pcrussell50 wrote:The Linea Mini is a fabulous look and feel machine. But don't be surprised if you find it less "flexible" than your Pavoni when it comes to shot pulling. With your Pavoni, you have control of the flow rate based on how hard you pull the lever. You will lose that with the LMLM. Of course, it's super temperature stable, so you will not have to put yourself in sync with your machine to get the extraction temperature you want. With the LMLM, you will just walk up and pull, any time you like, and the temperature will always be right. Pick your poison.

-Peter

That's the idea! I'm not getting rid of the La Pavoni for the rare occasion I want to do some flow profiling on a tough coffee, but by-and-large I want a machine that maximizes consistency. I have enjoyed my La Pavoni for the last four years or so, and I've definitely enjoyed my fair share of incredible shots, but my single biggest frustration has been how difficult it is to get repeatable results. I want a machine where "dialed in" actually means "dialed in", haha. Blame my science background, but I find espresso most enjoyable when I can perfectly isolate each variable.

Jake_G wrote:Not at all.

The alignment itself is a method of ensuring that the axis of the upper and lower bushings are aligned with each other and are holding the journal of the burr carrier vertically such that the burrs are coplanar. Removing the lower burr carrier should have zero impact on that alignment once you've tightened the grind chamber to the motor plate. The lower burr carrier comes out quite easily and drops back into place with a little wiggling and twisting action to index it with the drive pulley.

The thing you have to look out for is the trust bearing on the Forte. The bottom of the burr carrier on the Vario rests directly on the brass ramp that Baratza calls the "Adjustment Spline", so all you do there is drop the carrier into the hex bore of the drive pulley. The Forte has a thrust bearing that rests on the adjustment spline and a little pin on the end of the burr carrier must be dropped into the center of the thrust bearing. It's easy enough, but the thrust bearing is just sort of hanging out on top of the adjustment spline, so have a long pointed implement like a bamboo skewer or equivalent is handy to line up the thrust washer before trying to drop the lower carrier into position.

Here's what that thrust washer looks like when looking into the grinder for reference:
image

As long as that silver thrust bearing is in the middle of the lower bushing, you should be good to go.

Cheers!

- Jake

Thank you so much
I am not entirely sure why the upper burr seems to have tipped downwards at the front judging from the ink test
I would have imagined it would be the lower burr being pulled by the belt and therefore wiping upper burr clean, instead of the other way round

Oh yes - I have messed up by not thinking about which one rotates
Thank you!

Gents, I return after nigh a month.

Vario, no upgrade to forte parts, no shims, just did the alignment and didn't even take out the burrs from the carriers, you might remember me from a few pages ago.

My god. Weeks later. I am having 2-3 double shots of ristretto drinks a day. Even the decaf has an avalanche of flavors now. Grinds are so fluffy. The thing just stays in alignment. Retention <0.2g.

This is hands down an amazing deal, I can't believe people shill the Niche Zero and no one talks about a $300 refurb Vario + 2 hrs with a screw driver is literal espresso heaven. I feel like a shill telling people on reddit to just read these threads and see the photos. Oh well. People want to believe more money = better output.

Me, I have my vario, and a play list of coffees I can seamlessly swap out with and instant dialin with the stepped system, grinding is just removed as a variable now - I'm trying to get an E61 dual boiler machine now the grinder is so goddamn good I know it can punch above my GCP!!

I was single dosing before but after filling the hopper - I think the weight actually improves grind output by reducing popcorning - anyone noticed?

Fluffy bois for days: (started doing RDT for single dosing, but now just fill the hopper)




The output:

Wow. That's a pretty compelling review!

Couple of three things:
1) The basic hopper is way better than the fancy shutoff hopper for single dosing. People with Fortes might want to get a regular Vario hopper for this
2) If you are single dosing, you HAVE to do the flapper mod. It will take your retention down from 0.2g to 0.1 or less. (Though you must RDT for static, and you must use a funnel in your portafilter because the grinds pile becomes super fluffy and tall)
3) For popcorning, I just put a (clean) dish towel in on top of the beans, folded so that a corner doesn't get pulled down into the burrs.

