Hello everyone!

I recently received my first machine about a week ago. I am seeking advice to help sooth my noobie woes.

I have some Red Bird Espresso beans roasted 10/16/13. I have gone though half a pound so far and have only pulled a few shots that I thought tasted really good. The rest of my shots have tasted quite bitter.

I have done much reading to try to fix my problem. I have gone through the Noobie Introduction to Espresso, Diagnosing Extraction Problems, have looked at the Photos of Common Extraction Problems, and been to many other references on this site and others. Still, I am unable to fix this problem for one reason or another. I have a gut feeling that the grind setting is off. I have done some experimenting with the grind, starting with a fine enough grind that chokes the machine and worked my up to a grind that pulled pretty well. The past couple days I have not been able to get one shot good enough to drink straight, this is what I prefer. My shots yesterday and today either went into the sink or masked with milk. I have also been having difficulty getting my pull volume to 2 oz. before blonding occurs. The most I can get is 1.5 oz. in 19-25 seconds. I have tried updosing with a finer grind, this helped with the blonding but over flow the glass with the 'foam' from the 'Guinness effect'.

This is what I have been doing:

Let machine warm-up for 25-30 minutes.
Dose 16g as evenly as possible. I spin the basket as the grind is dispensed from my Preciso, then level it off.
Tamp 30lb, verified with a scale.
Red Bird roasted 10/16/13

If you have made it this far and have some advice I greatly welcome them. I have attached a video of my recent pull, has been the best one today unfortunately. Hopefully this will help provide more insight into what is going on. By the way, after the 'Guiness effect' settled I had a total volume around 1.25 oz.

Your shots do seem to be flowing, and blonding, too quickly. A finer grind will help with that. Try grinding fine enough to pull a ristretto shot, and see if you like the taste better. (That is how I tend to prefer Red Bird's Espresso blend.) Measure your output by weight rather than by volume, for more consistency, and shoot for about 16-20g espresso out of a 16g dose.

The bitterness could be happening because you are pulling your shots too hot. I've never used your machine, but maybe if you search the forums here you can find info on managing its temperature so you can get that under more control.

You could also try down-dosing further (adjusting the grind finer to slow down flow accordingly). A smaller, Italian sized dose will likely mellow and sweeten your extraction. I've pulled some very nice "comfort food" shots of this coffee using that approach. (This might or might not work for you, depending on the size of your baskets.)

Finally, I tend to prefer the taste of Red Bird Espresso most once it has rested for about a week after roasting.

That looks like there is way too much pressure put through the coffee by the pump. I don't know whether your machine has adjustable OPV, but I would check and if possible reduce the pressure to be between 8-9 bars.

I have a gaggia classic. There does not seem to be a way to adjust temp, unless I surf or install a PID? I am not positive if PID helps control the temp or if it simply just displays the temp for when you start your shot... I have read some on it but did not get to in depth. There also is not means to adjust the bars unless I open it up and poke around. I will do some research.

Thank you for your replies, this is helpful!

ds wrote:That looks like there is way too much pressure put through the coffee by the pump. I don't know whether your machine has adjustable OPV, but I would check and if possible reduce the pressure to be between 8-9 bars.

The Gaggia Classic pressure is adjustable. The common wisdom is that it comes set high from the factory to allow the use of pressurized pfs. I think it's worthwhile to make the adjustment.

In the absence of a pid, it's worthwhile to temp surf. I flush so that the light goes off, and start brewing right when the light comes back on to give myself a fairly consistent starting temp.

IntrepidQ3 wrote:The Gaggia Classic pressure is adjustable. The common wisdom is that it comes set high from the factory to allow the use of pressurized pfs. I think it's worthwhile to make the adjustment.

Thank you. I just watched a video for how to adjust the pressure. Is there a strategic way to adjust without a pressure gauge? Or is it only adjust, check pressure, and repeat till you hit your mark?

Well - this is likely to get my membership revoked here... but I did do it without a pressure gauge (you have to do the same back and forth to set up a Stratocaster, so I'm sort of used to this type of adjustment). It's easy to get to the little nut that you use to adjust it, so taking it apart and making minor adjustments is not a big deal. It will cost you a little coffee, though.

The recommended adjustment is to turn the nut 270-degrees (3/4's of a turn) counter-clockwise. Ultimately, that is where I ended up, though I did it over three adjustments of a 1/4 turn each. Adjust. Try. Adjust. Try.

Of course, the obvious downfall of doing this without a pressure gauge is, you're starting at an unknown pressure, and ending at an unknown pressure - so there you go. YMMV.

Nurk thanks for taking the risk to share your advice and experience. I have myself a les paul cutaway, so I understand the blind adjustments. Since I am extremely new to this I might read up on how to make myself a pressure gauge. If this is kinda costly, I will just dive in and take it a quarter turn at a time, as you did. It seems as if your results were positive.

What I was afraid of, not being knowledgeable, is that a small adjustment would make a huge change and I would have difficulty adjusting back if the original adjustment was not positive.

Fwiw - I did a 3/4 turn ccw on my Gaggia Classic opv and it made a huge difference. I'd recommend doing it right away. You can always check your work with a pressure gauge down the road. You won't get great results with this machine until you back the pressure off on the opv.

I also added the pid control - it's really nice and one more variable I don't have to sweat over as much.

Good luck!

IntrepidQ3 wrote:Nurk thanks for taking the risk to share your advice and experience. I have myself a les paul cutaway, so I understand the blind adjustments. Since I am extremely new to this I might read up on how to make myself a pressure gauge. If this is kinda costly, I will just dive in and take it a quarter turn at a time, as you did. It seems as if your results were positive.

What I was afraid of, not being knowledgeable, is that a small adjustment would make a huge change and I would have difficulty adjusting back if the original adjustment was not positive.

Actually, dig around a little and you can find the instructions/parts for a homemade pressure gauge system pretty easily, and it's cheap too. Keep track of what you do and it's very easy to "undo" it. I didn't meant to discourage you... I just didn't bother. Maybe someday I will.

I likened it to a Strat rather than an LP, because to setup a Strat you have to slack the strings, unscrew the neck, adjust the truss rod, reinstall the neck and strings... and then, only after all of that, will you be able to see if you made the correct adjustments to the relief - and even then it's best to give it a little time to adjust to the new tension. On your LP and my 335, you just remove two tiny screws and - bang - there's the nut for the truss rod. They even give you the right size-tool.

That's my comparison to the blind OPV adjustment. Take it apart, adjust, reassemble, brew, repeat.... why this feels "easier" to me than just doing it for real with a pressure gauge, I don't know. It's got to be a psychological issue.... but:


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