Hey everyone,
I recently acquired a Classic Coffee Gaggia on ebay for £50.
I am planning on restoring this machine, so I thought I'd share my experience.

This is the machine as it looked like when I first took it home:









I've removed the dip tray to show the rust on the chassis. Same on the sides: small spots of rust.

The restoration plan

The machine is working: water flows from the group head and the steam wand, but it's coming from a clearance and the seller knew nothing about it, so a complete cleaning is in order (plus I really want to take it apart).

First steps:

1. take it all apart and clean the group head, boiler, solenoid valve
2. change all gaskets and the two thermostats using a service kit
3. brush the inside of the chassis to remove the rust, while I find a place in London to have it properly shot blasted and powder coated

I will post the pictures of all the internals next.

Welcome to HB Riccardo! Your third picture didn't show up. But either way, I hope your new machine serves you well. Sounds like a decent deal if its working.

Hey thanks Tom.
It was just another picture of a rusty side

Hopefully the next batch will be better!

Funny, I'm looking at the brickwork behind the machine, and I go "That's got to be England!". Then I look and see you're in London! Never thought about it before, but there's a particular 'look' to English brickwork; color, shape, 'crumbliness'.... it all comes together to create a uniquely identifiable style of brickwork, I don't see here or elsewhere. Anyway!

I just did a recondition of a Classic Gaggia, so, deja vu. Don't know what's up with the confusing names, with Gaggia. Yours is known as the "Gold Edition Classic" (thankfully, I did not get the Gold edition!). Gaggia have another competing model known as the "Coffee", but they're stamping "Classic Coffee" on this edition of the machine! Then just to make things more generic, confusing and unGoogleable, they have a model called the "Espresso". Whoever comes up with the names for Gaggia machines should have been fired a long time ago...... from a catapult. Anyway!

I got my Classic for $40 (CAD, about £20 I think), from a guy I met in a shop. So I didn't know what the history of the machine was either. But I certainly did not go to such lengths to restore it. Not necessary. Even though I very much doubt he was the original owner, it was in surprisingly good condition.

I did not open the boiler on this machine to clean, because I've had bad experience when I tried to open the boiler on an old Baby Gaggia. But I cleaned it with Durgol, and I feel relatively sure that its clean (enough). I did not replace the gaskets, just cleaned the head gasket. I did not replace the thermostats, since the machine worked fine. I did not take apart the 3-way to clean it, I don't normally do that and don't think that's necessary. But if I were to go to such lengths well... the pump would be a higher priority. It has more parts and its where all water travels, and they can give off a smell sometimes on used machines. So you might need to disassemble and clean all parts of the pump, if the machine is in that bad condition. I did not feel it necessary to clean the pump on mine.

There was a bit of rust in the corner of mine, but everything else was spotless. So I did not even consider 'sandblasting' it or anything like that. Just removed the rust spots with steel wool, an SS cleanser and elbow grease.

Hey Paul,
to be honest the machine, as I said, was working fine so some descaling and a clean to the group head would have sufficed.

Truth is I really want to get to know exactly what inside so decided to get some fun. I have a La Pavoni that is serving me really well so this is more of a discovery project.
As for the powder coating, I really want to make it of a specific color to match my kitchen (and I hate the gold)

thankfully, I did not get the Gold edition!

Is it just about the color, or has to do with it being different from the Classic?

ricca509 wrote:Is it just about the color, or has to do with it being different from the Classic?

I was just commenting on the color. I believe my Classic is pretty much identical to the Gold edition, as far as parts are concerned. And I did consider buying the GE edition at one opportunity, 'cos I thought it was 'cool'/special. But after seeing more of it in close-up photos, I'm just not digging the look. I think they went a bit overboard with it, making too many things 'gold', and the (somewhat polished) "Classic" silver stainless look is preferable, IMO. Perhaps also, the scrubbing I did on mine with steel wool might not fare so well with the GE edition, if the gold coating comes off under such aggressive cleaning (it seems to be wearing out a bit in places from the photos here). There is one minor exterior difference I can see between the two editions, which is that my panarello is stainless, and the GE one is plastic.

Either the way, I just got my Gaggias, and I think the Classic makes a pretty nice cuppa espresso. (I also almost got a La Pavoni lever akin to yours, the other day). I encourage people to learn more about their machines, so I totally understand taking it apart, just to see how its put together. I do that too, if I don't know the machine. Great idea to paint your Classic, too. Post photos when done. The only thing I'm not that keen on with the Gaggia Classic, is its bland industrial look. (But I would still give the Gaggia a slight favor over the boxier and equally industrial Rancilio Silvia). But Gaggia should have produced editions in color, like with their other machines. So I think a Classic would look great painted with color.

Opening it all up

All seem to be in good order. Nice and clean



Solenoid valve



Electric connections





The boiler seems to be pretty clean (at least on the outside)





The group head needs some cleaning



I will start with it and then work my way up to the boiler

Did you remove a screen from the group head before taking your last picture? If not, you are missing the dispersion block and the dispersion screen.

Just to confirm any differences between our Classics, that last photo shows what it pretty much looks like inside my silver standard edition Classic (circa 2001, around). You appear to have the alu. boiler, as mine has, so we're both fortunate for that. Not sure if the pumps are the same. Mine has an "Invensys" pump. Yours could be either Invensys or a 220v Ulka.