So I have my Vario set to 18.5sec which gives me approx 20g. I guess I had slightly less than enough beans in the hopper as it ran out with a second or two left in the timer. So I dumped a few more beans in and ground for another second or so. After dumping the grinds in the the basket I knew I had a little more than usual. Oh well I thought, a little variation from the norm is healthy. The pull was thick and nicely striped albeit with some lingering dead spots that pulled together near the end of the shot. Either way this resulted in one of my best tasting shots pulled to date. I immediately added a second to the Vario timer. We'll see how tomorrow goes!

Beans are a blend from a local roaster. Cafe Artigiano. The guys who started 49th are the same who started CA. In fact even though CA is under new ownership 49th still roasts for them I believe.

Guess I was naive to think I could repeat yesterday's masterpiece by simply doing what I did yesterday. Ha! This morning my 3 attempts at updosing led to mostly uneven extractions with jets. Boo. I made the mistake of throwing in another variable. I thought I would improve distribution by holding a basket under the Vario spout and rotating it as it ground. The pile looked fantastic. Oh well. Back to the drawing board. I'll try grinding finer, tamping less tomorrow.

So the Rocket basket fits 20g and clears the screen? That's interesting.

On my entry level machine, updosing to 18g helps things a lot. I've always thought that every machine has a bit of a sweet spot, but higher end machines might be more lenient. Keep playing around with it - some portions of my routine started as accidents.

The next day you filled the hopper?

Maybe u enjoyed the overdose, but ground a bit coarser. the hopper being empty would of led to a coarser grind... (unless you adjusted it)

If u remember the setting that worked, try just grinding enough beans for one shot, maybe u'll repeat your luck

I only make 2 shots all day and that is first thing in the morning. I fill the hopper only with what is needed. I keep a 2-3 day amount in a Vacu-vin container and the rest is portioned into containers in the freezer that hold 2-3 days worth as well.

benm5678 wrote:The next day you filled the hopper?

Maybe u enjoyed the overdose, but ground a bit coarser. the hopper being empty would of led to a coarser grind... (unless you adjusted it)

If u remember the setting that worked, try just grinding enough beans for one shot, maybe u'll repeat your luck

+1

Also if you were grinding a blend, your result could have been influence by an uneven bean mix at the end.

mini wrote:So the Rocket basket fits 20g and clears the screen? That's interesting.

On my entry level machine, updosing to 18g helps things a lot. I've always thought that every machine has a bit of a sweet spot, but higher end machines might be more lenient. Keep playing around with it - some portions of my routine started as accidents.

I actually use a triple basket. Both the double and triple for this machine are on the small side so the triple is probably similar to a large double on other machines.