Author: Cody Neville

The ugly truth about machine de-liming costs

It requires about 6-8 hours of labor to disassemble a machine, de-lime the components, and then reassemble the machine.  The normal bill for de-liming a two-group machine is over $600.

To make it even worse, your machine may be in our shop for a week or more. 

After your machine is cleaned, you’ll continue to get a limited amount of lime buildup even when you use a water softener, but the buildup won’t be as fast or as severe.

Think of water softening as a low cholesterol diet for your espresso machine; you can’t completely eliminate the risk of a heart attack with a low cholesterol diet, but you can greatly minimize the chances.

Municipal vs Filtered vs Softened Water

Municipal Water Treatment

• Most municipal water plants do not soften their water
  • Citizens Energy says Indianapolis City water runs 12-20 gpg  hardness
  • City of Carmel Utilities saysCarmel water is softened to 8-10 gpg  hardness
• Central Indiana utilities often use surface water supplies when their reservoirs are full, but will use well (aquifer) water when needed.  Since surface water generally contains less hardness than well water, water hardness may fluctuate immediately after water sources are changed.

Filtered Water vs. Softened water.  

• Filtered and Softened water are not the same thing.
• Filters remove floating minerals, softening removes dissolved minerals.
• Bottled water is often advertised as filtered, but rarely as softened.
• Reverse osmosis water (RO) and distilled water (DW) can be used to make coffee—and you can’t have lime buildup if your water contains no minerals.  The downside to RO and DW is those missing minerals change the coffee’s taste (both waters are somewhat acidic and this effects extraction) and may prevent the espresso machine from working properly (minerals enable the machine to determine when the boiler is full).
• Some centralized or whole house softeners are set to regenerate every 24, 48, 72 hours instead of every X gallons. If that hourly setting allows for too much time between regeneration, it is quite possible that in the hours immediately preceding regeneration, the water is not getting softened. Consequently, you may still be feeding hard water to your machine. Ensure your centralized water softener has the correct regeneration settings for your water usage.

Checking Your Water Hardness

• An easy way to determine the hardness of your bottled or tap water is by using a swimming pool test strip. Locate the hardness part of your test strip, dip it in the bottled or tap water, read the strip. If the reading is in the lowest two levels your water is sufficiently soft. If it is in the third level or higher, your water is too hard.
• Drip coffee makers do not require soft water; these machines are not pressurized and can easily be cleaned.
• If you need to satisfy your inner chemist, more detailed information can be found at Water for Coffee FAQ

In-line water softeners are economical and easy to install.  We can set you up with a complete kit, and replaceable filters, or we can install it for you. 

Indiana Limestone and Coffee Quality

Coffee only comprises 5% of your what goes into your cup, with water being the other 95%. Coffee does not transform water into a great drink, water transforms coffee into a great drink. Regardless of where your water comes from, if you don’t like how the water tastes, you’re definitely not going to like the coffee it makes.

The taste of any water is determined by what is in—or not in—that liquid. Water from a reservoir tastes different than water from a deep well aquifer. Central Indiana aquifer water seeps through countless amounts of limestone, which results in a high calcium content aka hard water. Reservoir water usually has flowed over farm fields and granite river beds and doesn’t contain as much calcium hardness.

Municipal water supplies rarely produce soft water. Indianapolis tap water is routinely 12 – 20 grains per gallon hardness. Ideal coffee making water contains 3 – 4 grains of hardness.

Live in central Indiana for very long and you’ll learn that hard water causes lime buildup, and expensive damage, in anything that heats water—especially espresso machines. The most common way to soften hard water is a standard, fill the softener with salt, setup. These softeners work well, but add sodium to your water, which affects coffee taste.

Some people believe using bottled water avoids hard water issues. Unfortunately, unless it’s labeled otherwise, that bottled water probably came from a municipal water supply and we know that water is rarely softened. Just because the bottle says it’s filtered doesn’t mean it’s softened. Filtering takes out things floating in the water, while softening removes what is dissolved in the water.

Some people use reverse osmosis or distilled water instead of tap water. Reverse osmosis and distilled water have very little taste as all of the minerals have been removed.  Also, the absence of minerals in the water means it doesn’t conduct electricity which may prevent your espresso machine from operating properly. Lastly, these waters are all somewhat acidic, which not only affects coffee taste, but the acid will attack coffee machine parts—especially home machines containing lesser quality materials.

The good news is that a $150 in-line water softener will protect your espresso investment!   Ask us how easy it is to install – or let us install it for you.  

GRINDERS: What You Need to Know About Conical vs Flat Burrs

Your typical home burr grinder is going to feature conical burrs. You won’t find any flat burrs in the running unless you’re looking to spend close to a thousand dollars — at least for now. There’s no need to worry though — both burr types produce coffee grounds worth brewing and celebrating.

The times are changing, however, and I’m sure flat burrs will begin appearing in less-expensive devices over the next few years.

If you want to get a leg-up on understanding how the two burr types function differently and why you may want to choose one over the other (if you ever get the chance), read on.

Fair warning though: it’s about to get technical.

