# Annoying pour speed



## Al Kent (Aug 23, 2012)

Is there a reason why my pour suddenly goes from a lovely slow, rich brown to a sudden gushing blond? I mean sudden, not gradual. I'm grinding, weighing and tamping to perfection for the first 15 seconds or so then the water just finds a way through. I don't want to mess too much with my settings and weight as I've got to almost where I want to be through a lot of trial and error and I know it'll be difficult to find this sweet spot again.


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## Mrboots2u (May 10, 2013)

How does it taste ....?


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## Al Kent (Aug 23, 2012)

It tastes fine but would taste a lot better with a consistent speed.


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## Mrboots2u (May 10, 2013)

Al Kent said:


> It tastes fine but would taste a lot better with a consistent speed.


What are you basing this on ?

Ok let's go to basics

How old is the coffee

Dose in > weight out > time

Do you have naked pf

It could be a defect in your distribution but shots will speed flow up and change colour


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## Al Kent (Aug 23, 2012)

Ha ha, I'm just basing it on the fact I'm getting more blond in my coffee than I'd want. If it was gradual I could stop it earlier but without super human reaction it beats me every time.

Coffee was roasted six days ago. 17g in, it probably blonds at round about 17g on the way out. I don't have an accurate way to time it properly but I can see and taste it well enough to not be fussed with that. Don't have a snaked pf.

So are you saying speeding up this drastically is normal?


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## froggystyle (Oct 30, 2013)

Al Kent said:


> It tastes fine but would taste a lot better with a consistent speed.


How do you know this?


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## GCGlasgow (Jul 27, 2014)

Are you trying to get rid of the blonding? As i've heard some people stopping shots when it blonds...would leave me with very little coffee.


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## h1udd (Sep 1, 2015)

Try grinding finer and slowing the shot down over all .... It will now taste different ... Does it taste nicer or worse ?


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## Al Kent (Aug 23, 2012)

Blonding is fine, it's the sudden blonding that's the issue.

Thinking about this "would taste better" comment though, I don't actually know that that's true now I think about it. "Annoying pour speed" probably sums it up better. It's just annoying that it happens. When you go to a lot of bother to make a tiny cup of coffee it would just be nice not to have something happen that isn't in the plan.


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## MWJB (Feb 28, 2012)

If you're getting your brew ratio, in a decent overall time, with a good taste, then the speed at which the shot pours is unlikely to be an issue.

You're saying it speeds up, think more about the average speed.

It's in the plan - any coffee that is brewed by percolation starts off thick & dark & ends thin & pale, as extraction progresses solids get progressively harder to wash out, so the last half of the shot weight might only account for a small % of the coffee extracted & will be mostly water. Some of this blonde output is usually necessary to balance the extraction.


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## Al Kent (Aug 23, 2012)

OK, thanks. I guess I'm just looking for perfection when perhaps I've already got as close as I'm going to get


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## Jiiim (Jan 5, 2016)

Could you post a video?


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## Al Kent (Aug 23, 2012)

Jiiim said:


> Could you post a video?


Will give it a go


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## h1udd (Sep 1, 2015)

you say you dont have a naked PF ... what does the puck look like after the shot ... I know ecology is pretty useless, but is there 2 whopping great holes in it at the end ?

give it a quick poke ... is there a soft spot that disintegrates when you push it

both of those can identify a massive channeling ?


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## Al Kent (Aug 23, 2012)

Puck is pretty solid. That was the first thing I checked. Nice and compact, no obvious channels.


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## i2idro (Mar 26, 2016)

I have had this 'part way through, speed up' seemed my machine had gotten too hot, slightly longer pre flush before attaching portafilter helped in my case.


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## Glenn (Jun 14, 2008)

A few years ago I was encouraged to let it run longer when blonding on a machine I was not familiar with, as I had been stopping the shots too early (based on look alone)

The difference was incredible.

At the time, the thought was 'blonding is bad' - that had been the convention for some time...

Since then the colour has not been an issue - taste is what really matters.

On some grinder and machine combinations the shots do not look great - but taste amazing.

If you're happy with taste then tweak the grind and try again - incrementally finer.

As the coffee ages it will behave differently so you may need to go coarser again as well.


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## jlarkin (Apr 26, 2015)

h1udd said:


> you say you dont have a naked PF ...
> 
> I know ecology is pretty useless


I believe he said he doesn't have a snaked PF so my question would be, why not? That sounds awesome.

I've never been a big believer in ecology either .



Al Kent said:


> Don't have a snaked pf.


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