[Closed] Show me your..........Espresso / Grinder Set-Up

Good work mrblobby!

As it's now the afternoon I've now switched to drinking tea. My Moka will be out again in the morning, but can I love it the same again?! 😀

Kitchen's done so after a three year wait, finally managed to get the coffee machine ordered.

Being an amateur home barista is certainly not as easy as it looks!

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Like that a lot.

Mine are:
Gaggia Classic with Rancilio Silvia V2 steam wand mod. You can also do a V3 steam wand mod like [url= http://kabalin.blogspot.co.uk/2014/05/gaggia-classic-steam-wand-upgrade.html ]this[/url]

Anfim Super Best grinder.

Eureka Mignon MKII grinder.

🙂

Sage Duo and a Sage pro grinder for me. Hardly touch them maintainance wise.

Rocky and Silvia here. To avoid descaling too often I use a Maxtra filter jug for all the water. (The kettle is 5 years old and hasn't needed a descale yet, the previous kettle without filter died in 18 months).

Rocket owner here too, had it for 6 years. Did a load of barista training once upon a time and had machine set up properly -pressure, group head etc. Works perfectly. It you have to experiment with grinds on new coffees. I have a couple of go to ones that I know produce lovely coffee so tend to just use them. Never, never drink takeaway coffee now for over 2 years as they are all bloody awful.

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Here's mine Isomac tea and Mahlkinig Pro M grinder

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I have a Rancilio Silvia with the Rocky grinder. It's a struggle! Never got proper espresso out of her and i blame the grinder. Do SIlvia owners agree here?
I cut the bottom of the portafilter out to see how the extractions were doing, and it's the same every time; channelling!
Cannot stop the channelling. If i go any finer on the grind it chokes. The grinds come out in clumps and i have to stir them up and get it as even in the basket as i can, then just hope for the best. Just seems to pull too quickly and rush through giving me a harsh, sour but very weak tasting filthyness. It's horrendous.
I bought it in 2012 and gave up probably 2014. I fitted a gauge and set the pressure to 9 bar etc. I temp surf.....
First world nightmare.
I just use an Aeropress now. I also have a pour over and that tastes amazing so i was considering selling the espresso gear and buying the full Hario setup with hand grinder.

Is there such a thing as a budget burr grinder that is worth using? My Dualit's plastic adjuster has cracked and I can no longer get it fine enough for espresso in my Gaggia classic.

@doorag. Are you using supermarket beans or ones from a roaster mail order/local to you?
My machine won't produce a cream with supermarket beans, I drank so much one morning there were shakes and palpitations, nothing would work.
Filtered water helps if you are in a hard water area.
The screen and water spreader are prone to clogging up, new screen and polypuf cleaning solution should sort that out. Don't overfill the filter to avoid it in future.
Apologies if this is teaching granny to suck eggs.

@sandwich
Haha. I hear you on the not feeling so good.
Deifinitely ruled the bad beans already. Water is soft here but full of chlorine. I actually think hard water makes a better brew - tea or coffee.
I was meaning to buy a bigger basket at one point (21g). The standard one isn't deep enough to tamp 14g before the tamp fouls the sides (58mm tamp).
It's the channelling that stops the water hitting all the grinds and extracting that goodness, resulting in foulness.
Are you using the Rocky? If so, are you around the 5 mark?

Pavoni Grinder, Pavoni coffee machine, the latter is nearly 20, the former a few years younger.

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R58 to go with Olympus 75E grinder.

Plenty of E61 vibes here. Gits!

Some nice machines you lot have.

If I have a nice kitchen or big enough space I would like to have an Elektra T1 Sixties or an ECM ...

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Takes up a lot of space but you do get good espresso.

Rocky set at 7 or 8. I'm using Wogan beans. Standard 2 shot basket with after market tamper. Sounds like you might have an undersized basket. Happy Donkey do oem Rancilio spares.

My grinder is an Iberital over two feet tall bought on ebay and postage from London cost more than i paid for it, it wakens folk up at 630 am when i fire it up
A Gaggia classic and baby my two machines and in the cupboard a bean to cup temperamental de longhi

redmex - Member

My grinder is an Iberital over two feet tall

Likewise!

Dreams