hi everyone,
I use a oe pharos V2 as a grinder and been trying to get a good latte out of my rancilio silvia V3. I use red bird coffee.

Temperature surfing: Once the boiler light turns off, I wait about 45 seconds then starts my shot for 27 seconds.

I have tried many different grind setting, and think ive settled with a grind just right for the Silvia (IE: 60ml in 27 second) with a nice crema shot. I have played this past week a lot with grind setting and while it do affect the taste, I find that no matter the fine tuning of grind setting, I still prefer my latte made with the breville.
I dont steam my milk btw, simple espresso + added hot milk.

what am I doing wrong here? why do I prefer the taste from my breville?
I find the taste from the breville needs much less milk to be as I like it. I need to add much more milk with the silvia to calm the strong taste of coffee.
In the breville, I put about 13-14g coffee, and in the silvia, about 15g.
Maybe I just like my coffee less intense tasting? I do like the mouthfull intense taste of the silvia, but the breville gives me a very smooth tasting latte that I tend to prefer.

Ive ordered new VST 18g baskets to replace the stock silvia basket as ive heard it makes a big difference...

ive been reading about OPV setting on silvia. could that be the reason?

Your Silvia's brew temperature might be a bit too hot. Perhaps try the flash-boil temperature surf, as demonstrated in this classic Mark Prince video: (397K views! The mind boggles ...)

im still new to making good espresso.

I just realized that I was pulling 50g of espresso shots with 14g of coffee grinds.
My grind was way too coarse.

Now with 14g of coffee grinds I pull 30g espresso shots that taste very good now!

baldheadracing wrote:Your Silvia's brew temperature might be a bit too hot. Perhaps try the flash-boil temperature surf, as demonstrated in this classic Mark Prince video:

this video is about the Silvia V2, isnt there a difference in the boiler with the V3 Silvia?

Right now, I wait until the light goes off, then flush water for 2 seconds, wait 5 seconds then pull the shots.

murphythecat87 wrote:this video is about the Silvia V2, isnt there a difference in the boiler with the V3 Silvia?

In terms of actual performance including temperature surfing, sadly Silvia hasn't changed much at all. For what it's worth, I found Mark's method documented in 2007 still held true during my review six years later.

ok, but the method in the video is very vague...

how long after the light turns off do I need to flush?

v2 and v3 have the same boiler. They also have the same thermostats.

Time, in and of itself, is irrelevant for temperature surfing. It is temperature surfing, not time surfing . Unless you have an appropriate thermometer, e.g., a Scace device, the only indicator of temperature that you have to work with is the flash boil, as Mark showed in the video.

Wait 20mins until the machine is fully warmed up. Flush until the light is on. Wait around 30seconds after the light is off.
Flush about 30-40ml water.
Load it and fire.

k, Ill try that! is that what you do with your silvia?

thanks guys!

Exactly. But this is my routine. For my setup and coffee.

Depending on environment temp. and coffee, timings may vary. You may try 3-4-5 seconds cooling flushes and see the results for your coffee.

Most important thing is to be consistent and always change one variable at a time. ( dose, grind or temperature)