I couldn’t say, as I’m not a drinker of tea or coffee. I’d expect probably along the builder/trucker end of the spectrum. I’ll be honest: Ballinluig’s quite frankly a wee bit rubbish, but it does excel in that sort of salty/greasy beige-chips-n-beans meal that only really appeals after some kind of exercise in the hills.
I too, have a second one just in case. Bought them used as a pair, and I have the one I use, and the one which just sits in the drawer waiting. The batteries were a bit duff, but I picked up the AA adapter and use more modern Eneloop/Fujitsu/Ikea batteries which seem to do the job a wee bit more effectively, even if they are a bit of a squeeze to get in.
My main thinking here was that I was able to get a clearly audible signal despite the S-meter not moving mostly on the basis of low background noise. It’s been a wee bit of a source of curiosity for me, wondering how far north of the central belt I’d be able to reliably operate 2m, and wondering how the lack of signal propagation vs lack of background RF would play into that.
I don’t think they’re technically a thing as the scale goes 1-9 for S, but that does sound like it was a very weak signal.