back in december i downsized from my faema due to a much smaller laranzato machine.


I thought i had the grinder (rr45) dialed in but in the last month or so my shots are all over the place, they come out too slow or too fast and then puck is coming out of the portafilter as a sloppy mess not a nice tight puck. I tried to adjust the grinder for changes in the bean.

my grinder has large steps so one step up is far to fine and seams to bog out the vibe pump and one click back down to where it has been seams to fast. I have tried tamping harder but this is getting me mixed results, even if i can get my double shot in the 30 sec range my crema is pretty week at best.

im using beans from a local roster so they should be quite fresh, they are very oily im not sure how much of a difference that makes.

im getting a little frustrated as not being able to pull two consistent shots in a row is a bit depressing.


one thing i may be failing in is my dosing, im currently using a faema double basket in my vfa portafilter, and i fill it right to the top before scraping it off and tamping it.

Would it be worth my while to get a small scale and try and measure my doses until i get a better idea of what i should be dosing.

If your steps are too large, then at least if you get a scale and you know exactly what you're dosing, you can change it to compensate for the grind.

There's also a stepless mod mentioned on CG.

Tamping pressure will have very little effect on the flow of the shot. With a stepped grinder you have to compensate by dose. If the shot flows fast on one setting and too slow on another then you need to dose up on the coarse setting or dose down on the finer setting. An oily bean is a dark roast which tends to produce more fines, switching to a lighter roast may help but you will still have the stepped issue to deal with.