Portafilter Pressure Gauge Kit

Works great…Save yourself some time and remove the metal filter in the portafilter first. Otherwise will likely leak. Also, put lots of teflon tape on and you won’t have to tighten it ‘all the way’. This allowed me to view the gauge properly. The chat support person was very helpful as well.

Tip: To remove funnel on bottom of portafilter, insert bottom into a bench mounted vice and pull on handle. Cover the bottom of portafilter with cloth before tightening the vice to prevent damaging the finish. I also added a few drops of food grade oil (can use vegetable oil) an hour before using the vice. I did not have to use heat.

Check the pressure of your unit with this pressure gauge kit. Swapped the spout of my OEM portafilter with this kit, using teflon tape around the threads, and ran the unit until the pressure maxes out (and the OPV kicks in). With this I was able to confirm my unit would tolerate much higher pressure then I wanted, and could also confirm my 9-bar spring upgrade worked as intended. Great tool for us crazy coffee folk!

The portafilter pressure gauge conversion is nice little package. The leak that it produced came from the basket not sealing tight against the walls of portafilter housing. I removed the basket retention spring and added couple layers of sealing tape around the filter basket and pressed it in housing. No tape produced 9 - 10 bar, with the tape seal 14 bar. I have not read about anyone else having this issue. I've had this Gaggia Classic Pro for 4 years or so. So the pump supplies water through the portafilter to the gauge, the filter housing fills with water and expels from under the lip of the filter and housing.
The only other item I would change is the pressure gauge mating treads from straight to taper pipe thread.

Heh. Not really. I seem to have stored the original in a “safe” place, & now I can’t find it. 😂 They both did the job. It’s a bit fiddly using plumbers tape on the short thread of the portafilter, but works fine eventually.