All,

My espresso has been suffering lately, and getting worse. I'm beginning to believe its hopeless but I know better.. still, very frustrating.

While I'm extremely good about flushing out the steam wand, running a bit of extra water thru the grouphead after a pull and wiping it down, keeping the PF reasonably clean - I've neglected any other sort of maintenance.

I've had the machine well over a year now, and am wondering what I really need to do for maintenance at this point. I'd just assume almost tear the thing apart to make sure its really clean, so I can:

1) Eliminate this as a source of bad espresso, and
2) Start "fresh" with a more reasonable cleaning routine, with backflushes, etc, are used, say weekly, or whatever is the recommended general practice.

FWIW, over time, the body of my shots has gotten less and less. Even with fresh coffee this last week my espresso's been extremely thin, with very little crema to speak of.

Why not start by pulling your shower screen and looking at the grouphead. You are due for a new portafilter gasket anyway. Rancid coffee will affect the flavor but really shouldn't affect the crema. Or you could grab some Joe Glow and backflush with the detergent, letting it sit for a while before lowering the lever to flush. The low crema makes me think that you may have water blockage and be in need of a descale (totally guessing here). Is your machine plumbed in and running of a filtration system?

My machine is not plumbed in - it has a tank in the back for water. If I'm lucky, when it gets relocated in the kitchen I might get a chance to plumb it in, but unlikely.

I'm assuming I need to do all of the above. But it sure would be nice if I found a concise/detailed procedure for the descaling. I've found several things, but its (maybe just for me) a little difficult to put all the pieces together for what I probably should do, and what I need to procure to do said things.

Bryan,

The FAQs page has numerous links to answer your questions. This one link alone address many of them and is the first place I'd start.
Cleaning a filthy espresso machine

Are you doing a detergent backflush every week, or has the machine never been backflushed with detergent?