Dan,

Saw your article about the Isomac Zaffiro. I actually purchased one of these from Chris Coffee years ago, and had issues with it right away. This was my first experience with Chris and he impressed the heck out of me with his followup and customer service. It seems that my machine heated up once....and only once. I didn't even get to pull a shot. Chris called me at 10 pm west coast time to see how the machine was doing. He sent overnight Fed Ex a new thermostat and said that they had a few machines come through with problematic thermostats. So I swapped the new stat for the old, but still had problems. I tried playing with the adjustment screw and nothing. I also noticed that the water was coming out of the brew group with a milky white appearance. I spoke to Roger at Chris Coffee as this was something I have never encountered and he readily assessed that the boiler element must have split open. So I called Chris, and decided to do what I was tempted to do in the first place. Go for the Elektra Microcasa a Leva. Chris took care of the shipping and the swap, and I was a happy camper.

I later purchased an Isomac Venus so I had a machine while my Elektra was down with a failed boiler element. I broke it down and replaced it myself, hence it didn't get done right away and I needed to make my espresso ya know what I mean? I had no trouble with the Venus, except that I needed to adjust the OPV valve to bring brewing BAR down from 14-15 to 9.5. I had to clip spring coils in the OPV valve to provide enough adjustability. Jim at 1st Line confirmed that I was doing things right, and the machine performed very well. I also upgraded the steam stat on the Venus and once I did that, I really couldn't complain. I recently upgraded to a Vetrano, because it was just time. I had upgradeitus and I was tired of filling a water tank. Ok, and I wanted to play like all the other HX kids out there.

I wouldn't buy any high end Isomac, because it's my understanding that they are getting out of the business or already have. Also heard they weren't real responsive to Chris Coffee regarding customer feedback, and problems. BUT, for a solid starter machine, I think the single boiler Venus, Zaffiro, etc are probably fine. So for anyone thinking of getting a decent machine but can't lay out a ton of the green stuff, the investment is reasonable and they get you in the game. You can pull some incredible espresso shots steam like a pro.

Rich

Wanna buy a Venus ....and hey, there's an Elektra back there too but it's not for sale