I am considering getting a new home machine and moving my current one to my office. I have been using my Espresso Forge and Pharos daily as my home setup since Sept 2016 with great results. I started out drinking cortados everyday early on, but as I have gotten better at the process I find myself enjoying straight shots most weekdays and saving any milk steaming for weekend beverages. Right now it takes me roughly 10 minutes from cold start to cleaned up for a one double espresso, with weekend cortados taking closer to 20 minutes.

The main driver for the new machine is convenience when making multiple drinks. I enjoy sharing my newfound hobby with guests, but even with multiple protafilter baskets I cannot seem to make drinks fast enough with my Forge.

I have had the best results from the Forge when using the pressure gauge to mimic the pressure profile of a spring lever machine. Because of this I sought out help from HB members in the Dallas area who have lever machines to see if that what the direction I wanted to go for my new home setup. Another member here, bill, was kind enough to let me come by see his Mkal and Gaggia GX. Both machines produced good shots, and confirmed for me that i would enjoy having a lever at home. Bill, is actually selling his nicely restored Mkal, but I am leary of the open boiler with my kids at home.

My plan:
Move Forge, Lido 3(already own and use for Chemex), and Bonvita kettle to my office.

Keep Pharos at home and add a spring lever on a timer switch for use for one person consuming mostly straight espresso shots during the week, but must be capable of at least 3 or 4 milk based drinks back to back on weekends. Ideally, I'd like for the spring lever machine to be able to produce shots at least as good as the Forge when using the lever profile. The machine is likely to remain tank fed, but plumbing it in may be possible down the road depending upon the kitchen counter space negotiation that still has to happen at my house.

Budget $2000-$3000
Contenders
1. Profitec Pro 800 (readily available from 2 good vendors, dripper is tried and true once temperature control practice is in place. PID for easy adjustment to different beans)
2. Londinium R (I'm not sure that they are any more functional, but I prefer the look of the valve control arms to the knobs of the Pro 800)
3. Bezzera Strega (I am not sure that I would utilize all of the potential variables this machine can control from watching Jim's videos, but it is actually slightly cheaper than the machines above so I think it should at least be considered)

I know there are several other vintage machine out there that make great espresso,but I am not really looking for a restoration project right now. If you have other suggestions I'd be glad to hear them.

Thanks
Jake

The knobs are easy to change on the 800

***BIAS ALERT***
1. I'm a lever fanatic (never had a machine, not a lever)-owner of an Olympia Express Cremina and former owner of the La Pavoni Europiccola and La Pavoni Pub 1EL.
2. Owner of a Profitec Pro 800

Jake,

Let me first say, you can't go wrong with your top 2 machines. Both the Profitec Pro 800 and the Londinium R are great machines. I looked at the Bezzera Strega and I don't understand why they decided to go with the HX function (you have to do an HX flush, I don't know...) that and the combination that the machine is also pump driven... I was able to play around with the Profitec Pro 800, the Londinium R, and the Quick Mill Achille, all great machines! With that being said, I ABSOLUTELY LOVE THE PRO 800, and for me personally, if I had to make that choice again, it would the Pro 800 every time!

The reasons I went with the Pro 800 is:
1. Reliability that the Profitec reputation brings
2. The rapport I developed with Clive Coffee and their willingness to special order the Pro 800. My e-mail exchanges with Londinium were also excellent!
3. Aesthetics. I love the look and the overall package of the Pro 800. I like the Londinium, but didn't love it. I didn't like the old school Italian cafe look of the on/off knob of the Quick Mill Achille, but that's just me.
4. Steam knobs, I like that you can control the steam through the spring-loaded steam control knobs (unlike the Londinium, new fangled joystick, when it's on, it's on full)

Things to also consider:
1. Size and weight, they are all MASSIVE machines. (Although I heard from the grapevine that Londinium might be introducing a smaller machine, not sure if that's true or just a rumor)
2. Warm-up time: Again because of it's 3.5 L boiler, it does take about 45 minutes or so to fully warm-up (brew head, and portafilter)

I hope that helps your decision-making process.

Best of luck!

I also had a chance to pull several dozens of shots on the P800 twice during barista training courses and I love it, the coffee is great and frothing milk is very easy..I'm planning to get it in a longer run

I, like Jake, am in the process of deciding between the Pro800 and the Londinium-R and am interested in the thought processes of others that chose one over the other. So far, the Pro800 seems to have gotten the lion share of the positives here but I assume that's because of the title.

So what put you over the edge between the Pro800 or L-R (LI)?
-Did you like the simplicity of the dipper over the fresher water of the HX?
-Rotary over Vibe?
-Aesthetics?
-Price?
-Availability?
-Joysticks over knobs?
-Adjustable preinfusion?
-Support from the owner/developer over a company?
-Didn't want to wait on Dan to finish his review?
-Something else that haven't seen or I've gotten wrong?

