orphanespresso wrote:Nice video. One of these day's we'll figure out how to post video.....do you give a tutorial?

Anyway, I agree with Peacecup on the seal issue. the Amore has 3 seals on the piston. The first (from the top) and the second contain the water aginst boiler pressure and the third (bottom) pushes out the water through the puck. We have been working with measurements sent to us from a desperate CA owner and finally got one on ebay and when it arrives we can do some hands on work and get some seals out there. As a preliminary caution, from the measurements it doesn't look promising from the sources we've checked, but we have yet to be stymied on coming up with some system of seals for an orphan machine.

Keep enjoying it. Looks good
Doug

Hi Doug if you ever do source some seals please PM me or email me. I'm in dire need of some seals and like you have the faintest clue where to find any (or something that will work).

Hi this is my first post.

I bought a ce14 a couple of months ago.

Mine used to leak a lot until i learned to warm up the machine with the steam valve open until steam comes out. Now I have no leaking. This machine really needs a vacuum breaker. YMMV.

It's because the machine operates on a thermostat rather than a pressurestat.
False pressure doesn't trigger a thermostat to cut off, so the boiler goes straight up to full temperature, putting a lot of pressure on the seals.

My machine came with a dead thermostat so I PIDd it - cheaper than a pressurestat and button thermometers aren't accurate enough. I used a little 1/32nd unit that fits in the base with it's SSR.

The thermostat had died because one of the heating element o-rings had leaked. I replaced all the o-rings in the bottom, drilled some holes below the boiler and epoxied a bit of brass strip in the base to form a dam to protect the PID.

I'm getting some fantastic coffee from it, but it's borderline whether you can call it espresso - the crema is very thin.

I don't think the spring is strong enough, I might try to source a new one. Anyone have the measurements and specs of the ponte vecchio springs or something else that may work?

cubastreet wrote:My machine came with a dead thermostat so I PIDd it - cheaper than a pressurestat and button thermometers aren't accurate enough. I used a little 1/32nd unit that fits in the base with it's SSR.

Welcome to the forum. I can't help with any of your questions, but I would love to see pictures of the pid and more details, perhaps in a separate thread?

Thanks,
Mark

I'm going to put in a thermal fuse as an added safety to the button thermostat and OPV, then a PID override switch for steaming. I'll take some pics then.

Wow, now that's the nicest looking Amore I've ever seen. What a beauty! Thanks for sharing the picture. In time I hope to have mine looking half way as nice. Again thanks for sharing!

Wow, what a genius installation, the PID, nice. We finally got our Amore and are about to clear the workbench to see what's what. The size and shape of the group looks an awfully lot like the Zacconi Riviera spring might work, or even an elektra spring. should be interesting to spec out some interchange on the spring as well as get the seals worked out. Nice observation about the warm up method working around leaks. I agree with the crema issue on some of the old levers....we finally got our Zacconi club machine up and running ...La Romana by name....tasty coffee but yet, no crema, and I'm telling myself that it is just a matter of grind and tamp combinations to find the sweet spot for the crema to flow, but so far, nyet.

Thanks, yeah, it's in really good condition and looks a lot better in real life than it did on the ebay ad.

I get some crema from it, but less from a double than from a single on the pavoni. If I push down real hard on the top while it's extracting, I get good crema.

I don't know how long my seals will hold out, so I think I'll machine a brass piston that will accommodate some standard seals at some point. I was thinking I'd cast up some custom seals, but a replacement piston with the grooves machined the right size for off-the-shelf seals seems like an easier plan, and would rid my machine of the cheap aluminum piston.
That would also allow me to accommodate a slightly different size spring if I need to.

Between that and a vacuum breaker, I think it'll make a killer machine.

I might see if I can top it off with a chrome eagle too.

I took the spring out last weekend and bent it as hard as I could against a pole to try and elongate it and it made a big difference. Before I'd get a little crema that would disappear within half a minute, but now I get a lot more, with a lot more staying power.

I've been using it all week and the coffee's been fantastic.

I can leave it on for an hour and it doesn't overheat either, which is great. Not a single burnt shot.

This Saturday I'll take the spring into work and force some steel rod between the spring in the vice, that should get some more life back into it.

I never got to do anything with my CA, but I was impressed by the large and heavy group. Should provide a good heat sink to prevent overheating. Remember that pressure is inversely related to the piston diameter, which is why you need a really strong spring on these. The group is as big as a commercial lever if I remember, but there may not be space for that big a spring. You may need to increase the lever arm length and bolt the machine to a firm surface to pull a heavier spring.

Tim! We finally got the seals all worked out! The main issue is that the darn piston actually takes 2 different size seals, at least on our machine. The differences are not great, but...the bottom seal we found a perfect, standard size for, but the middle & upper grooves are slightly smaller - just a fraction of an mm. Everybody curses the aluminum piston, but, to use the standard seal, one needs to enlarge the two upper grooves just a bit with a file, and then, you get a PERFECT sealed piston & cylinder! We are working on a 'how to' page on the matter. We have 2 sets of seals in hand, and ordering more tomorrow (or today, as it turns out!) The upshot is - we're pretty sure we've got the seals solved, and we'll have them out there pretty quick.