Astoria 1 group renewal - Page 2

[Robbert]

Hey all,
just got to france, where I am studying for a year.
had to reassemble the machine in a hurry,
and some of the paintwork i had just finished spraying got scratched

the bolt extraction was messy.
I will write more when I have time.

[Stuggi]

You do know that Hydrochloric acid is one of the most dangerous acids there is. Be sure to neutralise the acid with a strong base, like soda. Also make sure that you don't let it come in contact with iron, brass or aluminum, since it's very corrosive to non-noble metals. It also attacks clothes, so be careful. I usually make a water solution with baking soda and put all my clothes to soak in it. Do the same with the tank and copper tubes when you're finished cleaning them.

[boar_d_laze]

Near complete agreement with Stuggi and Grandpa -- if e'er the twain shouldl meet.

On the one hand (Gramp's), we're talking about swimming pool strength HCl which was diluted by another 2:1, so final concentration was about 20:1, which isn't really very strong. On the other hand (Stuggi's) not only do you have to be careful about screwing up common metals, you have to worry about fumes coming off them. They're not only toxic, they're bad for you. Work in a well ventilated area. Really.

Rich

[jesawdy]

Heat, use boiling hot water, it accelerates the process but be careful. That much soaking, you will eat away at the edges of the brass bolts (and threads). When all else fails a little elbow grease will go a long way, and a touch of scale residue wont hurt anything, especially if it means eating the threads up on your fittings trying to get that last spot off.

I can't speak to how long before you'd eat away too much metal, but when using a winemaker's Acid Blend, I put the parts in a large pot and heat it on the stove to near boiling. I then rinse the parts with copious water and repeat the process until done. In the last step, I do a quick soak in a basic water/baking soda bath in the sink and rinse again. I've read but haven't verified that caustic (basic) solutions may be detrimental to some electroplating.

[Stuggi]

I don't really think baking soda would do much harm to any metals, but one never knows.
Yeah, I forgot to mention that when hydrocloric acid comes into contact with a common metal it'll form a salt (depending on the metal) and hydrogen gas, which isn't harmful. but extremly explosive.

[cannonfodder]

I don't really think baking soda would do much harm to any metals, but one never knows.
Yeah, I forgot to mention that when hydrocloric acid comes into contact with a common metal it'll form a salt (depending on the metal) and hydrogen gas, which isn't harmful. but extremly explosive.

But watching the parts bubble is mildly entertaining, until your garage explodes. Using acids or bases of any kind can be extremely dangerous so take a lot of care when using it. You could blow up your house or melt your face off so be careful.

[Stuggi]

"Melt your face off" must be the perfect warning for these kinda things, cause that really makes people think twice!

[djmonkeyhater]

Descaling Victory!

Muriatic Acid or dilute Hcl was the answer for me. All discussions aside about safety, respirators, baking soda treatments, inhalation dangers, environmental hazards and melting body or espresso machine parts - it did what I needed or wanted it to do - remove the black scale. All of it. And without injury to me, the machine or the shoes I spilled it on for a day. Again as the new guy, I have no idea whether or not some scale is bad so I'm working on this thing like I work on car engines - cleaner is generally better.

After about 6 hours in the acid bath (14% concentration cut 1 part acid/2 parts H2O) the parts were clean. I would dunk them in and leave them for 30 minutes, come outside, don gloves and scrub with steel wool for a couple minutes and re-dunk it. There were some particularly meaty chunks of scale on the back side where the bolts go into the boiler that I chipped at with a screwdriver.

I rinsed everything on the lawn and dunked it in a bucket of water after achieving cleanliness. Then it went in the dishwasher when the wife went to the health food store. All of the brass and boiler fit in. I put it on the max length cycle with plenty of detergent. Since I had used WD-40 to disassemble some of the parts, two acids to descale them and been working on parts of it on the floor of my basement - it seemed like a reasonable step. I set it for a long rinse and it all came out looking pretty good. Even the coffee oil/grind paste came off of everything.



