My Rancilio Silvia isn't delivering the way she used to. We have a party tomorrow night and I fear I won't deliver the goods. HELP!

What happens is, I grind the beans, tamp, but the water just doesn't pump strongly enough to give me the mousetail streams of espresso I'm looking for. And if I, say, go with less fine grinds or tamp with less pressure, I get a dribbly gurgle from the portafilter instead of clean shots. Is there some basic trick I'm missing? Do I need to clean the inside hoses somehow or is the pump dying? Any clues would be great.

Maybe you need to descale the machine. Does it pump water through the group when you take the portafilter off? I'd say run some descaler through it and see if that helps.

Thanks for the quick response. How hard is it to find descaler? What is it exactly?

Start by giving it a cleanup. Use the cafiza or other powder that you use for backflushing. If you don't have any order some, and get 2 packets of cleancaf at the market for now.

-- backflush (use a table spoon of clean caf if necessary)
-- screw off the shower screen and scrub (use the cafiza or the rest of one packet of cleancaf)
-- use 1 1/2 tablespoons of the cafiza or a packet of clean caf, dissolve it in a tank of water, and rinse it through the system, group and steam valve (the hot water button). Then rinse with two tankfuls of water.

Cleancaf (blue tinted cleaner and descaler) is available at *$ for $3.95 usd. Contains 3 packets. Good for a quick fix when you don't want to wait for mail order.