What the Puck?

[Bigtwin]

Received a Mazzer mini, Vivaldi II 20amp, Hottop B and some SM Monkey blend about a week ago. I don't really know the difference between a sink shot and a God shot :) I've been making caps mostly and the milk probably hides your mistakes.

When I first received the machine I didn't have any beans and my wife had picked up some stuff from our local Mega Mart. I've began preparing shots using 15 grams of the mega beans and they tasted pretty good in the caps and when I knocked the portafilter to clean it, a nice well formed puck came out. I roasted the Monkey blend to a Full City and began to use 15 grams and reduced to 14 grams. I've never been able to get a nice puck to form or one that stays together when I give the portafilter a knock. I've tried going up to 17 grams and grinding finer and then more coarse, yet a messy puck continues to exist.

Any idea of what I need to try? I figure since the puck is a mess vs a well formed one, I must be doing something wrong.

[Niko]

I think you're reading into your pucks too much.
You don't need to worry about "Puckology" and how the puck looks and feel.
The pucks I knock out look like crumbly pieces of shrapnel and sometimes they're soaking wet.

[Bigtwin]

thanks Niko. I have found that if I go fine to +4 the extraction chokes, so somewhere between 0 and +4 lies the best grind for SM Monkey.

Where should the tamped level be? Above the line in the double basket?

[hlsheppard]

Mine are usually just above the line in my triple basket...

I'll second Niko - my pucks are ALL over the place, but the product is pretty darned consistent.

Espresso is the type of "hobby" where you can easily obsess over EVERYTHING to the point of enjoying NOTHING. (I think I've been there)

[chas]

I can't attest to this personally but others have reported that they actually increasing their shot length by grinding coarser. Conventional wisdom would state that the shot length gets longer and longer as you grind finer until the machine chokes.

However, the S1 is pretty good about blasting channels through or even going done the sides of the puck when it can't find a better path.

[wgaggl]

I can't attest to this personally but others have reported that they actually increasing their shot length by grinding coarser. Conventional wisdom would state that the shot length gets longer and longer as you grind finer until the machine chokes.

However, the S1 is pretty good about blasting channels through or even going done the sides of the puck when it can't find a better path.

I think you need to differentiate between "shot length" (also called shot volume in oz) and "shot duration" (or time).

It makes of course sense that the shot duration gets longer the finer you grind, unless you experience immense channeling.

Shot length (=volume) otoh has a maximum at optimum grind setting (and technique) and decreases in both directions. If I find myself grinding far too fine, pulling the shot will take forever, but it will be very "short" (usually used for "little volume" in the espresso world). If I grind to coarse, it will also blond immediately. There's a point (and you have to play with the grind level for that) where you maximize your shot volume.

Again, as confusing as it may sound, "lenght" and "short" or "long" as attributes for espresso shots are quite often used for volume, which is not a monotonic function of grind level. E.g. Ristretto is also called "short espresso", eventhough it might even take longer to pull the shot.

Shot duration otoh is basically a monotonic function of grind level (assuming constant packing pressure), as long as there's no channeling involved.

Wolfgang