Hello! Everybody,

This is my first post in this great forum. I've just upgraded from my Gaggia Baby to Isomac Rituale. As a newbie of using HX machine, I've been searching around anything about HX, cooling flush, adjust pressurestat, etc., but still wanna to ask some basic questions like,

1/. Do I need to draw some water once I switch on the machine? Seems the machine pump would automatically run a few seconds every time I switch it on.
2/. The brew pressure gauge reading always stay at around 6-7 bar when I'm not making shots. Is it normal?
3/. Would the adjustment of boiler pressure to some extent affect the brew pressure as well as the temperature?

Thank you very much !:D

Keven

Designer wrote:1/. Do I need to draw some water once I switch on the machine? Seems the machine pump would automatically run a few seconds every time I switch it on.
2/. The brew pressure gauge reading always stay at around 6-7 bar when I'm not making shots. Is it normal?
3/. Would the adjustment of boiler pressure to some extent affect the brew pressure as well as the temperature?

1. No. The pump engaging right after switching the machine on would be the boiler autorefill. You need to do the cooling flushes before pulling shots. A lot has been written about this.
2. This is normal.
3. As far as I understand, no. Brew water comes from the heat exchanger and the pressure is generated by the pump. This is not affected by the boiler pressure.

Br,
Teme

In addition to Teme's comments, I'll add my recommended reading that I noted the other day:

• How I Stopped Worrying and Learned to Love HXs (required)
• Buyer's Guide to the Andreja Premium (close enough to the Rituale)

And for more in-depth treatment:

• Perfecting the Naked Extraction (especially the Troubleshooting Checklist)
• The Home Barista's Guide to Espresso (especially Barista Technique)

Part of this site's mission is to document the base knowledge all home barista's need the first months of starting out with high-end equipment. If you read these and find there's stuff missing, feel free to suggest improvements, new topic areas for future articles, links to other noteworthy articles, etc.

PS: Also check out the carefully vetted list of recommended Resources elsewhere on the web.

Hello! Teme, Dan,

Many thanks for your informations, I've read those related readings before acquiring the machine, all those are the best articles I could ever find indeed. I'm going to practice more in all those related aspects. Thanks again!

As the machine cools the pressure/water level drops. It's normal for the pump to run when switching on from cold.

The Izzo Alex had a problem with headspace in the boiler for steaming and drawing water out of the boiler was a way to help get the water level down a bit to dry up the steam. I don't think the Ritual has that problem, though.

The boiler temp DOES NOT affect brew pressure

The boiler temp DOES affect brew temperature. You also adjust the brew temp with a cooling flush of varying length.