Reiss Gunson post=12119 wrote: if you grind fine enough and tamp hard enough you will create what i like to call a 'coffee brick' which will be impermeable at boiler pressure
this means that when you release the lever the 9 bar pressure of the spring on the piston causes the water to disappear into the still dry puck, and you observe a high grab of the lever
this will be the case regardless of what seals are fitted to the machine
my suggestion would be to try grinding a little coarser, especially for a darker roast - although what extraction times are you currently running?
I was just going to email you about this, but hey, might as well post here!
i never quite understood what you meant by this, but i think i've finally (fingers crossed) figured this out. I received my LevTamp from Kafatek last week and it has forced me to tamp lighter than i had ever considered. to my surprise, it has greatly reduced the amount of channeling i was getting in my extractions. it has also had the unexpected result of improving the lever catch, which is what i think you are describing above.
would be great to get a nice visual sketch again Reiss :cheer: !
I switched beans last night. Now using a lighter roast than what I was using previously, probably medium-light. I pulled two shots last night but both ran far too fast and neither was any good. I didn't have a chance to pull any more as family duties take precedence. The better of the two was 18.5g in, 36g out in about 23 seconds. My tamp pressure was much lighter. The lever did catch a little lower but not as low as I hoped. This is probably for the opposite reason of what I was experiencing before in which the grind was too fine and the tamp was too hard making the puck a bit impermeable. Now the grind was too coarse and paired with a light tamp the puck didn't provide enough resistance. I raised the p-stat from about 1.21 to about 1.27 at the end of the night.
This morning I woke up and pulled a shot before I headed off to work. I tightened up the grind a bit. Paramaters were 18.5g in, 33g out in 29 seconds. The lever caught lower and where I hoped it would. The shot tasted good.
Like Dan, I'm using a Kafatek LevTamp but I've have had it for less than a week. Coming from the Londinium button tamper and having never used a standard shaped tamper, it was very easy for me to overtamp with the LevTamp.
Marc - seeing the same thing with the darker roasts? i just opened up a new bag of beans that were a little darker (maybe medium roast) and getting a higher catch now. higher meaning its still catching a good place, but just slightly higher than with the lighter roast.
what does it mean if the lever does a little shake/jiggle right after catching until about the mid way point and then it smooths out? will try to take a video...doesn't happen every time, but seeing it on the pulls where its not catching as low as others
when the machine is cold i would try pumping the lever up and down at least 30 times, maybe more
i suspect you have a dry area on on the bore that is causing the seal to quaver
personally, i think id leave it and spend the time pulling a lot more shots as i think the grease will move around over time and lubricate that area too
these are low maintenance, almost bomb-proof machines
darker roasts need a coarser grind than lighter roasts, or as i have said water at boiler pressure will not permeate the puck during pre-infusion
the water is then forced into the coffee by the piston (which is being driven down by the spring at circa 9 bar) and instead of each and every coffee ground being surrounded by water (which makes the passage of water though the puck nice and slow - the log jam effect is what makes espresso!) vast numbers of the grounds are surrounded by air, and so the water shoots through these areas at great speed and extracts almost nothing from the coffee grounds that were surrounded by air (i.e. no log jam effect occurs)
First post. After reading lots of reviews on this and other sites, I bought an L1 over the summer. Overall, I've been very happy with the machine and the high quality espresso it makes. The only problem I've had, the topic of this conversation, is that the lever did not consistently catch at 45 degrees. When I first got the machine and for some weeks afterwards I didn't know that the lever was supposed to catch at 45 degrees so I was puzzled when oftentimes the machine pushed out considerably less than 30g of espresso. At Reiss's suggestion, I called him on FaceTime and he helped me ameliorate this problem by tamping less hard and increasing the pre-infusion time. These techniques mostly worked but occasionally the lever would still not catch. Reiss sent me the new seals a while ago but just had time to put them in three days ago. Since I've put them in, I find that the lever now consistently catches at 45 degrees like it's supposed to and does so even with very short pre-infusion times. It seems that Reiss has solved this problem.
In addition to the excellent espresso, the other thing I've enjoyed about owning an L1 is the excellent customer service. Reiss has been incredibly helpful answering all my questions on this and other espresso related topics - I've learned a lot by talking with him.
thanks for taking the time to post jeff - i do understand that not everyone enjoys posting on forums (I'm one of them, but i have to as its a cornerstone of the business)
I think i'm getting the hang of it...must be (As you had mentioned to me before) how precise the monolith Flat is, small adjustments to grind and tamp pressure make big differences. getting more consistent grabs at 45 now, a couple that don't here and there. and this is only with darker roasts and the shots still taste amazing even if ti grabs a little higher than 45.
here is a video i made this morning of an extraction...a little channeling, but not too bad?
Dan, I have the Monolith conical and love it. Here is a shot I just pulled this morning. 15.8 grams of beans, 20 gram shot, about 37 seconds. I would definitely recommend grinding finer. The scale Reiss mentioned is in the video: Acaia Lunar, a bit overkill, but I like it! Rob
Reiss, followed your advice, and like every other time, your advice worked like magic!
tightened the grind, lightened the tamp (to more or less a tap!), and lever grabs exactly where it should and the shots taste AMAZING! this has been consistent for the last 3 shots in a row.
Matthew Hoffman post=12055 wrote: I received new seals today. Since I had put a set of the old seals on recently, I decided to put only the bottom seal in place (the one nearest the coffee). This seems to have worked fine. The lever grabs lower than this morning, with the same coffee, grind, pre infusion, etc. The EY (measured with Atago refractometer and Coffee Tools) is 1 percentage point higher (21.1%) And it tastes nice. If this combination of seals, old ones around the white teflon guide and a new one below, works in the long term, it could be helpful to those of us who have quite a few pristine old-style seals hanging around.
