Weird Problem - Minerals Blocked Steam Boiler Input
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Eric Christoffersen
Aug 14, 2022, 10:29:07 PM8/14/22
to Brewtus
Made 3 shots in the morning. Wife made a shot, then... strange in our house.. she made a steamed milk drink. No issues.
At noon wife found me to say she turned off the machine because it was making a horrific noise. Turned on machine and indeed its making an awful low pitched murmur.
Lifting brew lever there's water trickling out of brew head, but no water to be had from steam or water nozzles.
Something's plugged?
Started taking machine apart step by step, nothing's plugged and finally I've got the steam boiler out. I can blow through the steam boiler output, but not into the steam boiler input. I can insert allen key into the steam boiler output, but not into the input. Input is plugged?
We impact gun to remove the heating element and there's surprisingly little scale inside. Lets say a bunch of sheets of grey that are maybe 0.25mm thick. In the past there was a planet of concretion on the heating element, this time it was very minor.
I feel around and there's this mass of hard mineralization piled around the steam boiler input. Sucker is totally covered in minerals. The output nozzle is clear.
We left the boiler filled with white vinegar for an hour and managed to pick the mineralization chunks out with my finger. Solid chunks of gravel about 7mm diameter. Finally was able to press a probe into the steam input and then it all broke free.
Super weird that all the minerals would pile up there. Must have been a long time happening. Maybe 3 weeks since we drew any water.
Reassemble and fired machine up, the steam boiler fill is really unhappy, big juddering with the steam heat light going on and off. Did that for about 30 seconds before it calmed down and now it seems normal.
At noon wife found me to say she turned off the machine because it was making a horrific noise. Turned on machine and indeed its making an awful low pitched murmur.
Lifting brew lever there's water trickling out of brew head, but no water to be had from steam or water nozzles.
Something's plugged?
Started taking machine apart step by step, nothing's plugged and finally I've got the steam boiler out. I can blow through the steam boiler output, but not into the steam boiler input. I can insert allen key into the steam boiler output, but not into the input. Input is plugged?
We impact gun to remove the heating element and there's surprisingly little scale inside. Lets say a bunch of sheets of grey that are maybe 0.25mm thick. In the past there was a planet of concretion on the heating element, this time it was very minor.
I feel around and there's this mass of hard mineralization piled around the steam boiler input. Sucker is totally covered in minerals. The output nozzle is clear.
We left the boiler filled with white vinegar for an hour and managed to pick the mineralization chunks out with my finger. Solid chunks of gravel about 7mm diameter. Finally was able to press a probe into the steam input and then it all broke free.
Super weird that all the minerals would pile up there. Must have been a long time happening. Maybe 3 weeks since we drew any water.
Reassemble and fired machine up, the steam boiler fill is really unhappy, big juddering with the steam heat light going on and off. Did that for about 30 seconds before it calmed down and now it seems normal.
I've no idea what the steam fill sensor looks like. Any idea what would cause the juddering? Machine seems totally fine now.
Heres a snap of steam boiler with what I think is the steam fill pump.
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