Cleaning – spouts. | The Bean Vagrant

Cleaning – spouts.

…P/f bowls nice and brassy, baskets, screens and blocks likewise – but spouts need attention soon!

So what’s the best way to clean p/f spouts? Get them off? If so, how? Wrestled with ours yesterday, and even though they’re almost new, they wouldn’t budge, and gave up for fear of breaking them..! Might not be any easier unscrewed anyway. So perhaps leave them on, soak, and scrub with a spout brush? Boil in espresso detergent then scrub with a brush..? Green scourer pad in there somehow..?

This entry was posted on October 1, 2009 at 9:09 pm and is filed under Uncategorized. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.

5 Responses to “Cleaning – spouts.”

james mcnally Says:
October 1, 2009 at 9:49 pm | Reply
You just need a mechanical advantage, to get the spout off. In other words, a lever.

I slot a cone spanner into the double spout (the handle is the right thickness) and twist. If your spout has the drilled holes – maybe stick a long screwdriver (star/Phillips head) in there, and twist. Works well for us.
- thebeanvagrant Says:
  October 2, 2009 at 5:55 pm | Reply
  Thanks!
  I tried (albeit a bit lamely) with a screwdriver, and a pair of pliers at the time, to no avail. Might need to try that spanner, or a vice, or better screwdriver …if I can’t clean them still-on with detergent.
blackmountainscoffee Says:
October 1, 2009 at 10:19 pm | Reply
Easy….just don’t clean it. It seems to work for so many out there.
- thebeanvagrant Says:
  October 2, 2009 at 6:03 pm | Reply
  Yep, that does sound easier!
  Even if I got them off, it’d still be tricky to get them really clean inside. With a scourer, you can get the p/f brass nice n shiny in a few ticks, but getting a scouring pad into the spouts with the same force is probably impossible. Yet I doubt detergent and a brush will get them as clean as the rest of the inside of the p/f – but if the spouts aren’t as clean as the rest – why bother..?!
  Makes a good case to go completely naked, but we use single shots in our smalls, so need some split doubles available.
thebeanvagrant Says:
October 31, 2009 at 6:28 pm | Reply
Ah – a solution! …at a cost:

http://morecoffeehit.blogspot.com/2009/10/teflon-coated-portafilters.html

Or, more affordably (to continue answering my own question!), simply make sure to get that green scourer down into ‘the void’ vigorously by any means necessary!
My resolution at the moment is to try to be a very fastidious cleaner with our new machine, despite the bemused and harrassed looks from the dozen or so other staff that use the machine without the same level of respect! 😉