Is there a cheap inline water softener?

One of these:

http://www.wateranywhere.com/Water_Filt ... 55_263_450

and one of these:

http://www.wateranywhere.com/Water_Filt ... th=255_308

Is about as inexpensive a water softener as I've seen. You want a post softener particulate filter to protect the machine.

Ira

This is an excellent post. A great time save.

For me, backflushing with chemicals = getting a 'dry' cam on the lever of the E61 group.

I do it as little as possible so that the grease on the cam does get washed away, otherwise I have to take apart

Cheers

Arpi wrote:For me, backflushing with chemicals = getting a 'dry' cam on the lever of the E61 group.

I do it as little as possible so that the grease on the cam does get washed away, otherwise I have to take apart

Cheers

On my e61 I used to get this if I did not backflush it enough times with water AFTER the chemical backflush. As long as I did 5-6 water backflushes post event, it was good to go.

I don't recall rinsing (water backflushing) helping much with the dry cam issue on the E61. I believe that the classic recommendation is to re-oil it. With what? Why, coffee, of course! Pull a few shots after backflushing and it should be smooth again. Worked every time for me on my E61s.

Tx for the tip. I'll give it a try next time.

I've been using lubri-film plus (food safe) and the cam lever gets very slippery. If it is very slippery, then the lever doesn't stay in the middle position by itself (preinfusion). It either goes up or down.

Cheers

All I can recommend on this one is:
IF you think that not using espresso detergent is a good idea and backflush without it,
try for few weeks then open the group,
or simply remove the showerscreen and see,
espresso detergent is engineered to remove the coffee residues and is doing that,
it will dry out temporary the lever but few shots will re-lube it naturally from the coffee oils
I always suggest to use NO more then a 1/4 of a tablespoon per backflush section, a lot of people uses a lot more which of course will dry out even more aggressively the group mechanism

stefano65 wrote:All I can recommend on this one is:
IF you think that not using espresso detergent is a good idea and backflush without it,
try for few weeks then open the group,
or simply remove the showerscreen and see,

Stefano, I think that the conversation has kinda drifted to 'is it useful to backflush without detergent between detergent backflushes'. I think that you're right, (IMHO) that using no detergent ever is probably a bad thing.
So, the new question would be; would a clear water back flush between detergent back flushes be better for a machine than doing nothing between detergent cleanings?

I personally think that the answer is 'yes'. Since the question came up (and I think someone suggested somewhere else that all this clear water back flush and rinse and wiggle are bunk without any scientific background) I've been pulling half my shots on the left group, and the other half on the right group. On one side, I've been doing a PF wiggle after every shot, and a clear water back flush at the last shot of the day. On the other group, just a clear water flush into the drip tray after every shot. This is, of course, after a really good cleaning of both groups with detergent, scrubbing, disassembly and new gaskets.
Which group do you think got which treatment?


I'm pretty comfortable with my regimen.

OK,

I've just now read this whole thread which started some time ago. But I am curious to know what group head got what regime. I'll bite, which one got which?

My guess;

1. Wiggle and backflush
2. Just standard flush