Matt
Reiss ... this makes sense to me ... do you think it is a viable option? It seems the 2 higher seals are under MUCH lower pressure (1.3 barr) than the lower seal which forces the water through the puck. I just replaced my seals (all three) on the 220V L-1 machine and noticed a substantial improvement in the grab .... will replace the seals on my 110V model this week. May try just replacing the bottom seal like Matt. Thoughts ?
bear in mind that it is heat that kills the seals, rather than the pressure they are holding back
as ive commented before to other posters on other issues, you own the machine so you are free to do as you please
the issue for me is simply that if i am to provide effective support there needs to be a 'standard' configuration
if owners want to depart from the standard that is fine, but they need to declare any non-standard configurations up front when they next report an issue otherwise it makes my job of providing support more challenging than it needs to be
so i've lowered my dose to a tad over 17g in a 18g VST basket and i've noticed much more consistent shots - much less channeling, better lever grabs. what is everybody else dosing, out of curiousity?
Hey Dan, I experimented with a 18g vst basket along with an ims 35 screen and each shot resulted in a messy puck and grinds all along the sides of the shower screen. Very different from when I was using an ims basket. Shots tasted good though. I switched back to an ims basket so I wouldn't have to deal with the mess.
Dan Tochterman post=12319 wrote: so i've lowered my dose to a tad over 17g in a 18g VST basket and i've noticed much more consistent shots - much less channeling, better lever grabs. what is everybody else dosing, out of curiousity?
those symptoms suggest the puck has not been saturated during pre-infusion
in this order;
1. what is your pre-infusion time currently? if less than 15s then increase it
if (1) does not solve it then (2) tamp less firmly
if neither (1) nor (2) solve it grind a fraction of a fraction more coarsely
Comments
I was just going to email you about this, but hey, might as well post here!
i never quite understood what you meant by this, but i think i've finally (fingers crossed) figured this out. I received my LevTamp from Kafatek last week and it has forced me to tamp lighter than i had ever considered. to my surprise, it has greatly reduced the amount of channeling i was getting in my extractions. it has also had the unexpected result of improving the lever catch, which is what i think you are describing above.
would be great to get a nice visual sketch again Reiss :cheer: !
let us know what happens once you've lightened your tamp...i got great results when i did
This morning I woke up and pulled a shot before I headed off to work. I tightened up the grind a bit. Paramaters were 18.5g in, 33g out in 29 seconds. The lever caught lower and where I hoped it would. The shot tasted good.
Like Dan, I'm using a Kafatek LevTamp but I've have had it for less than a week. Coming from the Londinium button tamper and having never used a standard shaped tamper, it was very easy for me to overtamp with the LevTamp.
Thanks for all the advice!
great!
thank you for taking the time to post
kind regards
reiss.
what does it mean if the lever does a little shake/jiggle right after catching until about the mid way point and then it smooths out? will try to take a video...doesn't happen every time, but seeing it on the pulls where its not catching as low as others
i suspect you have a dry area on on the bore that is causing the seal to quaver
personally, i think id leave it and spend the time pulling a lot more shots as i think the grease will move around over time and lubricate that area too
these are low maintenance, almost bomb-proof machines
kind regards
reiss.
the water is then forced into the coffee by the piston (which is being driven down by the spring at circa 9 bar) and instead of each and every coffee ground being surrounded by water (which makes the passage of water though the puck nice and slow - the log jam effect is what makes espresso!) vast numbers of the grounds are surrounded by air, and so the water shoots through these areas at great speed and extracts almost nothing from the coffee grounds that were surrounded by air (i.e. no log jam effect occurs)
In addition to the excellent espresso, the other thing I've enjoyed about owning an L1 is the excellent customer service. Reiss has been incredibly helpful answering all my questions on this and other espresso related topics - I've learned a lot by talking with him.
best
reiss.
here is a video i made this morning of an extraction...a little channeling, but not too bad?
they are a lot of money but the acaia scales (the small black model that came out second) are just superb for measuring the flow rate of the shot
thanks for posting a video, they are always welcome
kind regards
reiss.
I have the Monolith conical and love it. Here is a shot I just pulled this morning. 15.8 grams of beans, 20 gram shot, about 37 seconds. I would definitely recommend grinding finer. The scale Reiss mentioned is in the video: Acaia Lunar, a bit overkill, but I like it!
Rob
Rob
thank you so much for taking the time to post those clips - its very rewarding to see customers getting excellent results
kind regards
reiss.
tightened the grind, lightened the tamp (to more or less a tap!), and lever grabs exactly where it should and the shots taste AMAZING! this has been consistent for the last 3 shots in a row.
will try to make another video soon
Reiss ... this makes sense to me ... do you think it is a viable option? It seems the 2 higher seals are under MUCH lower pressure (1.3 barr) than the lower seal which forces the water through the puck. I just replaced my seals (all three) on the 220V L-1 machine and noticed a substantial improvement in the grab .... will replace the seals on my 110V model this week. May try just replacing the bottom seal like Matt. Thoughts ?
sure!
bear in mind that it is heat that kills the seals, rather than the pressure they are holding back
as ive commented before to other posters on other issues, you own the machine so you are free to do as you please
the issue for me is simply that if i am to provide effective support there needs to be a 'standard' configuration
if owners want to depart from the standard that is fine, but they need to declare any non-standard configurations up front when they next report an issue otherwise it makes my job of providing support more challenging than it needs to be
kind regards
reiss.
those symptoms suggest the puck has not been saturated during pre-infusion
in this order;
1. what is your pre-infusion time currently? if less than 15s then increase it
if (1) does not solve it then (2) tamp less firmly
if neither (1) nor (2) solve it grind a fraction of a fraction more coarsely
let us know
reiss.