Here's the bucket on the lawn. It's a kitty litter one and it fits the 7L boiler perfectly. You can tell when the acid is getting used up when you can't see to the bottom. Next time, my roommate will provide a ph meter and I'll have some notes on how used up it was. It definitely gets slower as you go. I used all 2 gallons of it.



This was second to last out of the acid. There were deposits on the top of the bumps that disobeyed for a while but the acid won.



This is my magnum opus thus far. Spotless although a little less bright after 2 hours in the dishwasher. It's kinda dented where some of the fittings are brazed on but I imagine that it doesn't affect performance.



This part took some scrubbing to remove a paper gasket material. Anyone know what the two holes on the bottom are for? Pre-heating the grouphead with HX water bubbling through?



This one is spotless. Inside and out.



Here are some of the other bits after various combinations of acid soaking and washing.

NEXT
- Frame and panels are in the car as I shop around for a decent blasting/powder coating deal. I'm in Seattle and just for the frame I was quoted $150 for black powder. That was higher than I was hoping so I'm shopping around, I'll let you know what I find out. Not sure what color to do the panels in but it will figure into the cost as well.

- A member of this board near me has graciously offered to help me puzzle through small parts and a new pressurestat.

- I wired a 220v outlet above the workbench for diagnostic purposes and will also dig into the wiring harness this week.

WES

[djmonkeyhater]

Continuing to fiddle while waiting on the frame powdercoating.

Here's my CMA closing valve all torn apart for investigation.



It came apart pretty easily. No real need other than wanting to see what is inside. It was a little stiff but it might have freed up with some use. There was a bit of scale in there that I picked at with a pocket knife after dinner at the kitchen table.



The valve part and it's driver. They fit together pretty nicely. Good machining on that day in Italy. I like knowing how it works.



Here's what many of you CMA machine owners will recognize as a $13 part called the BSP Closing Valve.



Lest you think I'm drinking Starbucks Double Shots whilst I resurrect the Astoria, my house mate has this. I tested the boiler out by filling a couple pint jars with PID controlled water for the citric acid soak. He's going to take it to work though. It lives pretty well there because he's a scientist and can weigh ground beans to 0.001g, test shots for ph, chose from de-ionized and distilled water, has multiple temperature reading devices and stopwatches. I don't know what good all of that is but he says he can do it.

WES

[djmonkeyhater]

Well, still fiddling.

Found another powder coater today. He quoted me $100 for the frame and the panels...if i removed most of the existing coating myself. Apparently my frame and panels are already powdercoated and thus will take a long time to blast and add to the cost. The panels are pretty thin material as well, and there is a risk of damaging them if you are in a hurry with the blaster. I didn't ask about blasting with walnut shells as my brother recommended. Tomorrow morning will see me slathering it with paint remover.

Anyway, the wife went to bike race up near Canada and the kids are watching some DVD. Should I do something productive or tear apart the 3-way solenoid and clean it?



Here is the inside of a Three-way Parker Solenoid Valve Guide. At least I think that it is the Parker. There is another model called the Lucifer (totally serious) that it could be. If it's the Parker, you can get them for about $47 new. If you need the electronic part that wraps around it (Parker Solenoid Coil) that's another $33. I haven't tested that yet.



This part is complicated. There are little rubber pieces at each end (black pointy thing at the top) that seem to be held in with another spring in the middle. That's in addition to that floating steel spring seat at the top and channels in the side of the piston. Anyway, I'm still at a bit of a loss as to exactly how 3-way solenoids work. Someone knowledgeable can explain if so motivated.



There was a fair bit of residue in this when I started. Between toothpicks, a knife, a couple hour soak in hot soapy water and a stiff little brush, it's looking a lot better. The piston slides up and down like butter now.

Steam/Hot Water wands are next.

