I have an Oscar by Simonelli Nuova, and SURPRISE...lol it isnt working properly......

I woke up yesterday, purged my steam wand and it was very weak. I didnt think much of it, but when I pulled a shot, it was only warm, not hot. The 2nd shot was the same way. After that it was all room temp water. The heating light stays on indefinitely and the water never gets hot.

The day before this happened, the machine ran out of water while I was pulling a shot, I think it might have damaged the element?

I think I have a bad heating element, but I am unsure of how to test it. I read some previous posts, and I have a ohm meter, if I could just get a little clarification on how to test the element, I would know shortly if it was busted or not. Im not sure if I should test the element terminals with the machine on or off, and with it disconnected from the machine entirely or not etc. Some posts said test the element terminals against the copper boiler???

Also, my water level probe is possibly broken/busted? When I was poking around and checking various wires, I tugged on it and the metal rod part of it pulled almost all the way out. The top nut of the water probe (its 2 nuts, one into the boiler and the 2nd one into the top of the 1st one) was loose enough to be unscrewed by hand. I had this machine serviced at a local espresso repair joint maybe 6 months ago,

As always, thanks a lot for the help I have received from this community over the years. Hopefully I can get my spro going on again soon

I can provide more data and pictures if needed

-Mike

Reezy wrote:I think I have a bad heating element, but I am unsure of how to test it. I read some previous posts, and I have a ohm meter, if I could just get a little clarification on how to test the element, I would know shortly if it was busted or not. Im not sure if I should test the element terminals with the machine on or off, and with it disconnected from the machine entirely or not etc. Some posts said test the element terminals against the copper boiler???

Be sure the machine is unplugged before opening and testing inside the machine.

You generally test the element with the wiring removed from the element terminals, and it doesn't matter whether the switch is on or off.

Test the element resistance with the ohmmeter probes on each of the terminals. For a 115V 1200W element the resistance should be a stable value in the neighborhood of 11 ohms.

Check that you have no continuity (OL or infinite resistance) between each terminal and the element/boiler base. If you see continuity you know you have a bad element shorted to ground. But if it passes this test you still don't know much for sure because it may leak current when under high voltage and your multimeter will not detect that. Electricians use a high voltage gadget called a megger to check for that. If your machine is running on a working GFCI and it doesn't trip the GFCI then you can be confident that the element is not leaking current to ground.

Reezy wrote:Also, my water level probe is possibly broken/busted? When I was poking around and checking various wires, I tugged on it and the metal rod part of it pulled almost all the way out. The top nut of the water probe (its 2 nuts, one into the boiler and the 2nd one into the top of the 1st one) was loose enough to be unscrewed by hand. I had this machine serviced at a local espresso repair joint maybe 6 months ago,

Is probably fine. The top nut is a gland nut, which you want to snug with a wrench but should be careful to not overtighten. It compresses the teflon sleeve/seal around that probe. When you pull up on that connector the probe typically pulls up. You might want to remove the probe and clean it of any scale, then push it back down where it was and snug the gland nut.

Thanks for the replies folks.

-what's the easiest way to check for scale being the cause? We have pretty hard water at my house, but I fully disassembled and de scaled my entire machine with Citric acid maybe 6 months ago (in case that's too short of a time for the scale to build up and cause these issues)

-is there an easy way to check if the heat exchanger has scale build up? I literally get No heat at all.

- I will test the element as described and will post back my results

I have an Appia 2 group and have encountered the same problem. See the 2 "problems" they have in the manual.

I suggest to flush the steam boiler using the spout to re-trigger boiler refill. The heating element (called the "resistor') and pumps do not activate when they detect that fill level is not up to level, 180 sec from turning the machine on.

What spout are you speaking of? Currently I cant get the boiler to draw water at all. Usually opening the steam wand will trigger the boiler to draw more water right? At least every morning my steam wand is very weak until I vent it fully and let it build back up (when its working). I have my machine on a mechanical outlet timer and it turns off in the evening and turns back on about 3 hours before I would use it in the morning.

Reezy wrote:What spout are you speaking of?

I'm not wearashirt, but I believe the Appia has a hot water tap. Your Oscar does not have one.

Reezy wrote:Usually opening the steam wand will trigger the boiler to draw more water right?

Yes, eventually. Probably around a milliliter (of water as liquid) per second is blown out of an open steam wand.

Reezy wrote:At least every morning my steam wand is very weak until I vent it fully and let it build back up (when its working). I have my machine on a mechanical outlet timer and it turns off in the evening and turns back on about 3 hours before I would use it in the morning.

The stock Oscar does not have an anti-vac valve, so this would be normal. The stock Oscar is not ideal on a timer because you must bleed off air (so-called "false pressure") from the boiler then let it come back up to pressure at the right (much hotter) temperature. Some Oscar owners add an anti-vacuum valve.

Should add that if you want to nearly empty the Oscar boiler (without removing the drain plug) there are tricks. This site: http://www.elektros.it/it/en/tips_tricks.html shows one way, where you bring it up to a little pressure, unplug it, pull the reservoir, then tilt it over and open the steam wand. Lots of other Oscar troubleshooting tips on that page that you may find useful. Be aware that their element resistance (~40 ohm) is for a 220V machine. A 110V machine would be closer to 10 ohm.

If attempting to retrigger boiler refill does not work, I suggest using the manual fill spout. RTM my friend!

Thanks for the replies guys. I tested the continuity and there is no continuity between both prongs of the Element, or between either prong and any other metal spot on the machine.

How do I test the element resistance? What setting should my ohm meter be on?

Currently, it turns on, and the heating light stays on forever. It will pump water to the grouphead, but its cold water. I cant get any pressure to build. Do you think I could still drain the boiler through the steam wand even tho there is no pressure?


Literally dying for some spro..been on the french press every day for the last couple weeks.