In the spirit of Gaggia New Baby: Deconstructed


Because I can

Dang the pump is as big as the boiler!

Front view:

Image: Deconstructed GS/3-Front View

Right-Front:

Image: Deconstructed GS/3-Right Front View

Right Side:

Image: Deconstructed GS/3-Right View


Right-Rear:

Image: Deconstructed GS/3-Right Rear View


Rear View:

Image: Deconstructed GS/3-Rear View


Left-Rear:

Image: Deconstructed GS/3-Left Rear View

Left Side:

Image: Deconstructed GS/3-Left View


Left-Front:

Image: Deconstructed GS/3-Left Front View

Group Components:

Image: Deconstructed GS/3-Group Components


Front Panels:

Image: Deconstructed GS/3-Front Panels


More to come. This will take slightly longer to assemble than the Baby Gaggia, which went together from table-shot to ready-to-pull-a-shot in less than an hour...

John, I think the pump is normal-size. It's a small boiler compared to your Elektras!

Cheers!

- Jake

Pump Installation:

Start with a bare frame:

Image: Bare Frame


Next, loosely install the rear motor mount for the pump:

Image: Rear Motor Mount in Place


As mentioned in this post, the rubber vibration isolation grommets were shot on my machine:

Image: Worn-Out Grommets


New grommets are inexpensive from LM, but I sourced a couple 3/16" ID by 1/2" OD grommets from my local hardware store rather than have new ones shipped in. Here is a new one with an old one in the foreground:

Image: New Grommet


With the old, worn-out grommets, the pump collar that attaches it to the motor and the bolt that tightens it were resting on the frame, as shown here with no grommet in place:

Image: Pump Collar Interference


After carefully squishing the new grommets into place, it's time to mount the motor and pump. Start by sliding the electronics cassette into place from the rear (I'll be treating those rust spots with some rust-inhibiting primer and then semi-gloss black shortly):

Image: Sliding the Electronics Cassette into Place


Loosely secure the cassette in place with the two Phillips screws. For reasons I dont yet understand, the screws are unequal length and I hear the longer one goes in the right side. Once that's in, lay the harness out towards the front of the machine:

Image: Harness Layed Out


Now it's time to set the pump into place. Start by lining up the studs on the front of the motor with the rubber grommets:

Image: Motor Lined Up


Then slide the motor into the grommets and set the rear motor mounting bracket over the stud on the previously installed rear motor mount:

Image: Pump Motor Set in Place

Next, loosely thread the tee-nuts onto the studs, taking care not to compress the rubber grommets:
Image: Tee-Nut Installed on Rear Motor Mount


With the tee-nuts in place, secure them by snugging the brass locknuts over them with a 7mm nut driver. Note the clearance between the pump collar and the frame:

Image: Locknut Installed


With the pump secured from the top, it's time to snug up the rest motor mount from below:

Image: Lower Stud for Rear Motor Mount


Finally, with the brain box slid out of the way for access to the two rear screws, install the inexplicably polished (and then scuffed-by a machine?) lower motor cover with the 4 brass slotted head screws:

Image: Lower Motor Cover Installed


And here we are. One pump and motor installed:

Image: Motor Installed in Frame


Next up: Boilers!

Cheers!

- Jake

For your consideration, there is a new TL tube that is supposed to make getting at the gicleur easier.

Also, make sure you damp the machine well. The AV version back then used to rattle and buzz...

Boilers:

Let's begin by placing the steam boiler onto the frame and inserting one of the 6mm bolts through the left hole (as viewed from behind) from the inside out. We'll put a nut on the bolt later:

Image: First Bolt in Steam Boiler


Next comes the second bolt. It's a tight squeeze getting the bolt through with the big fat wire harness in the way. Once it's through, place the washer and nut on the bolt, but leave it loose:

Image: Second Bolt in Steam Boiler with Washer and Nut


Next comes the stabilizer bracket for the coffee boiler. It fits over the first bolt followed by the nut. Leave it loose for now:

Image: Coffee Boiler Stabilizer Bracket


Next comes the coffee boiler. Same story as the steam boiler except it fits on the outside of the frame mounts and the holes are threaded:

Image: Coffee Boiler-Hanging Out


With the coffee boiler loosely mounted to the frame, swing it up and loosely hold it in place with the stabilizer bracket:

Image: Boilers Loosely Mounted

Finally, loosely mount the lower front panel to set the group neck height and then gently snug up the upper boiler bolts to their respective support rails:

Image: Boilers Mounted!


Next time we'll take on the elements and the left side plumbing/instrumentation.

AssafL wrote:For your consideration, there is a new TL tube that is supposed to make getting at the gicleur easier.

Gicleurs are so 2017...

But actually. I have the original TL30 tube with no separate gicleur. The seat for the 3 way plunger is bored to 0.6mm on mine. The new tube is nice. But I'll just drill mine out when the time comes to profile.

Also, make sure you damp the machine well. The AV version back then used to rattle and buzz...

Any thoughts on why this is and what they changed to address the buzzes? This is why I went through the pain of stripping it back to the frame so I could change the motor mount grommets, but I'm sure I'll spend some more time post-startup chasing a few vibrations before all is said and done.

Cheers!

