Thanks for posting the website info, I found that they also have some parts for my LaCimbali Junior grinder! They seem to carry only a few parts for the M15, I didn't see a pic for the heating element so I'm not sure they carry one. You mentioned that yours was functioning, are you going to descale it and continue to use it? I didn't see much of the inside of your machine, does it have the natural gas/propane kit? Does it have a water level sensor cutoff sensor? I have the gas kit, but no water shut off sensor. I was thinking about installing one on my machine, but that interest is slowly fading away.

I wonder what that extra hole in the heat exchange area next to the rubber tube in the HX is for? Now that I think about it, I'll bet that's where the water comes from that fills the heat exchanger. I'm still wondering why they went with rubber versus plastic or copper for a dipper tube?

Did you have a chance to try to remove any gasket material yet? My next job is to clean up the HX by removing the remaining gasket material, then remove all the copper fittings from the boiler ends. They're all pretty stuck together, so I'll soak the heck out of them with penetrating oil since I'm in no hurry.

I'll have to admit, I got my machine without reaching the parts availability since there are a lot of people in these forums doing restorations. It's really nice that there are places that continue to carry parts for these machines. I might end up ordering some additional parts and store them away for either myself or the next person who ends up with my machine. Rebuilds are inevitable, but parts availability aren't so predictable.

Do you know of any suppliers of appropriate wire for these machines? I wanted something retro in appearance, but maybe modern wire and clips is the better way to go. I need to source better electrical clips than the junk found in common hardware stores, plus I need to make sure my main control switch can handle the 220v amperage verses the 380v rating it was designed for. Since I'm running at a lower voltage, I think the amperage is higher if I keep the wattage of the heating element about the same. I had this stuff figured out a few months ago, I should look into it again since the rebuild will be happening soon.

So... gasket survived the cleaner I mentioned. Need to try something else.

The threaded openings on top of the group are blind. So these may be fixation points for sth.


The hex slot opens a cavity where the 3-way channels go. Just a plug, nothing more.

I also discovered that brass shower disk is missing under the shower screen.

You mentioned that yours (heater) was functioning, are you going to descale it and continue to use it?

It's still in the boiler, I had no time to examine it visually yet. But it works and if it looks good - I'll just descale it.

I didn't see much of the inside of your machine, does it have the natural gas/propane kit? Does it have a water level sensor cutoff sensor?

No, this is just electrical version. There's no water level sensor I could notice so far. I'll try to open the boiler next week.

I wonder what that extra hole in the heat exchange area next to the rubber tube in the HX is for?

Yes, this is just a channel that transports water from hx to the small chamber under the nut/plug with the hex slot. There water goes "out" to the 3-way valve... and then, if allowed, finally goes back to the group through the 2nd opening and flows to the shower.

They seem to carry only a few parts for the M15.

That's true, it looks like they have just few random elements. No heating element for sure... but try here: http://www.astramgroup.com/EspressoMach ... CI1001.htm

Do you know of any suppliers of appropriate wire for these machines?

No... I had no chance to check the electrical system in my M15, try to understand it and copy on the paper.
It will be hard, because I see there was a lot of rework done before... Insulating tape everywhere, brown cable as grounding, cable structures that are very... 3D I'll need to remove everything and start properly... but this is a task for future.

I have to apologize, I've been referring to the "group" as the "HX." For some reason I think my terminology is incorrect unless the entire brew head or "group" including the heat exchanger tube is considered to be the HX since it's a system as a whole? To my understanding I've always thought you lock the portafilter into the "group" which is part of the HX or group-head that sometimes has a lower heat exchanger tube attached that goes into the boiler depending on the espresso machine design. I think that's correct?

To get a good visual on the condition of the inside of the boiler before "cracking it open" I pointed my cell phone into the opening where the HX attaches to it was compact enough to take some great internal pics which I posted in my M15 post. I had a good layer of buildup in the boiler, but significantly less than some of the more extreme cases that others have had to deal with in this forum.

Here's one of my favorite M15 restorations posted in a German forum, take a close look at the boiler ends and inner rings and you'll see something very different. The one boiler end is very different than the other, and the inner rings were cut for removal. If you scroll through the rebuild you'll notice these interesting differences between our machines and the one in that post.

Here's the link: https://www.kaffee-netz.de/threads/rest ... 667/page-2

This is the link and picture to the seal lubricant question I was referring to:
https://www.kaffee-netz.de/threads/v-la ... 976.86478/

To get a good visual on the condition of the inside of the boiler before "cracking it open" I pointed my cell phone into the opening where the HX attaches to it was compact enough to take some great internal pics which I posted in my M15 post.

It's impossible in my case, cause it's still impossible to dismount the HX (I mean the tube that goes inside the boiler ) from the boiler. The gasket holds it like it was welded together. What you see on my pictures is actually the hx (tube) entrance - black because of coffee.

I'm wondering how to replace the rubber/plastic tube that goes inside the hx to supply fresh water... it looks now like it shouldn't have contact with food anymore


The point is that the plastic/rubber tube goes through entire nut and ends just at the top of it. It is the smallest black ring with the smallest diameter here:


Obviously, it is also not rigidly attached to the nut, but can rotate inside. I'm wondering how to replace it with something else (copper preferably) and keep the connection free of leakage.
I couldn't find this part on drawings. Is there a chance that you know its part number?

I did not notice the lubricant on the gasket when I was checking the German thread before. I'll ask a service guy on next occasion if this is recommended.

While looking at your dipper tube assembly I noticed that there appears to be a brass insert that the rubber attaches to. That brass insert appears belled or flaired, kinda what you need for rigid brake lines on cars. In theory, couldn't you just get small copper diameter tubing and use a tube bender and bend the tube to make that curve and go straight into the heat exchanger tube and just flare out the end to fit into the fitting that screws into the group?

