Dave: Thank you for taking the time to label the parts. It's replies like your that make HB a wonderful place to hang out.

Mark

This is looking pretty good. There was a bit of scale on the boiler level probe, the probe itself is virtually spotless. The vacuum seal is looking pretty clean too.

Shooting a 3 Watt LED into the boiler probe hole and looking thought the vacuum seal hole gave me a bit of a view. Seems like there is a light gray coat inside, nothing like some of the scale pictures I've seen. Looks like I'll need a 12 mm Allen wrench for the heat exchange cap (anyone know the real size, I'm guessing as my 10 mm one is too small).

The machine has sat for a while with water in the tank. Would this be the same condition as what is put into the system a couple of months ago, or would it have precipitated out minerals? In any case I used a straw to take a water sample of the water in the boiler, a quick test with a Hatch ppm test strip yields a 50 ppm. Hey, this water is better than my water softer water....



Mark

I soaked the outside of the level probe in citric acid and hot water for 30 minutes. The portion above the boiler water line clean up. The other area is thicker than I originally thought. Kind of like one to two sheets of paper in thickness.

Mark

Sounds like it is in good shape. I would still give it a descale just to cover the bases and keep ahead of any problems. I have not removed the heat exchanger inspection bolt so I am not sure what size it is.

Allen head size 12mm good for top of grouphead and heating exchanger

Definitely you need a descaling, the probe casing is solid brass ( normal color in real clean life)

Yep descaling is in order. While browsing the HOW-TOS I didn't see a definitive guide. I'd like to read up on how strong to make the citric acid solution, guides to how long to leave it, heated solution vs cold, etc.

Couldn't find a 12mm Allen wrench at Lowes or OSH, guess I'll have to order on-line.

In the mean time I dropped out the group head.... ughhhh, makes me scared to ever order an espresso at a restaurant. The green scrubby hardly touches this stuff. Scraped some of the crud off with a piece of wooden chopstick. They are currently soaking in a strong solution of hot water and Cafiza (again).

Here is a over exposed shot so that the rather black good is shown in it's full glory...


Cheers
Mark

Yup. I figured the group would be in bad shape given the portafilter condition. You will probably want to replace those gaskets as well. There is one in the group and another between the flying saucer (that thing on the left) and the grouphead. They are probably both hard as rocks. You may want to get with Stefano (two posts up) and see if he has an Elektra gasket kit and replace all of them while you are working on the machine.

A couple of the holes in the shower holder are plugged solid. I'm thinking of using a needle to clear them (if I can). A kit of Elektra gaskets would be a welcome thing. The green (vikon?) gasket is actually still plyable, but it needs replacement. The group head gasket is a bit plyable, may have been replaced at one point. In any case I'll be replacing it too.

Mark