This is a link to when I did the flapper mod: Baratza Vario, flipping the flapper for the win

Though as with the super alignment, I cannot lay claim to having invented it.

-Peter

@Peter, I am humbled still more to learn...

1) damn I have two fancy hoppers! Why is the normal hopper better for single dosing you think? I sometimes have to persuade 1 or 2 mutiny prone beans to fall into the grind chamber (they hang out above

2) when i did the alignment I took off the flapper, gave it a good clean (was oily and grime) and put it back. Don't know but I might have flipped it. Is the mod to flip it or totally remove it?

3) man...is popcorning bad...really don't wanna put a towel in now workflow is already so long haha. What's the harm with loading the hopper? I was feeling so good programming the precise time to grind 17.5g dose - now have workflow upgraditis that I'm trying to resist...but please tell me how good this is going to be and I will follow, as usual :p

sheedapistawl wrote: 2) when i did the alignment I took off the flapper, gave it a good clean (was oily and grime) and put it back. Don't know but I might have flipped it. Is the mod to flip it or totally remove it?

3) man...is popcorning bad...really don't wanna put a towel in now workflow is already so long haha. What's the harm with loading the hopper? I was feeling so good programming the precise time to grind 17.5g dose - now have workflow upgraditis that I'm trying to resist...but please tell me how good this is going to be and I will follow, as usual :p

You don't remove the flapper. The main body of it serves a purpose. You just put it back together upside down, so the flapper is not obstructing the chute, as with the pics in this post: Single Dosing My Baratza Vario Success!

As for filling the hopper, nothing wrong with that. My dish towel suggestion is only for single dosing.

-Peter

sheedapistawl wrote:I was single dosing before but after filling the hopper - I think the weight actually improves grind output by reducing popcorning - anyone noticed?

There is a theoretical advantage to a full hopper on many grinders. If one is single-dosing a small mass such as an espresso dose in the Vario, then all that may happen is the grounds are finer at the same grinder setting. See comments and the last graph of the first post here: Apex vs. Vario - Kruve comparison

The disadvantage to running a full hopper is that beans that are partially ground remain in the burrs and stale. Normal practice in a shop would be to dump the beans and clean the grinder every evening. What people at home do is purge a few grams of beans to get rid of the stale grounds/partially-broken beans before grinding for a coffee. My rule of thumb was if two to four hours had passed then I'd purge.

What I do now is use an Aeropress funnel as my hopper. Then I use a 41mm tamper to hold the beans down during grinding. The tamper will slide down the Aeropress funnel's cylinder, and then go down to rest in the upper burr carrier. Only the last few grams of beans won't have a weight pushing them into the burrs. (41mm tamper is for the LM Strada / VST 58mm single basket.) My original thought was to 3d-print a cylinder that was shaped to get right down into the burr chamber ... however, I did some blinded taste comparisons, but cupping, not espresso. Once I adjusted for the differences in grind settings, I couldn't taste a difference between a 10g dose in a full hopper, Aeropress-hopper, or single-dose into a Vario hopper. However, that's me, and I am by no means a great taster!

pcrussell50 wrote:Wow. That's a pretty compelling review!

Couple of three things:
1) The basic hopper is way better than the fancy shutoff hopper for single dosing. People with Fortes might want to get a regular Vario hopper for this
2) If you are single dosing, you HAVE to do the flapper mod. It will take your retention down from 0.2g to 0.1 or less. (Though you must RDT for static, and you must use a funnel in your portafilter because the grinds pile becomes super fluffy and tall)
3) For popcorning, I just put a (clean) dish towel in on top of the beans, folded so that a corner doesn't get pulled down into the burrs.

This is a link to when I did the flapper mod: Baratza Vario, flipping the flapper for the win

Though as with the super alignment, I cannot lay claim to having invented it.

-Peter

presumably the same flapper procedure for a forte? thanks