Giotto not maintaining boiler pressure - Page 3

by **pravspresso** on Wed Jan 07, 2009 2:14 pm

This is turning me off from buying the Giotto Premium Plus.

by HB on Wed Jan 07, 2009 2:59 pm

Because of one report of a problem in an online forum? There are plenty of positive comments in the forums, plus plenty of positive consumer reviews on Coffeegeek. Not to forget the good news that ECM split off Rocket to give their semi-commercial/prosumer manufacturing proper attention.

by **Ozark_61** on Thu Jan 08, 2009 2:46 am

Hey Praveen - the ECM is a great machine! Any machine you have is going to need work here and there... and I've worked on my machine several times and I can even figure it out! :lol:

It's like working on a 73' ford pickup - open the hood and you can crawl in the bloody engine bay and work on the part directly. Any machine that's exposed to that much heat and pressure for that long a period of time is going to need work at some point. At least if something goes wrong, there are a bunch of good people here with experience to help you out.

by **jimmy** on Fri Jan 16, 2009 9:58 am

OK- I de-soldered the relays from the board and have tested them off the board. They all switch. I put them back on the board, scratched my head, and tested the primary winding of the transformer and guess what? no power. Of course no power on the secondary winding either. I'm just guessing, but maybe the transformer was going bad and finally just quit. I guess it still doesn't explain why the pump would work all the time but not the heating element.
The transformer on the board is a Myrra- a french company I think. I couldn't find an exact replacement but I did find a replacement from Newark.com. Part # 81f2431. I'll have to jumper the secondary legs but for 10 bucks shipped, I can deal with that. I'll report back with my results.
James

by **Ozark_61** on Fri Jan 16, 2009 4:59 pm

Sweet... I've got two dead gicar boxes, so if that works, I'll test those windings too.

by **jimmy** on Thu Jan 22, 2009 7:55 am

Well good news and bad.
I replaced the transformer and I'm back to the heater turning on very intermittently.
Its weird. If I tap, wiggle or rotate the Gicar boards I can get the heating element to turn on. I cant figure out if there is a loose connection somewhere or if its a bad component on the board. The only parts on the board that have moving parts are the relays and I tested each one off the board and they all switch.

Its frustrating but I'm so deep into fixing this that I just cant resort to buying a new Gicar box for $250.

Eric, any more ideas from you?

To be clear: when I rotate, tap or wiggle the gicar boards and the heater turns on I do not hear a relay switch. I hear a relay switch when I power the machine on with the front panel toggle.

I'm getting 12v DC at the voltage regulator as I should.

http://users.rcn.com/erics/ · by **erics** on Thu Jan 22, 2009 11:47 am

Your description of the problem would lead me to believe there exists a loose connection somewhere in the element circuit.

As an aid to troubleshooting, I would suggest you substitute a simple light bulb for the heating element and install a "silent" switch to power terminal 1 on the Gicar box. This would practically eliminate all machine noise from hampering your efforts.

Also - I was under the impression that the relay coils were powered by ~16 VAC and the water level probe was regulated at a lower voltage but still AC not DC.

edit - info about the Gicar box for the Quickmill machines from a friend - "The black box on the right side is the power supply transformer TR1 which puts out 20 volts for the sensor probe and 15 volts for the relay. Tests I did, showed a 1.5 second delay between open circuit at the probe and turn on of the relay."

by **jimmy** on Thu Jan 22, 2009 11:58 am

Thanks Eric, I'll try the lightbulb idea. I'm not sure I understand the silent switch idea. I'm no electrical engineer, just a home hack.

the relays are 12v DC. Pretty much right after the secondary winding of the transformer there is a rectifier and a 12v DC regulator.

Thanks for your patience and great ideas. If we can figure this out it might save folks a headache and money.

http://users.rcn.com/erics/ · by **erics** on Thu Jan 22, 2009 12:12 pm

The main switch on a machine is typically "noisy" and MAY inhibit you hearing other "things" you should be hearing. A simple silent light switch installs easily.

edit - A simple silent light switch controlling the power to the Gicar box installs easily.

by **jimmy** on Thu Jan 22, 2009 1:00 pm

That makes sense. I was reading too much into "silent"!


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