I have been looking for a 2 group linea for quite some time, but they have all been out of my price range...

I recently found one at my favorite coffee shop in Philly (Chestnut Hill Coffee) that the owner/John Hornall bought from some lady off of craigslist.

It was initially advertised as fully working, but when they went to buy it, they found that it was quite damaged!


The ended up picking the machine up anyway (for MUCH cheaper than advertised obviously) and really didn't get around to doing any work on it (these guys do have a coffee shop to run lol!)

As a frequent customer there I always hinted that they should sell it to me, and they did so last week.

Here's what It looked like when I brought it home:


And the tear-down begins!


This is where the site glass assembly (which is nowhere to be found) used to be connected

The steam boiler also had some fittings completely missing (must have broken off):


After taking out the brew boiler, I was AMAZED at how powerful freezing water really is!


Here is the frame, which needs some hammering and a few spot welds on the right lower side (also you can see my ghetto method of labeling the electronics with scotch tape + paper):


Thankfully BOTH groups were in good shape - that was one of my main worries:

I really like this picture - it seems to convey the feeling of "trying to bring it back to life"

It also has the stupid "auto-frother" which means the L side steam wand is solenoid controlled and has a thermocouple sticking out of the tip. It can be run in manual mode (turn switch off to close) or auto where it turns off at some preset temperature. Not really sure what I'm doing about this - switch back to normal or not?


Here are all of the parts getting a nice descale:

please note.. that is just the flowmeter bottom - YOU DONT want to stick the top (with electronics) into descaling solution!

And this last picture, I found kind of hilarious. The "Brain" of the machine has all of the wires running to it, and on the PCB they are labeled "CN1,CN2,etc".. as a medical student I literally started laughing [CN is cranial nerve]...

too bad CN1 doesn't allow the machine to smell the coffee


So of course all of the gaskets/o-rings are going to be changed... but the major damage ($) was:
- brew boiler
- steam boiler
- steam heating element
- sight glass assembly + associated tubing

The steam element was not burst like the brew boiler, but as seen in the pictures, many fitting were broken off:


These would all have to be welded back on, which would have even been doable, but when I was removing the heating element on the steam boiler (used paul pratt's technique with the chain vice grips holding the boiler) the steam element literally ripped a hole in the side of the boiler instead of turning out of the threads.
The boiler must have been so scaled and internally weakened that imo it would be safer to get a new boiler.

You must be wondering... WOW you bought literally a DEAD paper weight?!
I thought so too... especially after looking at prices on boilers

I called many parts suppliers, and finally got in touch with a guy (can't recommend him right now.)
He really went out of his way to give me some advice and hook me up with some EXCELLENT prices on the parts.
Needless to say, I will be doing many future orders with him!
If you need to order any parts, I highly suggest him! You can mention that you were referred by Ilya from home-barista.com forums and he may throw you a nice deal


Now the waiting game for parts to be delivered!

It's hard to really appreciate how wrecked this thing was when I picked it up with the OP...
but the pictures get close!

Yikes, that boiler looks like a bomb went off inside. Looks like despite some big expenditures it shouldn't be that hard to restore. Subscribing for pics!

If I were replacing my steam boiler, I would consider trying to get the GB-5 boiler to work. That way, you could have preheated brew water! Looks like a fun project. Keep posting pics as you progress.

I have seen that machine many times. It sat upstairs by the roaster. I almost asked them about selling it more than once. Glad I did not. More work than I would want to do. I guess on the good side, you do not have to descale the boilers.

I love the Linea line, .. We still have one in our training room but its been awhile since ive seen it plugged in or turned on. I was going through some old parts and found some LM keypads and my old tool for working on the group heads.

Your gonna love that machine .. the only caution i give is to make sure that wiring is not brittle, ive seen it get brittle in that era Linea!

Enjoy the journey
Mark

Removed the group Diffuser today...

LM makes a 60 dollar tool for the job:



I think we can improvise... haha!


guess where the part is from?
Works like a champ and available for rent to anyone who needs lol!



Group heads getting a much needed citric acid soak [lower concentration than other parts] (after a carfiza soak first)

That looks a lot better!


I don't think the exhaust tubing ever looked this good!

Your post is fabulous.
thanks for doing it.
I can't wait to see it done.
i'm jealous. When i worked on my cimbali jr.
it was in better shape than your linea, but
i remember long days and being exhausted and
damn frustrated. I took i phone photo's of every conceivable angle
before this gutted it.

can't wait to see the results.

btw.. how much was the boiler and did you send the photo's of the
frozen bomb to lm?

thanks
m

Thanks for your effort. Will be following your progress. Very interesting.