A couple of follow up notes; first the good news, then the bad:

Doubles: In the review I said that the singles were spectacular, while the doubles were roughly the same as E61 machines. In the meantime, I've gotten better with doubles too. The trick is to dose the E61 style basket it comes with with only 14 grams, rather than the 18 or so one gets using normal dosing methods. At first, you'll need a 1/10 gram scale to get it right, since theirs no real landmark on the basket for dosing.

Pstat Woes Many recent buyers, perhaps even most, have experienced sticky pstats which fail to turn off properly (or sometimes at all). The Mater brand pstats have a prior history of having this problem en masse; possibly due to a production defect in their plant. My advice is to replace these with Ceme pstats. I've done this, and it works better. If you do get the sticky mater, you can turn the stat off by rapping the machine's base with your fist on the left side, close to where the pipe with the HX water enters the boiler. Obviously, this is just to get the heat off, it's not a fix. I've posted instructions on how to make the switch in this thread.

Jim,

Thanks for the update.

However, the 'how to replace the Mater with the Ceme stat' instructions are not easy for me to understand. What is COM and NC?

Is it at all possible to show an illustration? If I felt I would not screw it up - I would replace that sticky Mater stat. (I really do like this machine otherwise)

By the way - after descaling my Semi last night - the pressurestat seemed to behave this morning - but I have the feeling it will act up again....

Howard

howard seth wrote: However, the 'how to replace the Mater with the Ceme stat' instructions are not easy for me to understand. What is COM and NC?

In general, I don't encourage people who have no experience fixing things around the house from doing machine repairs; but I guess everyone has to start someplace.

There are two wires with slide on connectors hooked to two of three tongue-like connectors on a pstat. the ones you want are labelled COM (common) and NC (normally closed), the one you don't want is labelled NO (normally open).

0. unplug the machine, allow it to cool, and empty the water tank
1. remove the driptray, remove the Philips screw you see under the tray, put it on a box somewhere. Lay the machine down with the black plastic base towards you, and pull off the base (you may need to use a screwdriver or knife blade to lever it off, it fits snugly. You will see the innards of the machine displayed.
2. The Mater Pstat is a black cylinder with a small box attached, and two wires attached. It is mounted on an l-shaped pipe going into the boiler and is aligned horizontally. It is **not** the box connected to the flex hose from the pump; that's the boiler fill solenoid. See the pic in the review.
3. Have a rag or sponge handy. Use two spanners to open the fitting screw between the pipe and the pstat. Take off the pstat, wipe any water that leaks out. Then ease off the two wires.
4. Take off the little cap with the paint mark on the Ceme, and give the set screw a half clockwise turn (towards the minus sign embossed in the case)
5 Attach the two wires to the Ceme, COM and NC (which wire goes where is not important), and use the spanners to reattach it to the pipe.
6. Put the machine upright, add no water to the tank, don't put on the plastic base, and fire it up.
7. When it reaches the right pressure range, and if the pstat isn't switching off at the right place, unplug the machine, tip it holding the base and tank, and adjust the setting screw about 1/6th turn in the right direction, fire it up and check if it's right. Repeat until you have it properly adjusted. The Ceme has a .2 bar deadband, so ideally have it turn on at the bottom fo the green zone, and turn off at the top.
8. Put the base back, fill the tank, and fire it up.

If you don't feel confident doing this, give the instructions to someone who does this sort of stuff, it's not a tough job.

Now you owe me a good lunch

Thanks for the details....on the 'pressurestat switch'. (Now I have to find someone who does this sort of stuff.)

Howard

Jim,

Has your rating for doubles changed with more time under your belt? ("Score is 9.25 for singles, 8.5 for doubles")

Also, has the drip tray become a non-issue or a bigger pain in the butt during your ownership?

I am on the edge of purchase ..... so any additional thoughts that might help would be appreciated.

h

harris wrote:
Has your rating for doubles changed with more time under your belt? ("Score is 9.25 for singles, 8.5 for doubles")

Yeah. It turns out the relatively low doubles score is because shot quality suffers a lot if the puck expands into the shower screen. The singles basket takes 11 grams before that happens, while the double starts touching at 17. The doubles are much better up to 16.5 grams. If you like larger doses, move to a triple basket.

Also, has the drip tray become a non-issue or a bigger pain in the butt during your ownership?

Sometimes three vices make one virtue. The group needs a short flush, the cups need to be warmed and the drip tray needs to stay dry; so if you flush into the cups, they are warm, the drip tray's dry, and the group is happy. I empty the drip tray once a day, it takes roughly 10 shots of 3 way discharge to overflow it. I'm not quite sure if this is a sparely elegant solution or just a work around.

I have a Leva and just got my semiautomatica in UPS.

I filled the boiler per instruction and the on light indicates, but it seems to not heat at all. Any ideas?

I know you said it takes about 45 minutes to heat, I have waited well beyond that. Bummer, hope it works.

When I received my demo Semiautomatica from 1st line about 14 months ago - I had a similar experience - it would not heat up and I thought I had a broken machine. Not so.

It turns out the heating element needed to be reset. Perhaps this is your issue. I would check with your supplier first - but I was told to remove the little yellow cap located on the underside of the machine - and push a reset button inside. Make sure to unplug first and get the water out of reservoir because you have to carefully lay the machine on its side to get at the bottom. It worked from then on - the heat has been good the last 14 months. ( now the 'sticky pressurestat potential' is what I worry about.)

You would think you would be warned about the need to reset - but anyway - I hope that is your problem - as it is easily fixed.


Howard

howard seth wrote:When I received my demo Semiautomatica from 1st line about 14 months ago - I had a similar experience - it would not heat up and I thought I had a broken machine. Not so.

It turns out the heating element needed to be reset. You would think you would be warned about the need to reset - but anyway - I hope that is your problem - as it is easily fixed.
Howard

Howard,

Thank you for picking up on my post. I was hoping it was something like this, I'll wait until the supplier opens this AM and give them a call. The machine has power so it definitely is not getting power to the boiler and your solution sounds like it should work, I had given a cursory look to a reset button.

All of the pumps operate mormally as well. I'll suffer along this AM with my espresso from the 9 year old Leva which is working well. Roger

Well, as you can imagine I couldn't reisist the temptation to pop the little yellow cap as it made all the sense in the world it would be a reset button.

Howard, you are "the man". Two thumbs up. We are heating up as we speak.

Thank you again for your assistance. Roger