Hello,

I've got a Gaggia Espresso with the plastic 2 spout PF. Because of the lack of a 3-way valve on this machine, I feel like using a bottomless PF will just make a huge mess after pulling a shot, as I usually leave a paper towel under the spouts and after a minute or two it is completely soaked (the amount of water coming out does of course depend on the grind and tamp, but for the most part there is a good amount after I'm done with the shot. I wanted to switch to a single spout after learning that I'm losing valuable crema from every surface the espresso touches, and once I discovered that the spouts simply screw off, I noticed that if the extraction *looks* perfect (which it certainly won't), I might have a chance that the coffee will bead up in the middle and go straight through the hole in the bottom of the PF. If not, however, it would roll down the middle of the PF and down the sides of the hole - is there a likelihood that in this case I will improve my shots or just splatter coffee everywhere? I figured there might be a reason that (almost?) all espresso machines come stock with a spouted PF.

Thanks!

Well, the coffee may "move" around the bottomless PF before it centers itself. You're not really emulating a bottomless PF by unscrewing the spout. But, you are definitely reducing the amount of metal your espresso touches and there are those who feel that it retains a bit more heat.

Thanks for the reply. I just pulled my morning shot and I think it helped a bit. The coffee was running down the sides of the hole throughout the shot, but I think I'll stop by the machine room at school sometime soon and see if anyone can chop of the bottom of my PF.

Thanks again

The lack of a 3-way valve shouldn't stop you from getting a naked portafilter if you want one. And it sounds like you do. If your regular portafilter drips after your shot, the naked one will too, but it shouldn't be any different. You can still catch the drops in a paper towel if you want to (or in the drip tray like most people do).

I use a nearly-spoutless portafilter on my Piccolo Cappuccino: it's a heavily-modified portafilter that originated as an early pressurized model (see my "depressurizing the PC" elsewhere on the forum). My solution for a "spoutless spout" was to bend a piece of stainless steel (NOT galvanized) wire into about 3/4 of a circle, with "spokes" at the ends going towards the center, which I then bent down so that they protruded through the pf output hole. I can easily put the basket in above this, and the surface tension keeps the espresso stream guided between the two wire ends coming out of the pf. Minimal surface area, but I can still have a predictable and non-splattering stream.

Spouts are a bit of a cleaning problem. Bottomless would make the clean up process even easier. Do you have room to stick a cup or steaming pitcher under the group?. The low capacity drip trays on my lever machines make it a necessity to use a pitcher or cup for flushing & cleaning the grouphead. The drip trays are literally driptrays. Plus a proper sized cup or steaming pitcher prevents any spray/splash.

I just pulled another shot. The majority of the coffee (last 10 or so seconds) seemed to be coming through the center of the hole, so I'm assuming that indicates a decent tamp and distribution? Of course there's a lot of information that I'm not seeing, and there's the chance it was making a huge mess inside the PF and just pouring down the center of the hole from all sides. I suppose I won't know until I get my hands on a large, round cutting blade. Time to make friends with some mechanical engineers around here.

Thanks for the tips! Seeing the bottomless PFs at Ninth Street Espresso and Joe: The Art of Coffee really makes me want to go for it. I see no reason to keep this PF whole, I don't plan on splitting any shots between two cups.

You don't have to be a mechanical engineer to drill out your portafilter. From my experience, the cheapest place to get a hole saw is a store called Harbor Freight. It's not going to be the highest quality but it does the job well enough and I've never broken any of their tools. You can get a set for under $3 when they're on sale which includes different sizes of hole saw bits and you just need a drill to cut the portafilter. It's not too difficult if you have a drill, hole saw kit, and files/Dremel/sandpaper to smooth out the cut edges. If you don't then maybe it's best to find someone else that can do it or else you'd have to buy one already cut. You don't necessarily have to smooth the edges, but it's highly recommended for looks but also safety.

I don't have to be a mechanical engineer, but the mechanical engineers have access to a machine shop with all of that.

Yeah that's true. I just assume that most people have access to some tools but maybe that's not always correct. Just an idea if you wanted to try it yourself.