Fiorenzato All Ground Sense and Clumping at fine settings
I just bought a Fiorenzato All Ground Sense grinder as an upgrade to Baratza Sette 270 (with a single dose billows). My espresso setup is Flair p58 manual machine, which requires an extra fine grind - and occasional use of Breville Barista Pro, which I now mostly use to make quick single shots and for steaming milk for my milk drinks. Previously, I had to shim the Sette 270 due to it not grinding fine enough for the Flair P58, and with one shim it would grind capably and uniformly at the finer settings for p58 and midway for the Breville.
Enter the Fiorenzato. It is a beautiful machine, heavy duty, much more substantial/heavy and queter than the Sette, with a clever easy access to burrs when cleaning with a press of a button (cab easily expose./clean the top burr(. Three settings for Espresso, Moka and Filtered. At default settings, the grinds are even and beautifully uniform. Problem is, it does not grind fine enough for P58 either - which I anticipated with a purchase of a factory 3-shim kit. On Espresso Parts site, there was a shim installation video, which I followed when first installing the thinnest shim, then had to settle for the middle one with the thinnest installed the grinder still would not grind fine enough for the Flair p58. The middle shim did the trick, but now my grind comes out clumpy - and these clumps cannot be broken up with WTD (and I have a modular tool as well as others, all for naught). It is also difficult to find a coarse setting for the Breville, for which even the coarsest grind now is too fine (with a middle shim) and it still comes out clumpy (and clogs the grouphead when pulling a shot). This happens with medium-lighter roasted beans and a darker roast - same results. Cleaning the grinder burrs and chute, same results. In the meantime, the same roasts are ground sans issues in the Sette - no clumps, no fuss. I realize the Sette is conical, while Fiorenzato is flat - but WTH? Any advice how to resolve this?
I like to single dose so outfitted the All Ground with a billows, and while it is meant to be used with a hopper with its wt, - Fiorenzato sells them outfitted with a billows from the factory. It retains a lot more than Sette does, nearly 2 gm. I am also not liking the fact that I can't use it with a dosing cup, but that's hopefully be remidied with a dfferent fork. The clumping is what makes me want to return it.