Guys, are these food safe solutions? Serious question, not trying to be an a**.

David, glad this machine is in your hands so you can bring it back to action. I never had a chance to open it up so good thing I listed it as 'for parts' or project machine. Good luck!

crazy4espresso wrote:Guys, are these food safe solutions? Serious question, not trying to be an a**.

I seriously doubt that anyone has spent the money for a certification of NSF. Epoxy resin, aluminum, and polyurethane are rather common materials that you come into contact with every day. In the uncured form some of these are right out toxic, it is on the label. I saw an article from the fever swamp some time in the recent past making the claim that aluminum cookware caused Alzheimer disease, or autism, I forget which.

crazy4espresso wrote:Guys, are these food safe solutions? Serious question, not trying to be an a**.

Well, I admit that nowhere does this say food safe, but "non-toxic" and "ingestion of small amounts are not harmful" are terms thrown around quite frequently. So, what to do?

The Por 15 seems to be in the same category. What is a food safe way to coat all this now?

David

If you want certified NSF good luck.

Ultimately, I think that the safest ting to do would be to sand down the epoxy and have it professionally chromed, if chrome will be able to go over the JB Weld. That should keep it in service for many years as the lever mechanism looks good. The heating element is stamped with an 86, so could this be from that year or do you think that this is a replacement? I thuoght that most of these machines were from the seventies. The other question pertains to the aluminum reservoir. I thought that I read somewhere that the Mini Gaggias were made of brass. Is the Min Moka a cheaper rebadge?

Also, are there replacement thermostats, or at least ones with a tighter on-off range that I could use for this machine?

Thanks for all the input so far.

Dave

Well,
the thought of 200 F H20 in the reservoir making "epoxy tea" had me worried. Therefore, I am removing the JB Weld with heat, scrape and brush. I will try to find a solvent to remove any residue. Then will try a lower temp aluminum brazing material. I found something called Muggyweld Super Alloy 1, which melts at 350 F. There are videos showing how to use this and it looks easier than what I tried. However, I did not use flux, though the aluminum brazing rods said that it was with flux.

Depending on how it turns out, I may get this plated. I think it will be challenging to find something reasonable. Possibly nickel.

Any thoughts?

Dave

Nickel quite bad for you, so you should probably verify that the plating process leaves you with a stable coating that don't leach or peel off. I guess the same applies to the brazing solder material - in my mental picture of brazing, there's very little solder, but in this application maybe some significant amount at the surface, and it's bound to be alloyed with something unwholesome to get the melting temperature down. (Sorry about "solder", but I lack a better word and "material" isn't it.)

Personally I thought the high temperature repair adhesive for cast aluminum, from the McMaster-Carr link in post #2, looked like a "no brainer." Maybe less fun that trying your hand at brazing aluminum, but far more likely to work.

Ultimately, I am concerned about long term reactions to hot water. I did not think about this at first, but I doubt that these epoxies are meant for food containing vessels. Also, if I do choose to metal plate, I was told that epoxies cannot be plated, or at least by the businesses that I contacted.

I have seen here that some boilers have been nickel plated. Chrome is also an option. Not sure which would be best for this use.

Dave

google is your friend.

While worrying about epoxy leaching into 200F water in an aluminum pot which does leach aluminum and various aluminum oxides into the water you have come up with muggyweld super alloy-1. A search reveals that this idea is a non starter. http://muggyweld.com/super-alloy-1 This is a cadmium bearing product.