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  • It is designed to either have a reservoir filled by hand or be plumbed in. For the first few years it wasn’t in a location that could be plumbed in and we got through 2 or 3 5l bottles of water a week (our local water is bastard hard). When we built our kitchen we had a specific coffee/tea making area and we plumbed in the machine and put in a bestmax xl water filter/softener.

    In the under sink photo there is the thin blue pipe that splits into two feeds- one goes to the tap and the other connects to the braided hose which attaches to the coffee machine.

    This has massively reduced our plastic waste and that filter also gives us filtered drinking water and feeds the cold water/ice machine in the fridge.

    For making coffee there is another benefit, as we can do pre infusion of the grounds, when the e61 lever is raised there is a point where the valve is opened but the pump isn’t active. So the mains water pressure can push hot water into the puck. Wait for 5-10 seconds and then fully raise the lever for the pump to press the water through.

    My assumption is that during the pre infusion the grounds swell a bit and we appear to get much less channelling in the shots. We only use a naked portafilter and very rarely get any little sprays coming out.

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