Hello all,

recently I bought an Crem Expobar Office automatic. It has a vibe pump, a CREM (pretty much same and compatible as E61) grouphead and an automatic dose electronics. It is just 3 years old.

The issues I have started just when the seller wanted to test it for me. It could not suck water, the boiler vac port could not close...
Anyway when I took it home, I took out the ULKA EX5 pump and cleaned it completely. This now seems working good. I put everything together but...
- the boiler filling time is pretty long. When it is empty, the electronics shuts off the pump (some timeout happens).
- brewing pressure seems to be also low and the time to get same amount of water from this Expobar is almost twice the time of my other machine.
- brew water temperature is not very high. After about 10 minutes of heating i run the water and I just can barely touch it...60 deg. C ?
- steam pressure seems to be lower than expected, but is not so bad.

So I decided to take out the brewhead today and cleaned it thoroughly (unfortunately I could not remove the shower screen because the seal is tight). Also the pressure relieve valve is cleaned. There was quite a nice limescale buildup.
- I put everything back, but all the issues persists.
- When the pump is running, quite big amount of water is returning from the deareator valve. I tried to close it by holding the tube, but the pressure seems does not go up.
- When I put a blind filter, the pump noise is still the same (low). It does not go higher in pitch.
- I tried to adjust the boiler pressure, but this will not solve the brew pressure.

Do you have any advices what to do? I am thinking to open the pump again and try to clean it again. And adjust the second ball valve, which should restrict back flow (I screwed it completely in).
And next I am thinking of descaling the valve for filling the grouphead and then boiler.

What is your idea? Thanks a lot.

And the pressure...I do not have a pressure meter, but when I make a shot, it has no crema. First 10ml it is just a black liquid and after that it goes to a water-like liquid. Surely the temp. and pressure are not good.

There is lots of Expobar info here: /downloads/ .

When beans are you using and how old? Ya need to get that shower screen/group gasket off and post some pics of your machine.

Thanks, I have searched the spare parts too.
It is this one: "office control" /downloads/ ... iagram.pdf
(you can recognize-it has a flowmeter with 1 side and 1 top port). But anyway there are just small modifications between these machines.

I use the same coffee on other machine - La Scala with no problems. Same grind, same lever with screen.
I will take photos tomorrow. I will also try to get the screen out. Hope the seal will not break.

Hope the seal will not break.

Well . . . I suppose I hope it does not break either. So then, order a new seal and dispersion screen before you make the attempt. These should be STANDARD (in the tool box) spares for anyone having an E-61ish machine.

Hi,

yesterday I probably discovered what went wrong. The HX boiler (upper pipe going to the grouphead) was almost clogged by lime scale. I mechanically removed the big deposits and descaled it. I have the boiler out so I will also descale the steam boiler too.

I hope when I put it together, it will work fine. But I am curious about the pressure - when I look at the schematic, the pressure generated by the pump should be also present in the grouphead through the bottom pipe. So clogged upper pipe is a problem for heating the grouphead, but still shouldn't be problem for pressurizing it.
I still need to remove the shower screen and clean this area, which could also block the water flow. I will post the results after assembling it back.

Share more pictures of how you descale it mate.

Hi,
basically it is simple. Just take apart almost everything, take photos or mark any wires so you know what comes where. Then clean the parts in acid. Wash with clean water, dry, assemble together.

So first of all power off the machine, let it cool and drain all the water out.
Then I removed most of the covers. I wanted the boiler take out so I unscrewed steam and hot water pipe. Disconnected grouphead pipes. Some of them you can remove on both sides, some must remain connected on boiler. Remove water pump connection. Remove electrical connections and screws from bottom of machine and the boiler goes out. Then I removed rest of the connections.

To clean the connections I used medium size pot filled with vinegar. It is cheap, works fine and after soem washing and running through hot water you will not notice its smell. Remove big deposits of lime scale with plastic scraper or screwdriver, try not to damage the pipes. Then put the pipes into the vinegar for about 1 hour. The time depends on how the deposits are big. For basic cleaning 30 minutes is ok, but I let it there for about 2 hours until I could not see any lime scale. When vinegar is working, you can see bubbles coming from there. After some descaling the vinegar needs to be thrown away and you need to use new one. Then I washed all pipes with clean water and tried if they are not clogged - just run water or air through.

o remove scale from boiler I used some rubber foam to fill the water outputs - you want to fill the boiler with vinegar, so it must remain there for some time. You can use anything just to cover the outputs. Then fill the boiler and the heat exchanger with vinegar - fully. Let it work for hour or so. Then drain it and clean with water.

Lastly I removed the grouphead. When the water connections are out, you just need to remove the 3 way valve - uncsrew drain pipe with hand and just slide down the valve coil. Then unscrew the grouphead from frame and it is out. To remove screen use screwdriver and try tu pull out the screen. It also depend on the machine which grouphead it does have. I had to break the seal, because it was hard as a rock. Under there it was a proper mess. I use plastic scraper, hand, old toothbrush and coffe clean detergent or bathroom chrome cleaner to remove all of the deposits. Then also remove the 3 way valve assembly (4 bolts) and a brass bolt on top of the grouphead to access the heating area. Also remove the Allen bolt. Check if any of the inside areas are not clogged or too dirty. Also remove the scale same way as before. Then disassemble the valve and clean it thoroughly. Always try to take photos or rememeber what goes where. Try do not to loose any gasket. You can buy them, but probably they will work fine. Surely replace them if it breaks or does not look good.

Then assebme everything back. On some pipes I used Loctite thread locker (pipe locker) just to make connections secure. Then power on, run about 5 liters of water through the machine so it cleans up and then its done.

I now need to buy new gasket and then try if the machine works fine. I hope the pressure will be fine. Will let you know.

Hello again,

so I put everything together and guess what. The problem with low pressure is still there!
Boiler is filled, HX too. All the pipes were OK, tightly connected. No leaks anywhere. I have checked the piping and orientation of valves. All seems OK. The grouphead is clean, 3 way valve cleaned...But when I turn the machine on, water from the grouphead just slowly flows, sometimes stops for a moment and a steam goes instead of water. I just cannot think what else could be wrong.
Do you have any idea?

I am thinking about 2 possibilities. 1)The HX boiler leaks into itself. I dont know how it will behave, but I can expect when leak is there, the pressure buildup will be very slow and the steam could leak from it too. 2) the pump is too weak or wrongly assembled. It will explain also looong boiler filling time and low pressure too.
I will try to use another pump. But if you have any idea, your help is appreciated. Thanks

I was so curious so I disassembled pump from my other machine and put it here. Works perfetly!

So I wondered what went wrong in the ULKA EX5 pump. Disassembled it and found a small rubber seal (about 6mm) is worn out.
You can check here. It was the seal just to the left of the first ball. I will try to find a new seal and it is done.