I'm having a real problem getting good espresso from my gaggia factory. I'm using a commercial grinder with two high settings, espresso and turkish. The turkish setting produces a fine powdered-sugar like consistency while the espresso setting is a big rougher. Problem is that on the "turkish" setting with a light tamper pressure no water can get through at all, which with the "espresso" setting I end up with something closer akin to strong coffee rather then what I think of as espresso.

Anyone out there have any ideas? If pressured into it I can provide photos of the grind and my tamping technique.

It sure sounds like a grinder problem. Is there any way to get a grind somewhere between espresso and Turkish? You could try switching between the two while grinding if the grinder is not any more adjustable.

How much resistance should I be looking for from the pull?

put it on a bathroom scale and zero out the weight of the machine. A 9 bar pull will be around 30 pounds of force.

What brand grinder is it? You will probably need a different grinder with tighter adjustments, age of the coffee will also play into the factors. When was the coffee roasted?

I, too, have a Gaggia Factory - which I use with an Ascaso i-Mini grinder. (Actually, I have two of each, as they're in different locations.) The grinders are stepless - continuously adjustable throughout their entire range by turning a grind setting knob that takes literally hundreds of turns to go from one extreme ("course" - for French Press), through "espresso" and through "Turkish", all the way to the other extreme, "full choke". (Note, none of these are labeled - all is just found by trial and srror...) The range for espresso is easily 50 or more turns of the knob wide, off toward the Turkish/full choke side. Even though I have the grinder generally dialed-in for espresso, I find myself contually fine tuning the grind setting knob for best results. For instance, each new batch of beans requires fine tuning of the grind setting knob. And even after dialing it in just right for a particular batch of beans, when grinding the same beans the next day optimum results generally require tweaking the grind setting knob half a turn or so further toward "fine". Small changes to the grind setting knob produce surprisingly significant changes in the pull. Just a small change in the grind setting knob can make all the difference on the Gaggia Factory between a pull that offers almost no reistance (and yields a bitter, crema-less brew that more closely resembles strong coffee than esspresso) versus a pull that with so much resistance that it's like winning a good arm wrestling match with the machine (yielding a full-body espresso with a relativley rich head of crema...)

Frankly, I couldn't imagine being able to obtain good results - much less consistenly good results - without a stepless grinder. I don't think any grinder with a single "espresso" setting (or even with just a few) can do the trick, because when it comes to grinding espresso, there's simply no such thing as a "one size fits all" grinder setting!

Yes, changes in tamping can help a bit, but you really need to be able to control both grind and tamping variables, with the ability to control the grind variable making the most difference - espeically as your beans are always varying (both as to type and freshness...)

r-gordon-7

So its sounding like I need a new grinder. Been eyeing the Mazzer Luigi Supert Jolly, but I dont really know enough about the different options I have. For the price, the Le'Lit PL53 looks almost too good.

FWIW, my understanding is that the features and "innards" of the Le'Lit and the Ascaso i-Mini are relatively quite comparable, with the biggest difference being exterior design. (Cost-wise, the two are also quite close...)

r-gordon-7

Since no one has the I-Mini for sale, any opinions on the Ascaso I-1? And how about the I-2?

Tried a lighter tamper and got too watery on the first pull (but with some good crema at the end) and almost unpullable for the second (too much pressure).

Sigh