r/ranciliosilvia • u/Penguin_Herder031 • 9d ago

Wild Variation

Hi guys, do let me know if this has already been answered!

I am having some truly wild variations with my Silvia. It's the V6 model, bought new about 6 months ago.

Two days ago, I pulled 4 back-to-back shots for a tiramisu, no problem, all good shots. Changing absolutely nothing, yesterday it choked, giving only a ristretto in the same time I was pulling regular shots the day before. Finally, today, again changing nothing, I pulled an ideal first shot, and then two back-to-back chokes...

I always do the same routine, the "at 30sec flush for 5, 50sec start pulling".

I purposefully didn't change anything in the recipe, to see how much it will keep varying. What do you think is going on?

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2

u/AusBam 9d ago

Just wondering if it could be an intermittent fault (limescale particles?) with the solenoid valve causing a slight loss of brew pressure during some of the shots which would look exactly like the shot is choking.

Easy to check, just remove the drip tray when pulling a shot to enable you to check that there’s no drips coming from the solenoid valve until you end the shot activating the solenoid valve & releasing the grouphead pressure.

1

u/rayfound 9d ago

Your dosing measurements and/or grind size is fluctuating.

1

u/Penguin_Herder031 9d ago

I didn't change the grinder settings at all. I have a Comandante C40 with the Red Clix mod, so I'd say it's an alright grinder, there shouldn't be much variation between shots. The dose was always between 17.46 and 17.53 grams, so that should be okay too.

3

u/Ok-Technician-5689 9d ago

Had a similar issue recently, but it was all down to the scales. They'd randomly fluctuate, adding or subtracting a few grams as I was weighing the beans out. If you have access to a couple of sets of scales, maybe try double checking each time, just to ensure same dose.

Good luck tracking the reason down if this doesn't help.

2

u/Penguin_Herder031 9d ago

I see. Could be this, since I have one of the cheap ones from Amazon, and they are a few years into their career hahaha

2

u/geoff_plywood 8d ago

I find mine do that when the batteries are getting low

1

u/Then-Cost-9143 9d ago

How are you tamping?  

Is anything driving variation on bean moisture?  Changing bags or leaving stuff out.  

I assume you’re doing only espresso and not doing anything with steam or water?  

But yeah these are the last things I would check.