There might already exist a thread that covers this but i have not been able to find it by searching.

I am about to descale my SemiAuto for the first time and need good advice of how to go about doing this. If anyone can take the time i would be very thankful for a "step by step" for doing this.

The boiler refills manually, so you can chose what water to put in. So my basic overall advice is

1. fill the boiler with distilled water and never descale it (when the boiler needs a refill, wait till you need to refill the tank, empty it out completely, put in a little distilled, and refill the boiler -- at one cappa and one mach a day, I refill about once every 5 days
2, Use regular water for espresso and descale frequently (once every two months or so) using exactly the same method as any home machine -- fill the tank with descaler and run it through the group while the machine is hot. Flush with water till the it runs tasteless (i.e. no citrus or wine acid taste)

If you do need to descale the boiler you'll need to drain it of water, fill it with descaler, then drain it and refill with water. The no mechanical aptitude required way to do the draining is to let the machine cool, open the steam wand, turn the machine upside down in the sink, standing it on the tank, and let the boiler drain slowly through the vacuum breaker. You can remove the tank and take off the vacuum breaker for a quicker drain, but this will require being careful with the decorative bolts holding the tank. Tiny scratches on the finish on the tank rim won't show since they are covered by the lid.

Leave the descaler in the boiler for a few hours if hot, or overnight if cold. 1 1/2 tablespoons of citric or tartaric acid (wine acid) makes a good, food safe, descaling solution. Run the descaler through the group when the machine is hot. Use about 1 to 1.5 liters, running about 1/4 liter at a time, then waiting 10 to 15 minutes for the next round. The water will be slightly blue tinged from the copper.

Niad-

I moved your topic over here to the Espresso Gear forum.

Jim can comment directly to your machine, since he has the Elektra.

These are the go to threads for descaling if you want further reading:

Water, Scaling and Descaling with HX machines?
How do I descale my espresso machine?

I would caution you to flush a lot before you do Jim's taste test above, while it is unlikely that you would ever hurt yourself, I will attest to the fact that it will taste very awful, and possibly for quite a long time.... trust me on this one!

jesawdy wrote:These are the go to threads for descaling if you want further reading:

Water, Scaling and Descaling with HX machines?
How do I descale my espresso machine?

These are good reading; but the nice thing about the Semi is the manual boiler fill -- one can fill it occasionally with distilled and forget about it when it comes to descaling. So the machine works like a simple homer for descaling.

I would caution you to flush a lot before you do Jim's taste test above, while it is unlikely that you would ever hurt yourself, I will attest to the fact that it will taste very awful, and possibly for quite a long time.... trust me on this one!

1.5 tablespoons citric acid per liter is about the same as straight lemon juice -- it won't harm you, but it will get your mouth ready to see what that 10 point acidity Kenya tastes like as an espresso

Thanks for the great advice. I will descale this week and then use distilled water for the boiler in the future.

Today, an espresso machine repairman suggested that I use reverse osmosis water in my Elektra Semi-Automatica boiler, rather than distilled water - he seemed to claim there was lime build up even with distilled water. He thought the reverse osmosis water better at preventing lime scale.

I also had a failed Jaeger p-stat, after about a year use. He thought using Brita water in the main tank - was the cause of p-stat failure - to much lime build-up. He also suggested using reverse osmosis water for the main water tank. Seems expensive way to go - with all the flushing one has to do between shots.

What would you do?

The repairman is clueless.

-- Distilled water has no minerals, period, and creates no scale. RO water has a small amount of minerals, but also won't cause scale problems.

-- The Pstat problem is from the aluminum membrane oxidizing and getting stiff. You can remove the oxidation by putting the section with the membrane with a little citric acid and get some extra service out of them; but the problem is inherent in using these pstats underwater.

The water you use for brewing espresso never makes contact with the pstat, unless you use the boiler refill switch.

Thanks for the response Jim. I guess that probably means the inevitable yearly p-stat replacement then, alas, with the Elektra Semi - I might as well use a Mater, or Ceme then. cheaper than a Jaeger. (I still think the Elektra is worth the bother and expense, though)

I usually replace the p-stat myself, but this time I brought it someplace to be checked out - hence the "repairman's input," who did say he found milky white stuff in the line behind the p-stat - could that be oxidized metal?

Howard

Everything that precipitates out of the boiler ends up in that line. That's part of the problem. I'm sorry to hear your Jaeger bit the dust, mine has held up about 21 months now, and I was hoping it was immune.

Jim - I guess I got about 13 months use out of my Jaeger p-stat; perhaps your procedures are somewhat - somehow - less corrosive than mine - or you just got lucky. (Or, I got unlucky - I wonder how much longer you will get with it... have you taken it out in the 21 months and cleaned it?)

Howard

No, in fact, with moving and all, I've even filled the boiler with city water a few times. It would be ironic if the problems are exacerbated by being overly fastidious.

I lived in Chicago for almost 14 years. Yes, there must be some magic in that North Side water. (I got my first espresso machine - an Olympia Cremina ordered from Zabars Nov. 1987 - while living in East Rogers Park - only city water went into that machine for nearly 10 years ....


Howard

da gino wrote:For example, should I just run through a quarter of it every 15 minutes until I've used up a liter of solution and then run fresh water through until it is flushed clean? I guess the focus of my question is 2 part - 1) is it good or bad for the solution to heat up in the actual HX (my assumption is its good, but I figure I should be certain) and 2) how long should I draw the process out for?

Sounds good to me. You can check its MSDS to be certain, but I believe Urnex's descaler is a mixture of citric acid and mild detergent. Ian's HX only instructions in Simplified HX Descale [PourOver] cover the steps, though it's a bit simpler for the Semiautomatica since you don't have to worry about boiler autofills occurring at an inopportune moment.

da gino wrote:Another question for Jim or anyone with an opinion - I use distilled in the boiler, but am not making many steam drinks right now, so I almost never have to fill it (less than 2 gallons in 4 months). Would you dump it out and put in fresh distilled ever few months in that situation? I did so just to be safe, but perhaps this is unnecessary.

You and I live in the same area. Assuming you're on city water, you don't need a water softener (see image below from the last time I checked). Depending on usage, your espresso machine will need very mild "preventative maintenance" descaling once or twice a year. I would not worry about freshening up a steam boiler that's only seen distilled water, unless it disturbs your OCD nature.


Cheap water hardness test strip (untreated city water)

da gino wrote:Do you use city water with no filter at all?

A few years back, I did an informal blind taste test between city water, carbon filtered city water, carbon filtered water with softener, and a quality spring water. The carbon filtered city water and spring water essentially tied. Only my wife was able to accurately identify the softened versus unsoftened water. Since then, I stopped using the softener and use only a generic carbon filter. To my taste, it's very good water. Without the filter, the distinct taste of ammonia or chlorine is present, depending on the time of year (the city switches the disinfectant a couple times a year to avoid bacteria developing immunity; the water during the "spring time" flushing has a rather nasty ammonia smell/taste).