Spiral design mixers are great, and with just normal maintenance, they will last forever. Because of their design, they actually mix easier than a planetary design mixer. They will mix a dough as small as 25% of the stated bowl capacity, so the one you’re looking at should handle a 50# bag of flour just fine. Check to see if the bowl has a drain plug in it. Without a drain plug, you’re forced to bail it out like a sinking boat when cleaning it. With the drain plug, you just toss in 5-gallons or so of hot water, cover the mixer with a sheet of plastic and let it steam for a bit. Then scrub it down with a pot brush, pull the plug and drain the water (hopefully over a drain). Then rinse and sanitize, and you’re done. The down side to these mixers is they are not equipped with an attachment hub, and you cannot change out the agitator, so it becomes a dedicated dough mixer only.
In my opinion, the best suited size for use in a pizzeria is one that is rated to mix 100-pounds of flour weight.
Tom Lehmann/The Dough Doctor
