Try some fresher beans too. With good beans any decent grinder will choke the Ponte Vecchio - including 50 year old hand grinders. On the other hand, very stale beans will almost always allow flow through the puck.

Bad seals would of course allow water around the puck, either out the blowhole in the back (piston seals), as Dan said, or around the portafilter (group head seal).

I'm sure with a little patience you'll be on you way to great espresso again.

PC

Dan and Jack are exactly right, and my knee jerk response that there was possibly something wrong with your machine was almost certainly unwarranted.

Susan

Remco wrote:I thought exactly the same. But my grinder only grinds to '11'. The beans are normal espresso beans, it is independent of brand. So maybe i should ask someone else to grind (with another grinder )

Very dark roasted beans can be almost like charcoal: in other words very porous and dry. In such a case the water can flow through the coffee like water through sand.

As to Ponte Vecchio quality: it is true that their QC is not always what it should be. However it is also true that they offer a product- at a price- that no one else comes close to. Any other dual group home lever machines out there? No. Swings and roundabouts...