Hello all,

I need some help with prep here. I went for years with bad, uneven extractions no matter how I leveled or tamped, and so on. Years of reading had me convinced that I needed a better grinder. I had a Rancilio Silvia and Rocky that I used for about 11 years before I upgraded. I upgraded my machine first, as I was still reading and trying to decide on a grinder. My new machine is an Expobar Brewtus IV with a vibration pump. I got myself a bottomless portafilter also to further try and diagnose my poor technique. No matter how I dosed, leveled, tamped, weighed, measured, groaned, changed coffee, temperature adjusted, magic wonded, prayed to the coffee gods, nothing changed for the better.

Again looking for more info, on this site, I read the WDT article. With a few spins with a chopped food skewer in my portafilter, and I couldn't believe the first pull. Even, beautiful, reddish brown espresso began seeping out of the portafilter. With the WDT, good pulls. Without the WDT, bad pulls. All this still with the Rocky.

Okay. Now with the new grinder. I went with a Ceado E7. Bigger burrs, more power, bla, bla, bla. I still find myself in the same boat. With WDT, good. Without WDT, bad.

I've read some posts on this site that some of you get a good, even pull without using the WDT, and without a conical burr grinder. So my question is: What step, steps,(unknown), am I missing?!

Thanks in advance for the help
Tom

With better grinders you can avoid the WDT, but it still requires skill. The biggest key is distribution aka "watch the fall" in other words, make sure that the coffee is as evenly distributed as possible in the portafilter as it comes out of the grinder.

Certainly on a Vario, Super Jolly, and on up you should be able to pull shots without the WDT and while I haven't used it, I would imagine that would include your Ceado.

One trick you might want to try is nutation, which can help if you have a reasonable, but not perfect distribution. You can find plenty of threads discussing the magic of nutation. (Not everyone is a believer, but I think it is easy to demonstrate that it helps and it takes on a second or two, so I can't see a reason to object to it).

Tapping the portafilter on the grinder's fork before tamping can also help. The tap together with nutation gives you a quick, clean, and streamlined prep that is forgiving of minor grinding issues.

Thanks Hugh. I will give it a try.

Tom, are you using the hopper with more than one dose of beans at all times or are you single dosing one shot at a time?

Meant to throw that in there. One dose at a time, per shot.

It doesn't matter how good your grinder is, if you LOAD the basket in the wrong way, chances are you'll get an uneven extraction.

Try to load the grounds as evenly as you can into the PF. It means that you need to move the basket around as the grounds fall in so that it will be distributed as equally as possible across the whole area of the basket.

You see, if you load a large hill of grounds on one side and then go to other areas, what happens is that the weight of the grounds weighs down on the lower layers and presses them. You could finish loading your basket/pf unevenly, and after the fact try to move the grounds around with your fingers as in the different distribution techniques, but that area where the hill was, still has more coffee in it, because it was compressed by the weight. The PF will look perfectly leveled on the top, but inside, underneath, the mass of coffee grounds are grossly different. You'll tamp it, and then pull, and the water will go through the shallow before your leveling much easier then they will go through the area of the hill. Channeling and uneven extractions.

What the WDT able to do is go "in" into the basket and "move" grounds from denser areas to lower density areas. In essence making sure that that hill grounds move around from the inside, as oppose to from the top only. That's why WDT worked for you.

When you see pro barista grinding and tamping without distributing and leveling, notice that they are very careful to load everything in a nice FLUFFY hill right at the center, and they will stop midway to knock the PF down on the fork or on the tabel. Then continue to carefully grind right at the center in a nice hill and tamp STRAIT down. I personally don't like that technique myself, I'm pretty good with a NSEW and Stockfleth combination, but I'm putting it out there so you understand the logic behind the importance of the "loading" phase. You can see Youtube examples of this top loading if you search for Australian world barista champion Scott Callaghan ... oh heck here it is https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LnXPXWGHwxY . BTW, he developed the curved distribution plates for under-dosing and strait dosing, so don't take his technique as something he preaches to everyone.

Your goal when loading should be to finish the grinding with a basket filled as evenly as possible before you need to do anything else to it. It looks to me that this was your problem.

La Dan,
Thanks for all the info, and the link. It does make sense. I will work on loading the center of the basket and see how I make out.

deshi135 wrote:Meant to throw that in there. One dose at a time, per shot.

Alright, no need to argue the merits of single dosing, but you'll have to at least give this a try...
In my experience every flat burr grinder I've used (in order: Rossi RR45, Mazzer Mini, Super Jolly, Major, and back to Super Jolly) has needed good doser technique and WDT and fingers crossed to get consistently good shots from single dosing. Even then, I felt that blonding was occuring earlier than it should. For these grinders (and Ceado E7 is very similar to the Super Jolly) I have found that at least two shots worth of beans in the hopper, preferably more, allows me to grind, dose (a uniform, centered mound like Dan was talking about), tamp straight down, and pull the shot with good, consistent results. I had single dosed for about a year and wondered why I was producing my best shots at parties. I realized after a few of these experiences that it was because I was using the hopper in these situations. I have no doubt that single dosing works well for some grinders/people, as many respected users here have had good results, especially with conicals, but I suspect flat burrs must have a change for the worst in particle distribution when single dosed. Even though I've tooted this horn a few times, by no means should everyone have to do it one way or the other, but I think everyone should at least try both techniques (referring to hopper fed and single dosing) for a meaningful amount of time before deciding on one regimen. It's likely there will be compromise in quality or routine, and most opt for quality. IMHO I opted for quality and though I thought using a hopper would be a compromise in routine, I actually like the slightly more laid back approach and I don't miss WDT. You can't switch between coffees easily, but that doesn't bother me. Still you must make sure your dose is consistent. I measure upon output, aiming low, and sweeping/pulsing to get the dose up to target within a couple tenths of a gram.

To sum up, I urge you to give the hopper a try. Decide what is important to you, but to me it sounds like you wouldn't mind getting rid of WDT, and I think this is the best, and maybe only way to be able to grind, dose, and tamp with consistent espresso pulls. It definitely is consistent with what one sees in a barista routine at a good cafe.

For what it is worth, here is my technique which takes far longer to describe than to perform, and produces nice looking extractions with my mazzer mini and expobar brewtus:

1. remove filter basket from portafilter, place on scale, and tare scale
2. grind (mazzer mini electronic doserless) directly into basket -- 1/2 dose only. shake down and weigh
3. grind second part of dose. weigh
4. put basket back into portafilter. rap in NESW fashion on sides of portafilter with knuckles to distribute grounds, making sure to leave no gaps near any edge.
5. bounce portafilter against tamping mat 2 or 3 times to settle grounds and allow any clumps to rise to the surface
6. using the weight of the tamper only, nutate top of grounds to break any clumps and level the bed
7. tamp, lock, and pull

Jonny,

Thanks for the info. "(and Ceado E7 is very similar to the Super Jolly)" is true, these were the 2 I narrowed it down to. And yes, the idea is to get rid of the WDT if I can. Coincidentally, with family over last night for Christmas, I loaded more beans in the hopper than just my "per shot" norm. I thought I had noticed a slight difference in the grind, but was moving along filling orders and didn't really have a chance to analyze it. At one point I thought I noticed a longer shot and through on the timer for the next one and it was a bit longer. Does having the extra weight of more beans in the hopper or less room for space between the burrs cause a finer grind? Maybe more consistent a grind? I will try this tomorrow (too late to start tonight and sleep).