Hello. Iām Chris. Iāve been slowly but surely getting into home coffee over the years which has now led me to becoming a member here.
After using a cafetiĆØre for many years and buying pre ground coffee I bought my first Delonghi Dedica espresso machine for Ā£10 on Facebook marketplace. Still using pre ground coffee (mostly lavazza at that point as it seemed the only pre ground espresso coffee that the dedica would not choke on).
I used that until it died and then got a used barista express. This was my first experience of using whole beans and I certainly noticed the difference, especially as i started to buy better, fresher beans. But the grinder loudness and lack of grinder settings annoyed me. I never could quite dial in a shot exactly as I wanted. It was always slightly too fine or slightly too coarse.
This BE eventually scaled up (using filtered hard tap water) and I was left with a non working steam wand and hot water spout. After some googling and you tube videos I managed to fix the issue my removing the offending solenoid valve and giving it a good clean. This fixed the issue and life was grand again.
Not long after this a friend was selling his Barista Pro and with a nice āmates ratesā price that I couldnāt resist. I also started using ashbeck water at this point. Double the amount of grinder settings and the upgraded Baratza burrs sold it for me. I really liked this machine but by this point I had started drooling over prosumer, e61 machines and better grinders.
Next up I managed to get a second hand varia vs3 version 1 on eBay. It also had the hyper nova burrs. This was a very big step up in taste verses using the stock grinder on the barista pro. I think the stepless adjustment is one of the reasons for this, Iām sure there are more. However a few months in the motor packed up. I knew this was a risk going on reviews and what I had read online. I contacted varia and for Ā£37 they sent out the version 2 motor. This sorted my issue and although now it has a slightly higher pitch when grinding, the results are good.
This brings me up to my current point where I have just ordered a Rocket Apartamento TCA and also just picked up a second hand T64 grinder. The main reasons I went with the rocket was because of the 0% finance, Sage trade in offer and the Easter offers they were running. I managed to get a decent chunk of change off the usual price. I am planning to keep the varia and run it alongside the T64 for different beans.
Iām looking forward to reading more here, learning and getting involved. Thanks.