Was in the market for one of these, and seems to be close to a historic low.
Breville BES870BSS The Barista Espresso Coffee Machine $519.20 C&C @ The Good Guys eBay
Last edited 17/12/2018 - 10:01 by 1 other user
Related Stores
closed Comments
Dual boiler is nicer to use but these go great
with 10% off GC this is an awesome price at $454, too bad my BES860 wont die yet..
Hope the eBay purchase is eligible for the Breville promotion
Should be, they give you a tax invoice when you collect.
Thanks for that! I was only aware of the other promotions for the more expensive machines
Link is not loading for me. Whats the promotion entails?
Still going strong from five years. Very good machine. Just waiting it to die so i can buy the dual boiler. But till then just enjoy coffee.
Picked this up a little over a week ago when eBay had a 10% off site wide, brought it down to $539. Had some eBay gift cards ended up paying $380. For someone who knows sweet f all about making coffee I haven’t made a bad tasting one yet.
Been using aldi coffee beans and the longest extraction I’ve had is around 20 seconds with the grinder set on 5 and grind amount set on 1 o clock for a double. Most of the times I’ve got somewhere between 12-15s extraction, no idea why. Was I not tamping hard enough?
Also when I try it without milk it taste quite sour. With milk it’s delicious.
If it's sour, then the beans might be a little light on the roast, or it might be a bit under-extracted. Some coffee's are just more acidic/sour; some people prefer this.
Is it taking 12-15 seconds to extract to 30mls, or do you have less or more than 30 mls after 12-15 seconds? Is there a thick and rich crema (probably not really with supermarket beans) or is just sort of spraying out a bubbly mess?
When you empty the portafilter, is the puck solid and evenly wet, or is there soggy parts/dry parts? Cracks?
Thanks. No idea how many ml’s I’m getting, I don’t have anything to measure it and it’s just pouring into a regular mug. I think the harder I tamp, the longer it’s taking to pour but the amount looks about the same.
It’s poured out nicely every time I’ve made one, no mess at all and the basket is evenly wet and solid. I’ve never seen it have a dry part or noticed any cracks but will keep an eye out for that.
I’ve tried out other beans that were bought from a local cafe which they grinder for me but they’re a little too course. These ones give w thick crema on top but also taste sour without milk and extract for around 12 seconds
Extractions too short. You’ve got 3 possible culprits: 1) Grind is too coarse 2) Dosing too little 3) Tamping badly. (3) is impactful only if your technique is wrong, strength won’t affect it as much as long you nail 1 and 2. 2 should be defined by the specifications of the basket (they’re all different but my double is ~18g)
So to troubleshoot (1), get yourself a scale, weigh the grind in your basket and keep this number constant. Reduce grind settings to be finer in increments while keeping the weight the same. Keep making it finer until you hit that 30s extraction for ~36g of extraction (1:2 ratio if you’ve got 18g). If all else fails, your beans are stale, try fresh beans.
You’ll waste coffee but if you’re not changing beans often, you can most times just keep settings the same.
This was really helpful. Is it 30s once you hit the auto two-cup button, or when you can see liquid come out?
My acaia lunar starts timing on first drop so I go by that, but many people say start timing when you hit the button is fine too, it's a grey area for me. Pressure gauge is a good guide as well, there should be an optimal zone (I don't own this one so I'm not sure what's optimal here)
Thanks. I’ll try weigh out the grind and make sure it’s 18g but the finer I go the more the basket overflows. At the moment with my settings (grind 5, amount on 1 o clock) the basket has at least an extra 1cm of grounds stacked and with a good solid tamp it leaves a couple mm gap from the top of basket.
Mine starts pouring after ~9 seconds and the pressure gauge goes up near 1-2 o clock. A video I watched said the perfect spot s 12 o clock but I’ve only seen it there once when I used more coursely ground coffee
18g is just a guide! Double baskets can go anywhere from 14-22g (which is why some people fork out money for a VST precision basket). A couple of mm from the top after the top seems about right — about half a fingernail for me.
To troubleshoot dosing, look at the puck after extraction. If it’s mushy and soupy it’s underdosed, if it’s like a brick and really dry, you’ve probably got too much. If it looks saturated, comes out easily and holds its shape when it comes out, youve probably doses correctly. It should feel sponges after pressing it.
Once you get dosing right then you can troubleshoot the grind and after 1kg of wasted beans you’ve finally got it haha
I've bought one from last eBay 10% sale too :) After many attempts on different settings with supermarket beans, here is my 2 cents.
Using reference settings from the manual, grinder set 5 and grind amount 3 o'clock, weight the grind 10g/18g for single and double respectively. (Mine is pretty accurate) During extraction, pay attention to the pressure gauge. If the pressure gauge begins from around 9 o'clock then goes to 1 o'clock, flow should starts after 4-7 seconds and after button pressed. If the pressure gauge is under optimal range, set grinder to 3 and try it again, if it is over (in your case) set grinder to 7 and try it again.
Currently mine is set on 7 and 3 o'clock for Vittoria's Organic from Coles, 5 and 3 o'clock for Tulip bought in Melbourne.
Set the Grind to a 1 or 2, tamp pretty hard but its more to do with how fine you're grinding the beans and use the double basket. The pressure gauge should be up the top end of the espresso zone.
Thanks, I’ve been waiting for this to come on special for Christmas
Harvey Norman currently have this on special for $519.20 as well, with the $50 AMEX cashback to sweeten it further.
I had this machine for over almost 3 years now. It’s easy to operate and it’s reliable and convenient and with a little bit of skill, you can easily make better coffee than most coffee places. I doubt anyone would have any complaints about it. Highly highly recommended.