Wasn't sure where to post this little tale of horror, but finally decided that it was a matter of technique after all.
Bought three used Astoria portafilters from Ebay - and no, this isn't where the horror lies, the vendor (finncaffe) was totally legitimate and upfront, even warned me that the "portafilters were kind of yucky.." - shipped ontime, and USPS didn't lose or mangle the package.
Unwrapped the package, noted that the one single-spout PF looked nearly new, and that the two double-spout PF's looked pretty well-used and grotty, but otherwise intact - fine, dirt can be cleaned - made up a sink of very hot water and a tablespoon of Cafiza, and dropped the PF's in to soak for the afternoon.
Four hours later, pulled the PF's out, cleaned the rest of the sludge and tar off with a green scrubber and made the delightful discovery that Marzocco triple baskets fit perfectly, unlike other E61 PF which have to be chopped because the triple baskets bottom out - very cool.
The old twin-lever machine was warmed up, so as the grinder was grinding enough for two triple shots - about 40gm - I decided to make sure that the two double-spout PF's where well rinsed, and the lever groups up to temperature, by flushing a shot or two through each of the groups with a blank PF locked in.
Now, on a full-sized spring-lever machine, you've got to be careful doing this, because the basket and grounds puck are all that keep the lever from flying back up at full speed - until it lands with a terrific BANG! on the stop, scaring the bejabbers out of you.
So I lowered the lever on the first group to its pre-infusion position (Astoria lever groups have an over-centering cam that holds the lever down for pre-infusion until pulled up), then turned off the grinder, and started to very carefully raise the lever - expecting to have to control it all the way up.
Imagine my surprise when the lever refused to rise at all - but just stayed an inch or two off the bottom, just like a stalled shot. Puzzled, I stepped back and though "Is this a Senior Moment, did I grind, dose, tamp, and load a PF and now have utterly no memory of doing this at all?"
No, the thought was too horrible - there had to be a simpler explanation - I'd been fussing around with lots of baskets - maybe I'd absent-mindedly put in a back-flush disc, or maybe one of the baskets that came with the PF's was clogged?
Yeah, that had to be it - just a simple basket-induced FUBAR, and not the beginning of terminal brain-fade. Much relieved, I confidently lowered the second group's lever down to pre-infusion and then carefully began to raise it up. Much consternation and fear ensued, as this lever slowly ascended, and a two thin streams of brownish-tan liquid came out of the spouts.
Gort! Now I've really stepped in it, one group is stalled, the other is producing what looks and smells like toxic waste, and I have no idea why. Totally frustrated, I pulled the lever down on the stuck shot to relieve the pressure, and carefully unlocked the PF from the group.
The good news was that there was no basket or back-flush blank in the PF, the bad news was that it was full of scummy brown water which was not flowing out of the bottom. I grabbed the second PF, and it was also full of scummy brown water, that slowly dripped from the spouts.
Hmmmm - this is where we get to the horror part - these two PF's were of the 'adjustable' type, which have an aluminium cover retained by a good-sized screw with a flat deflector on the end - the idea being that you can tune for two perfectly equal 1oz shots by turning the screw to favor one spout or the other - of course in this case, neither side was favored, they were both completely plugged.
After several delightful hours of creative cursing, and a couple of mighty THWACKS! with an impact driver, the screws came out to reveal a truly disgusting sight - both PF's were clogged with a black, tarry mixture of fines and rancid coffee oils - but somehow liquid (I cannot in good conscience call the resulting effulent espresso) was forcing its way out through pinhole channels in the muck.
The horror is that these PF's obviously came from a machine which was being used in commercial service - somewhere in this great country of ours folks were being served swill - worse, repulsive, foul-tasting, rancid swill - and had obviously been coming back to enjoy more of it for several years! Crimney, even the Green Mermaid draws the line at rancid.
The moral of this story is that now matter how hard we work to quantify, measure, analyse, and refine our processes and techniques - there will always be some random Gotcha! skulking about in a dark place just waiting to spoil the fun .....
Cheers
Jim
