Que envidia! Me encanta la maquina. Sadly in neighboring Colombia, we did not have as large an Itali

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Hello Coffee Lovers I would like to officially introduce my self, my name is Roberto and I live in Caracas Venezuela, although I already made a few questions here, I guess this is the correct time to post this note. In the first week of February during a sleepless night I decided to get a household espresso machine in order to have some good shots for my self since I am the only coffee drinker in my family of four. I was lucky enough to find this site and read many of your post, before take any purchase hamilton beach decision because hamilton beach I was walking the wrong path. I soon realize that an espresso means equipment and that can be translate in dollar sings, so I decided to got a La Pavoni Europiccola. Lever, no pumps or high tech expensive features, vintage hamilton beach look, in short perfect to fulfill hamilton beach my desires, but (there is always a but) maybe a few of you already knows, Venezuela is going through the most difficult political and economic situation ever in the last fifty years with among other restrictions get foreign currency is almost impossible, thats why I did a local research just to find a Gaggia Orione two lever commercial machine cheap and can be paid in local currency and the price was the equivalent of about $350. As a side note I would like to let you know a little bit about the Venezuela Coffee scene, by the end of the eighteen century hamilton beach Venezuela was one of the world most important producer and exporter of coffee beans recognized for it quality and due to the huge presence of italians immigrants, you could find and espresso machine in almost every corner of the country but amazingly the final product "a well served espresso" is hard to find, generally speaking. A new generation hamilton beach of coffee enthusiast are working to change hamilton beach that, starting with the recovery of the plantations of the beans that once upon a time make us famous around the globe. Since this will be my first espresso machine ever I was afraid not to be up to the task of restore her by my self, that is why a former Gaggia technician toke care of the clean and tune up. And this is what I purchased And after some TLC this is what I got Now I have my own espresso machine I need a space to placed her and I convinced the wife to start a project "a coffee/cigar bar" hamilton beach and this is what I did achieve until today. It is an on-going project I still have to do some cosmetic and operating upgrades to the "machina" hamilton beach but after struggling with the machine installation, in short the house electrical grid can not handle the almost 30 Amps required for the two 1500 watts heating elements, a qualified electrician must come to see what is need it, in a meanwhile thanks to God and to the Gaggia engineers the machine also works with gas and here we are, finally she was fired up literally As I told before this is a project in execution and I still have to look for a good grinder among other pieces of the equipment required to perform the job. But tell me the true, who could resist to at least try to pull a shot after this saga, I made my self and look for my no capable grinder and grind some beans I use in on my daily dose of caffeine and did the best I could. Of course I got no luck the results were the kind get with a coarse grinds, old beans and some malfunctions in the equipment. I now for sure that one of the shower screens was replace with a hand made, yes a hand made one, let see what are we talking about Watery, no cream at all, big volume hamilton beach and very hot. That is the end of my very first attempt as a home barista please let me know what do you think about the whole history. I am here to learn. Thanks to the braves that read the whole thing, I hope you also enjoy the trip
Que envidia! Me encanta la maquina. Sadly in neighboring Colombia, we did not have as large an Italian hamilton beach migration as Venezuela, so finding vintage lever espresso machines is much harder I'm sure with patience, a bit of research and most importantly with a good grinder, you'll eventually get great shots. Good luck! sanzrobinson   Posts: 36 Joined: May 12, 2013 Location: Princeton NJ
This is a brave attempt on a great old machine. Congratulations on getting it cleaned up and heated with gas. And yes, you definitely need a good grinder and good, fresh coffee. Otherwise it is very easy to get a bad extraction with rapid flow and high volume. Back to your machine for a moment, what boiler pressure are you getting? This is important for managing temperature. Your pressure gauge may or may not be accurate. The pressure you show in your picture is about 0.8 bar, which would be low for this machine.
Great start! I note you have a crack in the weld seam between your group bulkhead and the boiler - I take it this isn't leaking ? Your pre