I have recently bought a new La Pavoni Europiccola and paired it with an old zassenhaus hand grinder. After using it for a while I am left with some questions on which I'm hoping someone here will be able to shed some light.

1) Quite a few shots turn out to be on the somewhat cold and sour side. Despite being able to grind fine enough to choke the machine, I have never had any "burned" shots, suggesting perhaps that the temperature might not be high enough, should I consider fiddling with the pressurestat or are there other remedies?

2) I am using either freshly roasted beans from a local roaster or self-roasted beans, but my shots seem to have a distinct lack of crema, even if the taste is good. I'm suspecting that it might have something to do with my hand grinder.

3) The boiler rotates on the base quite easily when the machine is hot. I know it is Italian, but it doesn't seem quite right Is this normal? And if not, is it easy to fix?

I would be grateful for any of your insights on these issues.

Best,
Gerard

If the shots come out cold, it may well be that the machine is not correctly warmed up. You might consider some method of assessing this: possibly a thermometer strip placed on the brew head (I find mine very helpful). If this is the case it would likely explain the lack of crema (but that could also be other issues too). I wouldn't definitely say your grinder is no good. There's no easy way of finding out unless you are certain everything else is balanced perfectly. I know, take it to your friend's house, who also has a pavoni but has had it ten years, and get him to have a go with it for a week. Easy really.
About the boiler rotating: just get used to it.

Fresh beans and a good grinder are very important. Be careful going so fine that you choke out the machine. I normally get better results with a slightly more coarse grind. Shoot for about 25 to 30 seconds, with moderate (but steady) lever pressure.

If you happen to have a pressure gauge, then you want to shoot for around 10 PSI basically. This will generally equate to about the right temperature for pulling shots. If you do not have a gauge, then you can pull water out of the group head into a cup and check the temperature. It should be in the neighborhood of 185 to 190. If you warm the cup up first, then pull water, it definitely should be up around 190 as it comes out.

If the boiler turns on the base, then it could be that the large securing ring (inside the base) is loose. There is a gasket in there also, which can dry up. On my machine, I use two gaskets (one on either side of the base). Even with this, you really have to tighten up that ring to keep the base from wanting to twist on you while operating the lever, etc.

I have the older machine (without the pressure stat), but I have heard of people chipping away the glue (or whatever the case is) on the pressure stats in order to make adjustments. From what I understand, however, it's very easy to break them.

For really good crema, I would suggest a high quality bean, such as Red Bird or one of the ones listed on HB's top coffee lists. The grinder is also super important in my experience. Not only does it need to be able to produce consistent grinds, but you need to really dial it in. On my machine, even one click either way has a huge impact on the final results.

Ray

Thanks for the suggestions. In this follow-up I would like to write the (so far unsuccessful) steps I have taken to resolve the sourness issue.

First of all I switched to freshly roasted single origin beans from a reputable local roaster, I am currently using a Guatemalan antigua.
Then for unrelated reasons I'm not able to use a hand grinder for a while, and I bought an Iberital Challenge conical burr grinder.
I installed a manometer, which shows that the boiler pressure idles around 0.75 bar, with the element switching on at 0.7 bar and switching off again at 0.8 bar.

Now I have been able to reduce the acidity somewhat by grinding finer and reducing the dose, but I think I might have reached the limit with that approach. Currently I am using 14g of coffee in the double filter basket, which yields about 20g of liquid in a little over 30 seconds (measured from the point where the first drops appear) after 10 seconds of pre-infusion and moderate pressure applied on the lever. Still only a very thin layer of crema.

I feel that I am quite close, I can almost taste the sweetness that is hidden beneath the acidity, but I am not quite sure how to proceed. I am tempted to increase the boiler pressure, but from what I read 0.75 bar is not an exceptionally low pressure.

If it helps with diagnosing the problem then I can post some images of the crema.

For crema:
1. max 16 gr, 15 gr of coffee is fine.
2. Fine grinding, light tamping
3. If no improvement, try a different coffee. Some single estate coffees just don't work on Europiccola.

For acidity:
Warm up the machine leaving the steam wand open, until you see steam coming out (not air). This gives more warm up time to the machine to reach higher temperature.
Then wait for light to switch off.
Your pressure is fine, identical to mine

I received a La Pavoni pre-millenium for xmas. Prior to that I used my aeropress. I still have the same grinder, a modded Kitchenaid Proline I got on Amazon a few years ago for $99 shipped. My shots have been all over the map, but it's been great fun working things out. I bought a temp strip from Orphan Espresso to put on the head. While it may not be pinpoint accurate it will give me a reference point, temp-wise, which will help reign in all the variables.

Right now my biggest problem, as far as I can tell, is the grinder. Even though I made it step-less and lapped the burrs I can still see some larger grinds that shouldn't be there. My solution is to give myself an OE Pharos for my birthday. Until I get the grind right I'll sit back and enjoy the grab bag of shots I'm getting. None of them have been bad and some of them have been awesome.

I roast my own coffee so the beans are fresh. I'll follow this thread to see how others chime it.

john402052000 wrote: Right now my biggest problem, as far as I can tell, is the grinder. Even though I made it step-less and lapped the burrs I can still see some larger grinds that shouldn't be there. My solution is to give myself an OE Pharos for my birthday. Until I get the grind right I'll sit back and enjoy the grab bag of shots I'm getting. None of them have been bad and some of them have been awesome.

The little Kyocera CM-45cf is a really great grinder. I modified mine so it has twice the # of steps and it works great for espresso. The grind is very consistent.

Ray

Thanks Ray -- I was aware of that grinder also and saw a demo of the mod you mentioned somewhere on the internets. Not to hijack the thread, but how many turns does it take to grind a dose?

Gerard,

You're parameters sound right to me and should give plenty of crema. Perhaps trying blends first, is the best tip so far. I live in Belgium and could send you a 60-90c temperature strip, in exchange for some beans, if it may help and we could compare results. Some single origins do very well on my pavoni, others I just can't get right.
(shipping those temperature strips to Europe was ridiculously expensive for what they cost, so I bought several packs)

john402052000 wrote:Thanks Ray -- I was aware of that grinder also and saw a demo of the mod you mentioned somewhere on the internets. Not to hijack the thread, but how many turns does it take to grind a dose?

Around 100 as I recall. Depends on how many grams and how fine. I use 9 to 10 grams typically for my single shots. If I'm making a Latte or Americano, then maybe 16 grams (which takes a little longer). It certainly keeps your arms in good shape!

Ray