[Avidan Ross] has an unyielding passion for coffee. Brewing a proper espresso is more than measuring fluid ounces, and to that end, his office’s current espresso machine was not making the cut. What’s a maker to do but enlist his skills to brew some high-tech coffee.

For a proper espresso, the mass of the grounds and the brewed output need to be precisely measured. So, the office La Marzocco GS3 has been transformed into a closed-loop espresso machine with a Particle Photon and an Acaia Lunar waterproof scale at its heart.

On the software side, to run the ‘smart brew’ function a make espresso button press is emulated, and the mass of the brewed espresso is constantly measured. Once the argument’s ‘target output mass’ is reached the firmware shuts off the machine. Brew time is then reported, allowing [Ross] or others to adjust the grind of the espresso beans to fine-tune to the recipe.

The next step is to phase out the human element of adjusting the grind — luckily there are some perfectly hackable solutions there. Fine espresso will fuel that endeavour in the meantime!

[Via Medium]