Normcore 58mm Precision High Extraction Basket With Titanium PVD Coating, Precision Filter Basket, Bottomless Portafilter Basket 18 Gram For 58mm Espresso machines, 18g

I love this basket! It came with a small stack of paper filters and a puck screen, too! Very neat!The basket fits perfectly in my La Pavoni after a few cranks. It top edge is flat and seems to not be for my machine, but a bit of elbow grease got the rim bent nicely and everything is fine now.My shots are great! The distribution of the flow on the bottom is also great!Everything is thick, the basket seems durable, the bottom is flat!, and I’m generally pleased.Happy with this unit and I think you will be as well.

Used in my Gaggia Classic Pro. The stock basket has always been fit or miss for me, 50% success rate in pulling a good shot. I got a 22g basket with a bottomless portafilter. That one had better flow success, but 22g is a bit too much caffeine for me in a single shot.With this Normcore 18g basket, I'm able to get consistent shots with great flow profiles. The biggest con is that the oval holes catch irregular fines and clog easily. Cleaning is not easy, as the grounds can stay stuck. Using the steam want to flush the fines from the bottom up gets most of them. But many get stuck so bad you need to soak and scrub to get them out. If you're not OCD about having a perfectly clean basket all the time, and care more about the quality of shot that comes out, I highly recommend giving this a try.

I've had this basket as my daily driver for 3 months.My recipe:1:1 Ristretto shot starting with 22g of coffee beans6 ounces of milkPros: (good size, high quality construction, tasty espresso)I really like this basket, I had been using the stock basket from Rocket prior to purchasing the Norm Core high extraction basket. The increased capacity is nice going from 18g of beans to 22g of beans. It feels pretty solid in your hands, really good construction. It gives you that espresso rain effect that I've come to love.Cons: (paper filters are required, lacks ease of cleaning)When it comes to cleaning I have to say it falls a little short. Something to note, the paper filters that come with the basket are not as optional as you might think. I've found over the past 3 months that not using the filters causes grounds to be stuck in the holes, and can make for a bad experience trying to clean. I feel this is especially so, when trying to pull back to back shots without a filter. While I prefer paper filters anyway, I think you should have good results regardless for a product at this price point.

First off, my basket came obviously used by someone who clearly did not want to use paper filters... Grinds were stuck very stubbornly into the slits/holes. I cleaned it, which was a bit of a task probably just because of how long it was sitting like that.It also did not come with a portafilter spring. I didn't see any mention of this in the product listing, so maybe they don't include that with this one, however they did for the other Normcore high extraction basket I bought (arguably that one is larger because it takes the 53mm filters instead of the 51mm included with this basket).Both of these baskets from Normcore make it difficult to lock the portafilter into the Bambino Plus. It concerns me that I might damage the machine since it is plastic.I then took the advice I saw in the comments and decided I will only use this with the included paper filters. Which are included, because even though the manufacturer wants to suggest you don't need them, cleaning this basket will always be a bit more involved due to the shape and size of the holes, so including them is an apparent suggestion that you will want to use them. There is zero cleanup when you use the paper filter (zilch, none, nada... Wipe it dry... done).Largely, I got the basket (and a few others) for my Bambino Plus so that I could grind a little finer, closer to my 58mm baskets, so that I could switch between machines more easily. The paper filter helps to go even finer, so that is another reason for me to use them. The basket does indeed allow you to grind finer than other similarly sized baskets. It's hard for me to say how much finer though.I grabbed one of the other high extraction baskets from this maker (it has much tinier holes). I used the same coffee and grind size and pulled these back to back. The other basket filled in faster, more evenly, produced a faster and better flow, and tasted better. I believe that the "slotted hole" basket would need a slightly coarser grind to match that flow.Overall: I should reserve final judgment until after I dial in, but I believe I can say that even for a relatively medium roast, I still needed to yield greater than a 1:2 ratio to avoid unpleasant acidity with this basket. I could see someone wanting this basket to make lighter roasts more achievable on the Bambino's, but from my limited testing it doesn't seem to help enough, though under dosing and larger yields will help, I don't think a 1:2 ratio will be doable. But it does help with a finer grind than other baskets, however you can go even finer with other designs. If you do want to avoid using the paper filters, I recommend soaking in cafiza regularly which helped a ton with the stubborn grinds stuck in the holes. Overall, my experience was lackluster with this basket.

I bought a week ago a different brand of filter. It worked, but not without struggle. Obviously when I got this brand my coffee was already set in the machine after trying different shots. This filter only took 2 shots to set the perfect shot of coffee. The first one to see where I was, and the second one to do the perfect shot.It was that simple!It took me about 6 shots with the other filter although the distance between adjusting the grinder was just relatively close.So only two tries with this one.One of the best filters for espresso. Very smooth and fancy!By the way, I am using Breville Bambino and the filter fits a bit tide, keep that in mind, and a disclaimer if you use it but the filter works great!!