Copper or stainless can be recycled, teflon cannot and will linger in the environment indefinitely. I would greatly prefer metal tubing, and manufacturers that don't use it are frankly irresponsible.

Another excellent point with which I couldn't agree more.

Just for info, here is link of John's explanation of tubing in decent:

Decent Espresso news

Bluecold wrote:Copper or stainless can be recycled, teflon cannot and will linger in the environment indefinitely. I would greatly prefer metal tubing, and manufacturers that don't use it are frankly irresponsible.

Certainly I'm for environmental recycling.. so I can't speak to Teflon, but traditional espresso manufacturers could do more to make the user experience better if they are going to use copper or plated brass. The plated brass in my mushroom is greatly compromised after less than 3 years, even though I was using relatively soft water .. and my steam gauge stopped working because the tube from the boiler to the gauge is so narrow any little bit of scale/corrosion will plug it. Add to that an SSR failure and you have 3 significant repairs in less than 3 years on a traditional design from 2018. So I would not rate these designs as low maintenance (but certainly the machines are high cost); and hence moves like Nespresso to PEX tubing.

Profitec now has stainless in most mushrooms, which is a good move.. not sure if there are other plated areas not visible.

In some areas, likely copper could be replaced for increased reliability (ie: narrow pipes).. But I'm surprised how long it takes manufacturers to make these improvement changes; (and I haven't heard of any manufacturer that offers a replacement for a 'bad' material design decision).