CONICAL BURRS — THE INDUSTRY STANDARD

If you pop open your tiny hand grinder, a larger electric grinder, or a higher-end batch retail grinder you would find at a grocery store, you’re going to find conical burrs.

Read: Manual VS Electric Coffee Grinders: How To Pick The Right One

This burr type uses an outer serrated burr and a cone-shaped (that’s what conical means) center burr. As the center burr spins, the sharp edges pull whole beans into the grinding area, where they are broken down into smaller and smaller pieces.

The shape of the burrs allows for fairly uniform grinding with a high level of grind size control. It also is a very efficient shape that allows for a lower-rpm grinder, which results in less noise and heat. Overall, conical burrs are not very expensive to manufacture.

Here’s where it get tricky and the debate begins.

Conical burrs produce a bimodal distribution of coffee grounds. This means that if you were to take coffee ground by conical burrs and place it under a microscope, there would be two distinct sets of particle sizes: small and large.

This holds true at all grind size settings — it will always happen with this burr type.

These two sets of particle sizes are what the world is used to and have played a massive role in developing espresso over the last century, in good and bad ways.

The smaller set of grounds (fines or micro-grounds) restricts the flow of water in an espresso basket, which allows the larger grounds more time to extract and produces a heavy, sometimes silky, body. By the time the larger grounds have experienced a balanced extraction, the smaller ones have over-extracted and contributed bitterness to the final cup.

Post written by GARRETT ODEN | JavePresse.com  Here is the original post: https://www.javapresse.com/blogs/grinding-coffee/conical-vs-flat-burrs

Did you know water can make or break your flavor?

When heated water comes into contact with freshly ground coffee, the heat breaks the bonds that hold certain flavor and aroma-producing molecules to the coffee grinds and allows them to dissolve into the water.

Since different molecular bonds break at different temperatures, changing the temperature of your brew water will create diverse flavors when poured over the same coffee. As the brew water passes over your ground coffee, it expands the grinds and dissolves many of the solids contained within the coffee. It’s these dissolved solids that give a specific coffee its distinctive flavors.

Too much of a good thing is bad! Although some calcium in your water helps make a great coffee, it is easy to have too much of a good thing. Did you know water exceeding 3-4 grains per gallon of calcium hardness can actually remove flavor molecules from the coffee drink? 

I’m sure we’ve all seen how hard water creates a soap ring around the bathtub. Calcium bonds with soap and dirt molecules to prevent them from dissolving in the bath water as it goes down the drain. It might not be a pretty thought, but the same thing happens in your coffee cup. The hard water bonds with many of the flavor molecules you enjoy and prevents those flavors from dispersing throughout the cup. Once collected together, those flavor molecules may be too concentrated and therefore present a bitter taste or, the hard water, and all the flavor molecules it has collected, might actually bond with the side of your cup and you never get to drink it.

Remember learning as a kid that you could only dissolve so much sugar in iced tea before you created a big pile of wet sugar at the bottom of the pitcher? Water can only absorb a finite number of molecules and too much of one type means it can only absorb so much of so much of another type. If your brew water contains a great deal of dissolved calcium or other minerals, that will limit the number of flavor molecules your brew water can absorb from your ground coffee.

Once the brew water reaches its limit of dissolved solids—whether calcium or coffee flavors—the water will just flow over the coffee without extracting any further taste.

Fortunately, we carry in-line water softeners which will manage the calcium levels in your water to help ensure a tasty pour in each cup!

How to prepare your espresso machine for reopening after an extended closure

Many businesses, including yours, may be returning to normal business very soon. Below are some tips from our team of experts for re-opening your espresso machine.

If your espresso machine has been sitting completely idle for two or more weeks, we recommend:

1.  Take these steps 2-3 days before you re-open to ensure the machine is working.

2.  If installed softener/filter cartridge has been idle for 30+ days, we recommend it be changed before the machine is used; if that can’t happen, go to step 3.

3.  Purge the water softener/filter cartridge

A. Open the softener rinse valve

i. Usually located immediately after the softener head
ii. Mavea has a flush button on top of the filter head
iii. If there is no flush valve, disconnect the water line at the machine

B. Put a bucket under the rinse valve or water line (or extend line to a drain)

C. Ensure water to the softener is turned on

D. Open rinse valve

E. Run 4-5 gallons of water through the flush valve

F. Discard water

G. Close rinse valve

4.  Turn on espresso machine

5.  Wait till the steam boiler is completely heated and pressurized (approx. 1.1 Bar)

6.  Using the hot water tap, purge two times your boiler capacity; discard water

A. Determine boiler size

i. Check your user manual

ii. Check the manufacturer’s website

iii. Most 2-group heat exchanger machines have an 11-14 liter boiler

iv. If your machine has separate steam and coffee boiler, assume an 8-10 L steam boiler

7.  Purge each group head

A. For heat exchanger machines, flush 2 L through each group

B. If your machine has separate coffee boilers, flush 3x coffee boiler capacity through each group

8.  Clean each group head thoroughly; do it a second time.

9.  Call if you need maintenance

10.  Follow similar steps for your coffee brewer

Welcome Back & Good Luck!

And remember, we’re here to assist you with all of your espresso machine service and repair needs!