# New Ponte Vecchio Owner



## CoolingFlush (Aug 4, 2019)

Hi, I'm just posting to introduce my Pontevecchio Lusso, recently procured on this here forum.

It's my first lever machine, although I've had various basic pump driven machines for the last 10 or so years.

The details: It's a 2014 Lusso 2, with black casing. It came with two teeny portafilters, double and single baskets, a solid custom-milled tamper, and a nifty 46mm metal lens hood / dosing funnel, as well as the manual.

What I've done: Opened it up, given it a good clean, re-set the Pressurestat from 1.6 to 1.3 (and recently back up to 1.6 for a light roast). I have also begun investigating how best to do a vacuum breaker mod, although that's probably best left to a separate post.

What I think of it: it's amazing! It looks beautiful. It's so quiet. It produces sweet shots, as claimed. You only have to use a small dose of coffee, so you can have more coffees! Having two groupheads is awesome. The tactile element of lever espresso is really rewarding and addictive, even with a spring lever.

The coffee: Initially I had to disagree with the online consensus that it's a very forgiving machine - it took me a while to dial it in - but on reflection I was just slow in grinding fine enough. I started at 14g and got gushers, but when I tightened the grind I got severe, watery channelling. I have since down-dosed, and this has allowed me to tighten the grind sufficiently to get slow, syrupy shots. There seem to be three camps online regarding dose: 11g, 14g, and 16-18g, but I am finding that I get better results towards 11g. I have to say I got a lot of support from the seller, via email, for which I am very grateful. The steam is superb. You can use it whilst your shot is pulling, and it's powerful and dry. I am having to adjust to only having 15 seconds to steam my milk, instead of 30+. I think I need a smaller milk jug, too.

Issues: I don't love the warm-up routine, (heat up, bleed off false pressure, heat back up, pull levers to initiate heat syphon, wait for grouphead to heat up) but I can live with it. I may do the vac breaker mod, but then I'd still have to manually start the syphon action, so I'm not certain I will. I don't think I'll insulate the boiler, as weekdays it's only on for an hour.

So there you are! If there are any other Ponte Vecchio owners out there is be keen to hear of your experiences with your machine.

☕


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## KTD (Dec 28, 2017)

Looks great. Really fancy owning one of these myself

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## joey24dirt (Jan 28, 2017)

Such a clean machine.

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## Hasi (Dec 27, 2017)

nice 
such a miniature footprint but already a 2-group. Perfect!


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## CoolingFlush (Aug 4, 2019)

Today I've given the Lusso a routine clean up, and thought I'd post an update. I started with a quick soak off this morning's milk:









Then decided it was time to pry off the shower screens and confront what lurked behind:









I know, I know. I can only apologise!


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## CoolingFlush (Aug 4, 2019)

A quick Pulcaff treatment yielded a lot of mess...









But resulted in clean pistons and group heads:









Albeit one (the left one) with a loose gasket. I am wondering whether the ridge on the business side of this gasket is normal, or whether I need to replace them?


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## CoolingFlush (Aug 4, 2019)

Either way, I finished it off with a noticeably cleaner shot of the deliciously sweet Colombian I am currently drinking:









Success!


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## Border_all (Dec 19, 2019)

Looks really good must say i keep finding myself thinking of returning to Colombian from Rave perhaps after i have drank what i just purchased.

Good luck with the machine


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