after playing around with various settings, I'm pretty close to having everything worked out. I'm getting about 1 oz in 30-40 secs (with 10 secs being for preinfusion), with an additional .75 oz that dribbles out after the mouse tails stop. Crema is surprisingly good and thick, and doesn't dissipate very quickly. Flavor isn't quite where i'd like it to be, but that's just indicative of me not nailing the temps yet.

In the video posted above (and in most others i've seen) the barista pulls the handle down with relative ease, and it stays down until manually lifted again. Mine does not do this since the spring is always pulling the handle back up. How can a spring lever stay down on its own? Mine has a little metal catch that will allow the handle to stay down, do these others work the same way?

Another oddity i noticed was that in my initial experimentation, the brass dispersion screen was a bit loose, allowing water to come out around the edges. when i tightened it down, it severely restricted the flow of water from the group. I don't see any way around this unless the screen is supposed to be convex---can anyone with experience with this group confirm this?

itsallaroundyou wrote:In the video posted above (and in most others i've seen) the barista pulls the handle down with relative ease, and it stays down until manually lifted again. Mine does not do this since the spring is always pulling the handle back up. How can a spring lever stay down on its own? Mine has a little metal catch that will allow the handle to stay down, do these others work the same way?

The Gaggia lever has a little hook that falls forward and engages with a cam on the top of the group to stop the lever rising again (the pinion part of the rack and pinion mechanism). If the hinge for that hook is too stiff it will not fall forward and engage.