Over the past few months I've noticed a little bit of water underneath my cremina after using it. Recently I've also noticed what sounds like a gurgling sound too. This AM I decided to take the case off to see if I could locate its source. It turns out that there is a little gurgling leak right where the sight glass feeds into the crossbar and the safety valve (see attached pic). I'll probably end up sending this to Doug and Barb, but I wouldn't mind trying the repair this myself first if this is something not considered too difficult (or dangerous) for a newbie to fix.

TIA,
matthew

I'm sure that Barb & Doug will reply... but this is definitely not an issue that you can't take care of yourself. Orphanespresso (and Kudos to them) have an abundance of rebuild tutorials on their site regarding the Cremina (and other machines) that will assist you in your DIY maintenance. PLUS... call them, email them... any way that you contact them, they are A#1 in customer service.

They have the seals available for the site glass and the information that you need to make the repair. BUT.. if you don't feel comfortable in doing this yourself... I can't think of anyone else I would recommend you send your 'precious' to.

Danny's advice is spot on. You need to replace your sight glass seals, which is a very easy fix. Doug and Barb will no doubt have the seals and can get them to you in a hurry. Good luck.

Tighten the nut or replace the seals? Big difference in the two jobs. Depending on the age of the seals you could try tightening without going to the trouble of seal replacement, which involves taking off the group, steam faucet, and faceplate. If you change the sight tube seals then you are going to likely need a new group to boiler seal, and if it is pre 1982, the steam faucet o ring and crush washer as well as the crush for the pressure safety valve above the sight glass (either old or new style you will need to reseal the safety valve).
If you go about the process of changing the seals for new ones you can tighten the nuts with any 17mm open end wrench while you have the face plate off but if you decide to simply tighten you will need to make a custom type wrench, made by grinding down a 17mm open end to make a thin fork and creating a modified box end by grinding off part of the box to create a kind of open box end. To properly do the seal change you replace the seals and tighten the nuts but not overtight and then run the machine for an hour or so to get a good heat up on the nuts (of course to do this you have to reassemble the machine, including the face plate). After a good heat run then you touch up the tighness of the nuts while hot (ish) by removing the pstat and reaching in to give the nuts another 1/4 turn or so. Either way it helps to have the special wrench instead of trying to use a pliers or something that will either slip or give you a false feeling of torque.
It is an uncommonly large job to change the seals and the sight glass leak is a very common one.
And by the way, it is not easy to break the glass tube. If you NEVER get close to the glass ends with anything metal then you have an almost 100% guaranteee of not breaking the tube. As soon as you start to probe or push with a metallic tool then kiss that glass goodbye!

Doug,
I think I'll try tightening the nut...but man is it tight in there! I tried to get in there with a pliers and a crescent but I'll just end up breaking the sight glass. However, it looks like you guys have the right tool for the job so I've ordered one: http://www.orphanespresso.com/Custom-Sight-Glass-Wrench-for-Olympia-Machines_p_2728.html
Thanks!

The sight glass wrench arrived in the mail yesterday and worked like a charm
I'm hoping this repair gets the machine to last another 18 months (by which time it will be ready for new seals anyway).
Thanks again!
matthew