La Pavoni Europiccola pressure release, releasing a torrent of steam - Page 3

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baristaal (original poster)
Posts: 9
Joined: 9 years ago

#21: Post by baristaal (original poster) »

And, after all the your help, the answer to why the steam was releasing so much is....

Well, first of all, all your ideas helped us gain confidence, not worry too much, and not spend money on parts ahead of time. Then we brought it to a neighbor. With the help of that neighbor who is more savvy than we are and can (like you folks) test these things:

The heating element was fine, as all of you thought.
The pressurestat was fine.
Ditto the wiring.

The safety release valve on my machine was a little different from the parts one of you showed me, but alas I did not take a pic while it was off. (I didn't think we'd get that far.) All that happened was that calcium got into the valve, prohibiting it to close up when it should, and so steam just kept escaping. There's some thought that when I briefly ran out of water, that could create calcium deposits in places, I guess, including the release valve. A toothbrush to clean the valve parts and our La Pavoni started working correctly again. All is well, we're making great cappuccinos again. I think one or two of you suggested this prospect. Hooray.

Of course the parts place was quite certain I needed about $400 in parts, so that taught me something!

Yeah, and thanks again.

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