WES

[djmonkeyhater]

A quick google search turned up a decent description of three-way solenoids.

http://www.omega.com/techref/techprinc.html

WES

[djmonkeyhater]

Weekend is here and it was time to make a mess.



If anyone thinks that descaling solution is worrisome, you'd let your kids play with it compared to this stuff. My fingers have all kinds of scaly chemical burns from using it. It's gooey and gets on tools, the hose and underneath things that you swear you just rinsed. I used gloves most of the time and still it got to me.



Here it is at 10:01 AM.



Here it is at 10:03 AM. Whatever this chemical is, it means business. Real business. It discolors the original finish on contact. If there is a scratch or thin spot, you can watch it ripple and bubble within 30 seconds. In 45 you can scrape 1" wide sections clean with a piece of wood.



I was able to get to the flat sections with an orbital sander. It looks pretty sweet raw. Not sure how reliable a clearcoat would be on the sanded steel but man it would look cool. Like stainless almost.



The frame has more nooks and crannies than I had patience for. I slathered a good deal in and around most of the frame and scraped where I could. The sand blaster will have to do the rest of it.



I did tear into the steam valve last night. On a number of these items, I sometimes hear faint echoes of "if it ain't broke, don't fix it" but each time I'm validated. While this one spun decently well before, there was a lot of black "stuff" (mold/scale/moldy scale?) all over the inside. Most of it responded to 10 hours in a mild descaling solution, some required a scrub with a toothbrush and one piece needed a good soak in soapy water.

On the back of one of the steam valve fitting there was a fossilized paper valve body gasket that took a substantial effort to scrape out. Some of the parts places sell copper ones in addition to the paper ones. I can not fathom why I would consider using a paper one when a copper one is available. Any advice to the contrary?



Deep down inside the valve body was more evidence of need for repair. It's not super easy to see but a chunk of the rubber valve seat stuck to the valve body leaving the other 87% stuck to the valve stem. Again, I'm not an expert so maybe it would have worked but I'm confident it wasn't designed to be like that. The new part is $0.65 so it's reasonably painless past the labor.

Back to the powdercoater in the morning with high hopes. Maybe this next week will see some re-assembly!

WES

[Paul_Pratt]

The frame is looking good! I wish CMA would do something more substantial with their rustproofing though. I like the fact that they bolt the frame together but wish the zinc dip or whatever they do was better.

I have also used such an aggressive paint stripper and agree that it is evil stuff. It does work though very well but I do wear a protective suit goggles and chemical resistent gloves.

Paul

[boar_d_laze]

[W]hatever this chemical is . . .

Methylene chloride. Yum.

Rich

[jesawdy]

Methylene chloride. Yum.

A better inexpensive organic solvent there may never be.....

[cannonfodder]

You have obviously never sampled my chili

[Trisha]

{{{{{shudder}}}}}



I don't even want to guess. . .

[djmonkeyhater]

Brother - "Are you pulling sick shots yet?"

Me - "Almost. It might take a couple more minutes. You know, it needs to warm up being a big professional machine and all."

[djmonkeyhater]

Here are some images of the 3-way solenoid. Most of the schematics show/identify either a Parker or Lucifer brand. In most of these images, you can not tell the coils apart but the valve bodies appear to be different. My looks more like a Lucifer than a Parker but I'm taking advice.

Since I haven't powered up the machine, I don't know if it works or not. I'm going to buy a new one mostly because of the rust and fear of the coil seizing to the valve body which can't be a good deal. Maybe I should just buy a whole new one.








WES

[Robbert]

Hey all, my machine is almost ready,
I do not have a digital camera here yet,
so photo's have to wait.
one question I do have,
what is the best method to test it?
should i fill the boiler with water
with the manual fill valve before turning it
on? should I do long flushes to get the last of the
stuff out?

those paper gaskets on the water and steams taps
are a pain. I replaced them with some generic rubber rings.