a skateboard bearing that’s the secret to its fluid spin. The three-piece design is threadless and held together by magnets, and the teeth are sharp as shit. The Aroma-3 blends all these features to create the funnest grinder ever. Grinding weed is now fun, and we find ourselves playing with the grinder throughout the day, even when we’re hours from a session!

This side view shows the grips that are formed on each plate.

Why the Old Mate grinder is all we reach for

The Aroma-3 grinder is the only grinder Troy and Jerry have used for well over a year now. When you have nearly every vape and grinder like we do, the ultimate recommendation is what we actually use, and we call this the “reach test.” But why is it all we use?

This is the first grinder that’s fun to use. The addictive nature of a fidget spinner is undeniable, and this is an excellent spinner! Troy has made videos of the top grind plate spinning for over two minutes. Whether it’s a livestream or Zoom meeting, we constantly fidget with this thing. It’s pretty hard to use a different grinder when this one is always in our hands!

The Aroma-3 grinds weed fast as the top spins around at mach speed, and it’s very easy to use. Forget gripping both halves of a grinder and brute forcing your way through a nug. This thing does the job as you watch it spin around and around! The grinds freely fall through to the lower chamber with very little effort. As other grinders jam up and are hard to turn, Jerry found the Aroma-3 to be perfect for arthritic moments. If it’s painful for you to use a grinder, you need to check this out!

All the parts from left to right: collection chamber, bottom grind plate, top grind plate. This grinder has been through heavy use for over a year without a clean!

Stainless steel is the king of grinder materials

Most grinders are made of stainless steel, aluminum, plastic or wood, with stainless steel having some distinct advantages. The Aroma-3 is made from stainless steel, so it’s rock hard with razor sharp teeth that won’t soften, dull or chip off into your weed. It will literally stay sharp forever, and has a classy look that won’t scratch when you scrape off herb patties. 

This grinder has survived many, many falls, even if our toes didn’t. Bottom line, we expect the Aroma-3 to last forever, and is a welcome self-defense partner.  Do not fuck with us when we have one in our right hand!

Here’s a virgin, pristine grind plate. The holes are sized for a medium grind consistency.

No more threads – magnets are better!

Remember when all grinders were threaded? What a drag. Tighten it too much and it’s hard to open up again. Cross-thread it when you’re high and you’re really screwed. And with enough use they all get weed on the threads and require cleaning. Fuck all that.

The old Mate Aroma-3 weed grinder is held together with magnets that literally fix it all. Don’t waste time and develop Popeye arms with your current grinder. Grab an Old Mate and have fun grinding!

Close up view of the teeth and holes in the bottom grind plate.

Zero maintenance

Cleaning a grinder is absolutely the worst part of using weed, and it’s not optional. Eventually you will have to do it. There are lots of nooks and crannies and sharp edges, and the grinder never gets back to “new” status. But everything about the Old Mate grinder just keeps on trucking. 

The bearing doesn’t require any maintenance. The threadless connection is strong, even when neglected and super gunked up. And when the teeth get dirty the grinder still works. We never give our Aroma-3 grinders a deep clean, and the most we ever have to do is knock off the occasional sticky chunk that gets stuck to the side of a tooth.

Side-by-side view of a brand new grind plate and my neglected, scarred grind plate. This gunk doesn’t hinder performance, and it still spins like new.

Thats’ right – grinding is fun now!

If you like weed and fidget spinners, stop reading now, click this link, and use code “troyandjerry” to save $10 on the Aroma-3 grinder. Functional spinning has never been this fun! You’ll quickly slice through the stickiest of nugs with just a few wiggles and a good spin.

Thanks to the skateboard bearing, the teeth float on a free spinning axis that feels responsive and never gunks up. It’s so satisfying to load this weed grinder up, gently turn it a few times, and whip it into a spiral frenzy as it finishes the job and the herbs fall to the bottom chamber. This grinder is so fun to use that it’s as much a toy as a grinder!

This skateboard bearing is responsible for all the fun and breakthrough performance.

Quality grinds, even when dirty

Even when dirty, the Aroma-3 grinder performs like a champ and keeps on spinning. Most grinders perform worse or completely fail when they get too much gunk on them, but this one continues to deliver a high quality grind. When it’s really gunky it can get out of balance and wobble some, but the grind still rings true. Amazing. As a bonus, the large chamber below can easily hold three or four grams of ground herbs.

When it comes to grind quality, we can think of better grinders, but not many. Grind connoisseurs focus on grind consistency – are all the bits the same size? To be fair, grinders like the Brilliant Cut Grinder, Santa Cruz Shredder, and the Kannastor grinder all have a slightly more consistent grind when clean, but they all eventually gunk up to the point of failure. We learned that grind size consistency doesn’t affect performance at this quality level, and all we reach for is the Old Mate grinder.

Close up view of my dirty teeth on the top grind plate. I can’t believe this thing still functions as a fidget spinner with all that gunk, but it does!

A few complaints

The Aroma-3 is our favorite grinder by far, but no product is perfect. Here are a few minor complaints.

• The magnets are incredibly strong, and at first some people need a little technique to open it up. Don’t worry, once you nail it, you’re good.
• It’s not a smell-proof container. If you like to grind and store your herbs in the bottom for a while, you will probably smell them.
• This grinder is heavy. It can weigh down a pocket all by itself and, as we said earlier, if you drop it, get your foot out of the way!
• The top spins so freely that it once twisted out of Troy’s grip and fell. Pick it up from the sides.
• As noted, hard-core grind snobs will find better grinders. We did. But at the end of the day it didn’t matter. While other “superior” grinders eventually fail and end up on a shelf, the Old Mate keeps going. Jerry noted for months that the grind wasn’t as consistent as a Brilliant Cut or Santa Cruz Shredder, but he couldn’t stop using it anyhow.

The Aroma-3 grinder is so beautiful when clean! Here’s a close up view of the holes on the underside of the bottom grind plate. The angled, beviled holes make it easier for the herbs to fall through.

Conclusion – Aroma-3 grinder is a joy to use!

Whether it’s the fantastic grind, the lack of maintenance, or just the joy of a fidget spinner, the Old Mate Aroma-3 grinder will bring a smile to your face. It does to ours before we’ve even started to grind, and sometimes that’s all that matters. Troy has stated that it’s the only grinder worthy of his desk space, and he’s right. Do yourself a favor and pick up this grinder. It will serve you like no other for years and years. And use code “troyandjerry” to save ten bucks!

The collection chamber has a magnetic center post to hold it all together. And there’s a decent shot of the grind quality.

Tell us what you think!

Got questions for the Think Dank? Drop them in the comments below. Got a question about the Aroma-3 weed grinder from Old Mate Designs? Drop those below, too. Let us know what you think!