I know the best way to decide is to get hands on with both of these machines but rural KY doesn't really afford me that opportunity.

Jakus, I saw you've got the 800pro already, how are you doing so far? Do you grind with the Pharos?
Do you plan to plumb it in maybe?
AMac, I've checked your location in Google maps, really nice landscape I might prefer Londinium to 800 if I've had a chance to try it but no such luck..I know it is stupid but the blue and white indication lights look ugly to me compared to green and orange of the profitec..much more natural to my eyes

AMac wrote:I, like Jake, am in the process of deciding between the Pro800 and the Londinium-R and am interested in the thought processes of others that chose one over the other. So far, the Pro800 seems to have gotten the lion share of the positives here but I assume that's because of the title.

I know the best way to decide is to get hands on with both of these machines but rural KY doesn't really afford me that opportunity.

The Pro 800 and L-R were certainly my top two contenders, please keep in mind that my experience lever is MUCH lower than a lot of the people on this board, but here are so of my opinion so far.

-Did you like the simplicity of the dipper over the fresher water of the HX? Yes, the simplicity was my preference here. After reading many threads on temperature management I felt like this was the easiest route for me to go.

-Rotary over Vibe? Honestly not a deciding factor for me.

-Aesthetics? I slightly preferred the aesthetics of the L-R based on the joysticks vs knobs, but I am glad I went with the knobs which I'll get too...

-Price? To me there was very little difference here ~$200, but you could get the L-R with wood accessories for around the same at the stock Pro 800.

-Availability? Yes the Pro 800 is readily available, but I don't think the L-R lead time is more than a few weeks.

-Joysticks over knobs? I had read somewhere here that the knobs where easier to modulate between off and full on, and that the joysticks are more of an all or nothing control. Assuming this is true, for me the knobs are a must. My milk steaming experience thus far is from a stove top Bellman steamer. It would take me nearly a full minute of steaming to stretch and bring milk to temperature. The Pro 800, and I am sure the L-R, is a WAAAAAY more powerful steamer. I'm guessing steaming milk happens in about 10 seconds with the Pro 800. Being able to give a little steam vs a lot has been very helpful while getting used to the new steaming power. I am sure that there are people with more experience who are used to cranking the steam wide open at all times, but I am not there yet.

-Adjustable preinfusion? I know that there can be some benefits to adjusting preinfusion pressure, but my impression is that the ease of adjusting the boiler temperature on the Pro 800 to dial in brew temperature for various coffees is a feature I am more likely to use vs adjusting the the preinfusion pressure. I have found that adjusting the grind and dose for the beast taste for me, means that I am just starting to get slightly visibile liquid around the edges of the bottomless protafilter after a 4 second preinfusion at boiler pressure. I could be 100% wrong here, but I am not sure that increasing the preinfusion pressure via a pump would lead to better resulting in the cup.

-Support from the owner/developer over a company? It seems that there are three camps of people when it comes to Londinium, those that really like the owner, those who don't seem to like him, and those who have no idea what to think. I fall into the later. I will say that I do like having a distributor that I could ship the machine back to if needed, but I hope I never need to.

-Didn't want to wait on Dan to finish his review? I do wish the review would get completed soon. At this point I am kind of using it as a mini owners guide.

I don't think I would have been at all disappointed had I gone the L-R route, but it seems being in the middle of the US, vs the coasts, it is difficult to get you hands on machines to try them out.

Hope this helps.

Stanic wrote:Jakus, I saw you've got the 800pro already, how are you doing so far? Do you grind with the Pharos?
Do you plan to plumb it in maybe?
AMac, I've checked your location in Google maps, really nice landscape I might prefer Londinium to 800 if I've had a chance to try it but no such luck..I know it is stupid but the blue and white indication lights look ugly to me compared to green and orange of the profitec..much more natural to my eyes

Stanic - So far really well. I am finding that dialed in shots with the Pro 800 are thicker and warmer than with my Espresso Forge. I had a great straight shot this morning, and I was able to bring out the same tasting notes as with the Forge.

I considered plumbing it in, but my water quality would have meant fairly heavy filtering and softening, so I opted to use the distilled water + potassium bicarbonate recipe that many here seem to like. I definitely see the benefit of plumbing with silent operation and never worrying about refilling the reservoir. I'm just not sure it would be worth the effort I would have to go through to achieve a good plumb in solution.

I would bet that you could change light bulb colors if you were so inclined...

thanks for your comments!

Jake - thanks for your excellent reply! The simplicity of the dipper is what is drawing me to it. I wouldn't have minded it with a pressure stat, but it seems the PID does allow the small changes that a pressure stat might not have.

Stanic - I love it here, but country life does have its downsides. 45 minutes driving to 90% of the world's bourbon production but an hour to get a decent cafe. I had the pleasure of visiting Zakopane fifteen years ago and it was wonderful.