Try to google it and you can find this in Shoppe.
Shipping from Bandar Hilir, 75200 Melaka.

I mean any review on it?? My friend ask me to consider buying china brand instead of delonghi or breville..

I bought Gemilai CRM 3605 last year for RM 999 from Shopee. Overall without mod, it's a class above entry level Delonghi or Saeco Poemia. Reason to choose CRM 3605 over CRM 3601 is the brew pressure gauge. Another advantage is using standard size 58mm portafilter.

In order to dial in 9 bar pressure, I had added in variable resistor to control the pump pressure. As it's running on thermoblock, note that it will heat up the brew group. Always run hot water thru the brew group to heat up the portafilter and warm up the cup. Also, in order to maintain the temp during brewing, I pour hot water into the water tank until it reach 50 degrees C. This will remove sourness from the espresso due to temp drop.

You should remove the shower screen and wash the internal. You will see coffee stain from the other side. Or if you are lazy, get IMS shower screen with nanocoat. There's no coffee stain at the back even after one month of usage.

Pretty obvious comparing your dose/yield vs taste notes that you have inconsistencies going on.
I see that you did lever mod on the steam wand, so question is did you mod anything else? OPV? Sirai Pressure Stat maybe?

Also, what are your grinding habits? Is this single dosing into the grinder?

IMS/VST baskets are precision baskets meaning their holes are guaranteed to be consistent in diameter and very clean. They are also in general larger in diameter than your average stock basket. In that sense, you will find that you will need to grind finer than normal when you changed baskets.
Grinding finer gives advantages of increase strength of coffee in all aspects however, if the grinder is not up to it (64mm++ burrs at least), you will find that you are producing more fines or clumping than normal. This gives you inconsistencies in your extractions later on

So in summary - your 2 areas to go analyze
1. Temperature/pressure stability in the Oscar
2. Grinder fines/clumps consistency across multiple shots

I do remove the shower screen, brass group diffuser and soak it together with basket and portafilter every time I do do back wash, which I did today.
Do you remove shower screen everyday?

This post has been edited by MyHobby: Mar 31 2020, 12:32 AM

All modifications were done by the previous owner.
I know that it has a faster heat up, OPV to control pressure which I adjust to 9.5 bar and steam handle is now with lever to control frothing.

If not mistaken, you used to use Oscar so you should be familiar with it. What more and how can I do to deal with temperature and pressure?

For grinding - does it means not far I can go than to upgrade grinder?

Yes, I must agree that something is not not right since I changed to a higher capacity straight wall IMS basket.
The thing that are obvious to me after the change to IMS basket - I will get more aftertaste that I like and enjoy.

Last brew today...
The best I did today with Columbia beans on IMS basket still with 1 tiny channeling (not obvious but still visible with naked eyes)
Dose of 22g yield 44g 22s brew time. Not sour at all despite of shorter brew time.
Puck knocked out in 1 piece.

Thanks...

Guys can refer me any retail for machine in northern area??

Used to do it every week but after changing to IMS nanocoat shower screen, I do it once every 2 months. It's not even dirty when I remove it.

Really not much you can do here.
Temperature on a HX machine (which utilizes pressure stat to control) always has limitations. You want to get yourself onto a PID controlled machine
That said, upgrading the basket might have turned out to be a "downgrade" since the other things cannot keep up to it

-

This post has been edited by stevanistelrooy: Apr 1 2020, 01:12 PM

unless its a commercial machine with adjustable gigleur...then you can make say group 1 hotter for some beans...group 2 cooler for others...etc

This post has been edited by dwRK: Apr 1 2020, 12:37 PM

my general observations...

1) maybe let your grinder settle down...dun take it apart for cleaning for a few months so the burrs can wear and realign...

2) you trying to keep yield constant 40g for the longest time, now 44g... i never do this...prefer instead to stop on "degree of blonding"...this way i "know" how much "COFFEE" has been extracted...not how much "WATER" has passed through... my coffee may end up sometimes ristretto sometimes longgo...but amount of extraction is about the same...so the taste is very consistent just sometimes more intense or diluted... running a shop is different because customer may ask or ristretto or longgo and you have to be able to adjust and deliver on the yield and taste

3) your coffee is sometimes sour sometimes bitter....so probably means is not a temperature problem per se...because cold==sour...hot==bitter...you just need to be more consistent...hard to say also if the bitterness its because of over extraction... you can do a temperature test to see how hot is your water

4) forget about studying the wet puck...puckology is useless...soggy or dry depends on many factors including types of bean and roasts levels...i got beans that always give soggy puck...1 tiny dimple does not mean channeling... clue to channeling is easy....just observe how fast the coffee comes out during the first 4-5 sec... it should just start to drip out...if you get quite a good flow you have channeling, or grind too coarse, or stale beans...

5) forget about getting a new grinder for now...

6) baskets are designed for certain range of doses...so big baskets need more coffee...


so for you to try this new 14 days...

dose as high as your basket design/allow...adjust grinder for 25-35 sec pull...learn the associated blonding color vs tastes...once you get consistent taste...then you can slowly adjust to get back the desired yield...playing with dose and grind

hope these helps and good luck

This post has been edited by dwRK: Apr 1 2020, 11:43 AM

Hi

first time posting here. wondering is there any other roasters to check out? Ordered from beanshipper and perk coffee before.

any recommendations? i mainly use the frenchpress and v60.

Best

Just bought a Niche Zero white from Dankoff with 10% discount. I'm tired of cleaning the Macap M4 stepless as I only single dose. Hopefully it's latest batch with NFC disc.

Shamelessly self promoting
Can check us out at www.reframecoffee.com. We're doing free shipping nationwide as well now for the MCO period

Frenchpress/V60 is just a brewing method. Question is what flavors do you like in your coffee? Fruity? Nutty/bold? etc

Been trying few type of beans for espresso around RM 70 to RM 100 for a kg. So far I still prefer Reframe's brazil beans.

Nice, I think i stumbled across our website before while researching. I'll look into it. i'm more a fruity person, any beans you recommend?

Filter and fruity then look for the Ethiopian Hama Bekele or the Kenya Gatomboya AA

The Kenya is a very good classic kenyan taste - strong blackcurrant, purple fruits throughout

Nice, it will be my next when mine finishes.