- Jake

Jake_G wrote:In the spirit of Gaggia New Baby: Deconstructed

<image>
Because I can

Looks like an episode of Air Crash Investigation. Ever considered working at the NTSB?

Jake_G wrote:But actually. I have the original TL30 tube with no separate gicleur. The seat for the 3 way plunger is bored to 0.6mm on mine. The new tube is nice. But I'll just drill mine out when the time comes to profile.

Interesting! I didn't know they bored the flow restrictor into the 3-way plunger. Seems like that would be a much more accessible location for servicing a clogged restrictor or replacing it. But I would guess it's more expensive to replace that part than the gicleur. Or maybe they got fascinated with having a "ruby" gicleur. Too bad they went that way. I've always thought the later position inside the boiler was a bad location.

FWIW, I have the newest TL-30 tube. The gicleur slips into the end that mates with the 3-way. It's just little nib with a 0.6mm hole drilled in it -- no ruby. So a very similar position to the flow restrictor on your machine, but likely much cheaper than drilling the 3-way plunger.

Not sure there's any reason to drill out the gicleur when you add pressure/flow profiling. True, you'll have compete control over the pre-infusion flow, but it's nice to be able to use the machine in stock configuration when you have a medium roast or darker that doesn't need any special fiddling.

BTW, that black stuff on your TL-30 reminds me that my fire sale machine had some sort of chemical reaction between the copper TL-30 tube and the chrome plating on the underside of the group cap. In addition to depositing nasty green "verdigris" on the tube and various other places inside the group, it caused the chrome on the underside of the cap to slowly flake off (yeah, into the boiler water!) I suspect this was the cause of the mysterious flow problems on some of the fire sale machines. I ended up removing all the chrome plating on the underside of the cap, right down to the brass. In case you haven't seen it, you'll find the story here (along with a similar story from shadowfax.) The copper TL-30 tube stayed much cleaner, but still oxidized a bit. When they came out with the plated (or stainless?) TL-30 with the relocated gicleur I went for it.

Can you show us a photo of the underside of your group cap? Curious how it looks.

Jake_G wrote:Any thoughts on why this is and what they changed to address the buzzes?

It had to do with vibration from the motor coupling to the pump, and then to the rest of the machine via the output hose. They tried to solve it with a shorter output hose, but not with much success. They finally solved it starting with serial number 831 by adding a bushing between the motor and the pump. You can see it in the parts catalog (version 3.2, page 20.) LM USA told me the mod can't be retrofitted to old machines. I suspect this is because they had to move the motor to the right so the pump would clear the left panel -- i.e., the motor mounting holes are probably in a different position, requiring complete disassembly of the machine to change. Now that you know how to do that, it could be an upgrade for you down the road.

Maybe the chasis motor mount was bent at a different place to allow the vibration danper to fit?

lagoon wrote:Looks like an episode of Air Crash Investigation. Ever considered working at the NTSB?

Hmmm. Can't say that I have, but that could be an interesting gig!

Peppersass wrote:Interesting! I didn't know they bored the flow restrictor into the 3-way plunger.

Sorry, I wasn't clear. It's the TL30 tube that's bored out, not the plunger. Seems likely identical to your newer tube but the gicleur isn't a separate piece.

Not sure there's any reason to drill out the gicleur when you add pressure/flow profiling. True, you'll have compete control over the pre-infusion flow, but it's nice to be able to use the machine in stock configuration when you have a medium roast or darker that doesn't need any special fiddling.

The only reason for me to eliminate this gicleur is to minimize the pressure drop across it so that the coffee boiler pressure gauge more closely represents the puck pressure. To use the machine as stock, I simply set the needle valve to give me ~7ml/s or so water debit and it should behave just like it would with the gicleur in there, except the the gauge will show me real time puck pressure.

BTW, that black stuff on your TL-30 reminds me that my fire sale machine...

That's just curpic oxide. It is fairly non-reactive and causes no issues so I leave it be when I come across it. It's the equivalent of copper rust, and tends to protect the copper underneath from attack. And oh, yeah. I spent a few weeks while I was waiting for this machine to arrive reading pretty much every topic ever started with the letters "GS" in the title

Can you show us a photo of the underside of your group cap? Curious how it looks.

Sure:

Image: Underside of Group Cap

They finally solved it starting with serial number 831 by adding a bushing between the motor and the pump. You can see it in the parts catalog (version 3.2, page 20.) LM USA told me the mod can't be retrofitted to old machines. I suspect this is because they had to move the motor to the right so the pump would clear the left panel -- i.e., the motor mounting holes are probably in a different position, requiring complete disassembly of the machine to change. Now that you know how to do that, it could be an upgrade for you down the road.

Yeah. I see that. I wonder what it's actually accomplishing to reduce the vibration. It definitely would require shifting the motor to fit that in there. I saw that "in the beginning" there was a little space that went under the pump, presumably to lift the clampoff the frame where I showed the interference, but we shall just have to see...

AssafL wrote:Maybe the chasis motor mount was bent at a different place to allow the vibration danper to fit?

Actually, I think the motor cutout would have to be adjusted along with the mounts. I'm not sure what else would have to be adjusted, and I can't see what a small spacer between the pump and motor would do by itself to resolve the vibrations, but there must be something in there that's helping things...

Cheers!

- Jake