Harbor Freight Tool has a sweet tubing bender for cheap. I've used this to bend rigid cable housings on my Harley without any scratching and it worked perfect! It's also on sale on their website, probably in their stores too. Here's the link: http://t.harborfreight.com/1-8-eighth-i ... 94571.html. Harbor Freight also sells a flaring tool, although it's not really rated that well. I think it might work better for softer metals, but you might find a better tool off eBay? Here's the link to the flaring tool for Harbor Freight Tool: http://t.harborfreight.com/double-tube- ... 62814.html

The only thing I don't know about is why they didn't simply use copper instead of rubber like yours? From my standpoint I would think it would have been a cheaper option to use copper because you could make that part in house and it's less complicated and would probably last forever. Thermal crossover could potentially be an issue, but the heat exchanger tube already gets hot since it's attached to the boiler and the group, so maybe there's a potential issue with mineral buildup with such a small tube? The tube on mine is probably 2x larger that yours in diameter, maybe more? In my thread I had a couple pictures of how much buildup there was on the dippertube, that's the only reason I think they used rubber on yours and plastic on some of the newer models.

I completely forgot about the heat exchanger tube blocking the view to the inside of your boiler, what was I thinking?!

Just wondering if you did the torch test to your gasket material yet, if it doesn't burn when using a simple propane torch or with MAP gas then it probably has a lot of asbestos in it. Remove as much of the big chunks as you can, then you might have to resort to the same methods I had to turn to. I wore a respirator mask and worked outside. I barely had to remove much material, but it kept me from damaging the soft copper and turned out great in the end!

I'm almost finished with the housing projects I'm working on, then the move and then I can take a short breather and work on my M15 as a moonlighting project. I still have parts I need to order from TSE, I'm helping a buddy with his LaCimbali Junior project so maybe we can combine orders to save time and money. So many projects, so little time.

I noticed that there appears to be a brass insert that the rubber attaches to.

Yes, I also noticed that... if this is truth - the element is connected really well.

In theory, couldn't you just get small copper diameter tubing and use a tube bender and bend the tube to make that curve and go straight into the heat exchanger tube and just flare out the end to fit into the fitting that screws into the group?

Yes, in theory, I could Thanks for the suggestion about tools, as I'm not so familiar with that. I'll try to find something similar here.

why they didn't simply use copper instead of rubber

I'm also wondering why. The only explanation I'd suspect is that it's always easier to handle with something that you can temporarily bend without destroying it.

I completely forgot about the heat exchanger tube blocking the view to the inside of your boiler

Well... it will probably look exactly the same without the hx tube... just a black hole. So don't worry about missing that
So now you understand why I'll need to open the boiler side wall first - just to grab the HX tube from inside and try to separate it from the boiler.
I also have another idea to get the hx out of the boiler before opening it. I'll try to do it this weekend and let you know on Monday.

Just wondering if you did the torch test to your gasket material yet

Yes. It doesn't burn.
Finally, after trying to scrape it off and threat it with many chemical substances, I found out that the best chemical for that is... a fireplace cleaning agent. It softens the gasket a bit and makes it easier to scrape. Another benefit is that you actually work with gasket that's wet - so no dust comes out... important if it is really asbestos.
The gasket is in 90% removed... But then I discovered that I know a guy working with soda blasting... It will probably clean not only remaining gasket particles, but also entire part. And it's totally neutral for the original surface... Let's try! Why I didn't recall this method earlier?
I'll need to wait about 3 weeks for that because of vacation time.

Good job on figuring out how to safely remove the old gasket material! What was the name of the fireplace cleaning agent you used, maybe we have that stuff here? I still need to remove some gasket material from the inside of the boiler covers since some of the boiler end gaskets are still stuck to the covers.

The cleaning agent I used is "SuperVetro" made by Italian company called... "Diavolina":
http://www.diavolina.eu/en/line-up/shee ... rvetro.php
Please don't expect diabolic miracles... it doesn't make the gasket removal a 2-minutes task and it doesn't make the gasket material soft as wax... but it makes it significantly softer than stone which it was originally

Now about removing the heat exchanger - a picture first:


The heat exchanger doesn't look as M15 heat exchangers usually look like. Notice the round end - usually it is flat.

As you see - I managed to separate the hx from the boiler without destroying it, and as you see there's no gasket on it. This time I didn't use the SuperVetro cleaning agent, so the post is about two possible solutions of gasket removal process.
This time I applied WD40 several times during last 2 weeks. And today I used an electric guitar 0.010 "e" string. I wound each end of the string on small wood blocks, just to grab them and keep my fingers unharmed when applying a force. I placed the string around the hx collar, exactly on a bonding line, so it could go deeper with force. To make the long story short: WD40 penetrated initially the hx/gasket/boiler surfaces, and the string just finished their relationship. Actually the gasket popped out without any fragmentation.


And the outer boiler surface:


The boiler looks relatively clean inside... at least this is my first impression.



Now - WD40 between the three bolts support and the inner boiler surface and 2 weeks waiting

Hello,
I disassembled the boiler from the frame, but I still didn't open it. I'll wait some time for WD40 to creep between side walls and gaskets. I hope to remove them without fragmentation again.

Anyway, I have a question - there are three features that seem to be unused (or I don't know their purposes) on the right boiler's wall. Can you advice?


Is it possible that this side wall is a common part for more models, and these features are just "for future use" for some of them?
Sometimes there's a kind of box mounted on in place of the triangular cover. Water level sensor?

LaCrema:
Btw. I saw exactly the same configuration in your boiler.

Well, the triangular piece looks just like the heating element in my Rancillo Classe 6 so I'd guess it'f for an optional element or optional element location.

Ira