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Line pressure boost
When I installed my L1-P, I noticed that my line pressure after the water filter is almost 2 bar. Extractions are excellent but there was obviously room for improvement still, also in shot volume as the line pressure goes into the HX and then into the brew group, so with more pressure, more water would be pushed into the brew group during pre-infusion and when releasing the lever, the lever would "catch" earlier.
Today, the plumber came by to install a line pressure booster and the results are beautiful. It's basically a vane / rotation pump adding 0.8 bar to the given pressure. There are three settings on the pump: off, auto and continuous. OFF is obvious. AUTO means it switches on as soon as flow is detected. For showers this is fine, but for espresso, the flow of just 60ml is too little to trigger it more than briefly and the max pressure is not reached. In the third setting, it's on all the time.
On the other hand, when continuously on, the pump heats up and it needs a flow to cool it down. So I switched back to "auto" and can trigger the pump to stay on when I open the cold water tap. A compromise but very easy still.
The lever 'catches' smoothy in an earlier stage of release and I notice the brew pressure is higher because the flow is also a bit faster, so I can afford to grind a tiny bit finer yet, expecting a higher yield in extraction-percentage.
Taste of the first shot is great, but then again the previous first shot of the day before the plumber rang my doorbell was a delight already!
Today, the plumber came by to install a line pressure booster and the results are beautiful. It's basically a vane / rotation pump adding 0.8 bar to the given pressure. There are three settings on the pump: off, auto and continuous. OFF is obvious. AUTO means it switches on as soon as flow is detected. For showers this is fine, but for espresso, the flow of just 60ml is too little to trigger it more than briefly and the max pressure is not reached. In the third setting, it's on all the time.
On the other hand, when continuously on, the pump heats up and it needs a flow to cool it down. So I switched back to "auto" and can trigger the pump to stay on when I open the cold water tap. A compromise but very easy still.
The lever 'catches' smoothy in an earlier stage of release and I notice the brew pressure is higher because the flow is also a bit faster, so I can afford to grind a tiny bit finer yet, expecting a higher yield in extraction-percentage.
Taste of the first shot is great, but then again the previous first shot of the day before the plumber rang my doorbell was a delight already!
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