Idle musing of a work in progress.
Well, after partially assembling, checking for leaks, fixing leaks, and completely reassembling, Miss Silvia (a 2006 Rancilio Silvia) is pulling its first espresso shots and steaming milk for lattes. So far everything is working more or less like it was before it died. Next weekend I replace the portafilter gasket and see if that gets rid of the niggling leak around the portafilter.
Well, I managed to fix the second major headache in my quest to revive Miss Silvia (a 2006 Rancilio Silvia). If you don’t remember, this was my boneheaded over-tightening of the high-temperature thermostat. It resulted in breaking the shaft of it…the part that screwed into the boiler.
I had a couple of options: buy a replacement boiler (to the tune of way too much money…), try extracting the screw using any means available, or jury-rig something.
Since the high-temperature thermostat essentially prevents the machine from turning into a bomb if it gets too hot (steam under pressure can be a dangerous thing), I wanted to do my best to extract the broken screw and replace it with a new high-temperature thermostat. So, I ordered the new thermostat and and a set of micro screw extractors:
The biggest screw extractor in the set did the trick:
Well, today I have another broken screw problem with my Silvia. This time I broke the screw off the high-limit thermostat. This is the part that shuts off power to the device if it’s about to turn into a bomb, so I’d rather back out the broken screw and replace with a new part than jury-rig a fix.
If you look closely, you’ll see that it’s broken off INSIDE my new boiler… and the local hardware store doesn’t sell reverse drill bits/screw extractors this small.
The fun never ends on this project…
Cleaning the Silvia was achieved by repeatedly filling the group head with a solution of water and citric acid (Dezcal), letting it soak, and scrubbing with a scotch brite pad. Took about 20hrs of soaking and scrubbing to get all of the mineral deposits off.
Well, for the most part, it’s been a pleasure to work on this espresso machine (a 2006 Rancilio Silvia). Until, that is, this:
Most people won’t understand the exquisite headache this represents.
Well, I bought the espresso machine off my employer when it stopped working. I got a good deal on it, and figured it would be a fun project to undertake fixing it. And at the end, I’d have a working machine and great espresso.
The model is a Rancilio Silvia, and this is what she looks like when she’s all buffed and shiny (actually, the image is of a V2 machine. The machine I have is a V1, and has a slightly different grill over the catch basin):
The first thing I had to do was diagnose what’s wrong with her. I was expecting to have to replace the boiler, regardless. But when we unplugged it, the machine was still able to pour on. It just produced a tepid pull of espresso with a funky taste to it.
When I got it home, the machine wouldn’t turn on without tripping the GFI outlet. Uh oh. Maybe this was going to be more complicated than I thought.
After a little bit of Google-Fu, I found this dicussion. After disconnecting the wires from the heating element posts, the machine powered on. Since I had planned on replacing the boiler anyways, this doesn’t really change anything for me except that it solves the mystery of why it wouldn’t power on.
I’ll post again when I start ripping things apart. But for now, here’s what the guts of Miss Siliva look like:
Let’s see… electricity, steam, heat & pressure… what could possibly go wrong?