The Right Way To Tamp 

I usually tamp to avoid channeling..but I don't want to avoid your channel.

Wondering if you’ve seen that fluid tamper? Basically a water bed tamper. Ends up in a puck with even density, although not even depth.

The Idroprep Hydroforming Tamper

I just TAMPER THE $HyT out of it!!!! BOOOOMM LANCE!!

Please a video on head space next.

It attracts too many puck worms. You have to tamp without rhythm.

As I consume larger and larger quantities of caffeine I’ve become imbued with a terrible purpose. I know this road leads to me drinking the espresso of life - at 100% extraction it’s unclear how it’s a liquid at all. 🏜️

may thy puck chip and shatter

@@wright.boy_ That one killed me 🤣

As it is written

Yeah would be nice to see a little more research be done on the sponsors used for the channel

Yeah I figured that was implied tbh lol I talk about this in so many videos about partcile compression I maybe errantly assumed knowledge in the side of the audience on that basic principle lol Appreciate the watch!

Imagine explaining the difference between conical and flat to Lance 😭😅

this is specialty coffee stuff, you would be surprised if you know what specialty tea culture is like especially in china

thats only a joke@@antiwoosh4302

specialty tea is definitely a thing in Asia, and it can definitely be this nerdy

Tea ceremonies: "Am I a joke to you?"

You clearly never had Chinese gongfu style tea. In fact, tea bags are one of the worse ways to have tea. There is actually no way to actually tell the quality of tea in tea bags. Once you go loose leaf, you never go back. Tea bags just taste weak and bland

Nutation is the best way by far. Maximum density, minimum room for serious errors, zero cost. I've been using it for 10 years and don't look back.

The whole video is gooood tho

The tamping pressure inconsistency is going to be just about the same as the tamping pressure inconsistency of the decent tamper. Don't worry about it. What Lance is pointing out is that a 15lb, 25lb or 30lb spring isn't going to actually hit 15, 25 or 30 pounds of force except for when the compressed puck has a specific amount of headroom. But the reality is that 25 lbs spring is more than enough to get well into the "consistent maximum compression" range unless you're seriously under-dosing your basket. The important part of the normcore tamper is that it tamps level. And if you want to turn it into a decent tamper then I imagine an appropriately sized piece of pipe section could be swapped in for the existing force spring to remove the variability caused by the spring.

@@isfiyiywafibc6qaiiiiiiiiii570 oh cool! thanks for pointing that out! That makes me feel better about my purchase. Thank you!

@@isfiyiywafibc6qaiiiiiiiiii570 that’s a great point of removing the spring if it’s not stiff enough and just adding a solid pipe

Reduce your dose

⁠@@user-cb9qe6dw5ihow much?

Puck thickness and enough headspace are important, sure. But perfecting those without also perfecting prep won’t give you good results with light roasts. Probably the only decent WiredGourmet video out there. He spreads so much misinformation it’s beyond belief.

I agree puck prep is critical. I failed at it for decades. Your comment is amusing to me because I watch many Lance videos where I react negatively, but not Wired Gourmet. I think part of my issue is that Lance's taste buds are not like mine and he likes light roasts, and you can go seriously wrong doing what he says with darker roasts. Anyways if you use a screen, you can overfill a basket but not under fill it (within reason), which Wired Gourmet does not talk about properly.@@RegrinderAlert

Yeah ive beenn thinking about it a bit lately, I think the digital load cell may be the option that takes off. Im surprised there isnt one in the market already. Who knows maybe we will see a kick starter for one before too long. I think there are a couple like the mh3bomber one that has a calibrated spring that clicks when its fully compressed but the reviews are mixed as to how it actually works. I have the YMWVH version which i really similar to the norm core, in some pics it has markings on the shaft like you say though mine doesn't. Im esentially banking on the max depression always being over the 30lb mark or so. I havent dont much measureing of head space etc yet, - I would think to measure tamp force you could just put it on the scales as normal then record the results as the spring bottoms obviously after that point the readings will be off. Im not sure you need to mess around with measureing head space unless Im missing something. At any rate my machine is a lapavoni pro which is not exactly the best machine to gage consistency, though the spring tamper is definialty a improvment over the plastic one I had before.

Check Sur la table “Gharyan Mug” ..not 100% sure

Id be interested in this too

Same here!

The important thing is the pressure gradient through the puck , and the absolute pressure in the puck, not the pressure that the group-head is seeing. This is affected by many things that Lance talks about in many of his videos. You can play with this by using high and low flow baskets, filter papers, various screens. As well as adjusting how many fines your grinder produces (slow feeding, burr type), and where they are distributed in the puck (WDT versus shaking). The effects of these varies based upon the coffee you are using. Overall, I would say a 9 bar group-head pressure, a good grinder, and a classical puck prep, as shown by the Wired Gourmet in a recent video should give you acceptable results with minimal fuss.

@@TomJones-tx7pb My question is: presuming all other variables are equal, what is the optimal pump pressure in a non-pressure profile EM?

Hoffman has tried to address that in his videos, and landed on 9 bar. That is not accurate, however, because the manometer reading is different on different machines. It would be more accurate to say that James does not like the machines he reviews set to 10 bar or above. Each coffee is different, which is why Lance goes on about the "dialing in" so much. Also a lot of coffees are forgiving on pressure. In fact a lot of coffees are forgiving on everything, within limits. Watching puck prep in some videos reminds me of Rafael Nadal getting ready to serve. @@dparad22

Yeah it can. That was Hugo tamping, btw. Lol Any spring tamp can do this. The leveler is a guide

This is why I tamp with a self-leveling tamper while I still have the dosing ring attached (as long as the ring holds the tamper level above the coffee, and allows the tamper to sink in deep enough).

I can fully tamp with my flair pro without issues. Did you try a courser grind?

@@pantac4493 So I was doing this for months, and my conical grinder has somewhere around 240 stepped settings. I found fresh coffee had to be ground at 36 from 0(lowest/finest setting), while towards the end of my canister, I could do 34 without choking it. Still, with these micro adjustments, I wasn't getting good flow, it either ran straight through, or it would choke, leaving me to believe there has to be some amount of space left in the puck for expansion, or something. I was getting very inconsistent results that didn't look good, until I started letting up on the pressure, stopping once I couldn't feel compression.

Depends on the coffee and volume in the basket. The real take away is ideal tamping would change coffee to coffee. You'd need to know the proper compression needed for ideal environment for extraction and would need it to be volume based. But since that's insane to calculate coffee to coffee, best to just load the heaviest spring (doesn't really matter) to ensure effective max compression for optimal consistency.