Analyze this puck

Beginner and pro baristas share tips and tricks for making espresso.
wearashirt
Posts: 228
Joined: 9 years ago

#1: Post by wearashirt »

Hi all,

Can anyone give me their thoughts on this puck? What explains the blackened area below?




Some details:

My portafilter faces 7 o'clock when loaded,
I remove double spout, so it's just the hole.

When extracting, the flow skews away from the barista.

I don't know if the VST basket is eccentric to the hole of the portafilter, but it might be...because even with the greatest effort in equal tamping, and checking if the shower flow is equal, there is still a skewing.

But more important, what can you say about this puck?

chipman
Posts: 1169
Joined: 16 years ago

#2: Post by chipman »

How does it taste?

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erik82
Posts: 2146
Joined: 12 years ago

#3: Post by erik82 »

Puckology is nonsense. How does it taste?

wearashirt (original poster)
Posts: 228
Joined: 9 years ago

#4: Post by wearashirt (original poster) »

Well, it's an espresso I can finish. Meaning to say it's good! It's not one that an Italian might appreciate, but more for diluting with a ratio of hot water and the drinker will appreciate the blend of a modest, base coffee, topped with a malic-acid kind of coffee.

I guess there's just room for improvement, knowing that the pour does skew eccentrically.

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drgary
Team HB
Posts: 14348
Joined: 14 years ago

#5: Post by drgary »

More relevant to your question is reading the Extraction Diagnosis section in the FAQs and Favorites at this top of this forum, here:

FAQs and Favorites
Gary
LMWDP#308

What I WOULD do for a good cup of coffee!

spearfish25
Posts: 806
Joined: 9 years ago

#6: Post by spearfish25 »

I have to say that everyone loves to dismiss puckology with the immediate 'how does it taste' but then we go to endless lengths to discuss grinder burr attributes, blonding times, sputtering at the end of a shot, etc.

Rather than 'how does it taste', maybe we should say 'show me the shot' or 'how did it flow'.
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Alex
Home-Barista.com makes me want to buy expensive stuff.

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HB
Admin
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Joined: 19 years ago

#7: Post by HB »

wearashirt wrote:Can anyone give me their thoughts on this puck? What explains the blackened area below?
I don't see much value in puckology, but given spearfish25's chiding, I'll give it try: Perhaps the darker area is a cluster of more finely-ground coffee. The prevailing assumption is that fines act as the brakes on the speed of extraction flow. If so, then the puck resulting in an uneven extraction would have more fines in one section than another.

Assuming a good grinder and an espresso machine with reasonable preinfusion/diffusion, the WDT and a bit of nutation in the tamp are cure-alls for uneven extractions.
Dan Kehn

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spearfish25
Posts: 806
Joined: 9 years ago

#8: Post by spearfish25 »

^ good stuff. :D
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Alex
Home-Barista.com makes me want to buy expensive stuff.

Kipp
Posts: 150
Joined: 9 years ago

#9: Post by Kipp »

Sounds like the "half fast flow" from a Mazzer E grinder

BenKeith
Posts: 309
Joined: 10 years ago

#10: Post by BenKeith »

Say it ain't the operator all you want, but I just finished doing some test for a similar situation, in almost the same spot. Almost every time the extraction started, it was in the rim at 7:00 from the handle. I was very careful to make sure the grinder distributed very evenly, even did the little stirring thing with the needle, extra careful leveling off the top, tapping it lightly down a few times. All those little voodoo tricks to get off that edge. Finally figure out, when I first placed the tamp in the basket, it was just ever slightly off level to that edge. Even though it was level when I finished, and I had even deliberately tamped some off level away from that edge, that disturbance in the grinds on that initial placement was causing the problem. I found I could deliberately place it in the basket with a very slight tilt to another direction and I could move all the way around the basket.
The funny part is, I was using a flat tamp I had started using because a while back I was having problems with a tamp I had made with a .025" convex to match the bottom of the VST basket. I tried the convex tamp again and I could just stick it in, tamp and get even extractions. Who knows, next time I may have to go back to using the flat tamp or one of the other shapes I have.

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