ira wrote:I believe the big capacitor is quite overrated so likely the one you used is fine. I repaired one of those once with a bad bridge and before I figured that out, I was able to get it working by adding a small disk or mylar capacitor to the electronics board near the 5V supply to the processor. The relays will pretty much work fine no matter wat the power looks like, but the processor want's something like a clean 5V supply, though as long as it never gets below 4V it will likely still work.

Okay great, I guess I'll address that once I get there new relays in and I am still having a problem. Though with finding 4 bad capacitors and every relay having oxidation on the contacts I'm confident that the issue will be resolved.

As for lowering the pressure, is there instruction on where to find that? It didn't happen often, but a few times it would let out with a loud "whoooosh" and steam would poor from every vent. Guessing pressure got too high and the safety valve opened up to relieve the pressure.

Dan

I owned a 3 button touchpad Livia 90 (90 s DE) for several years with quit a few control box replacements before I sold it and replaced it with a Livia 90S PM with only an on-off brew switch and a much simpler control box, and all (well, mostly) my problems went away. A guy who became a friend, who repaired the boxes for me, told me that the extra electronics within a small box, the power consumption of the flow measurement device, two ribbon cables, and touchpad issues, all contribute to the relatively poor reliability of the semi-auto version versus the manual one.

Since the Livia 90 machines all were designed to route recycled water from the OPV valve to drain, the flow measurement feature becomes relatively useless when you have other than extremely good grind control, as I do. (I have rerouted OPV water back to the reservoir, as I suspect many have done, just to keep the drain tray from overflowing). Bezzera, I believe, corrected this when they designed the BZ 99, but I believe that their earlier BZ 90 was made exactly like the 99.

Unless the electronics issues can be resolved rather quickly, I would look for a 90 PM parts machine and make the relatively easy conversion. They really are very good machines, but not with the DE's issues.

Seems like a decent idea, honestly in the many years I've owned it I've never once used the dosing buttons, only the start/stop button for the pump. If the work I'm doing now fixes the issue then I'll just roll with it, but if it fails a few years down the line I'll do the conversion. Though hopefully by that time I'll have either picked up either a Decent or what I really want, a Victoria Arduino E1 Prima. Doubt it...

Dan

saabracer23 wrote: Replaced them with 105 c Nichicon

Then your machine should soon be making beautiful music ... uh I mean coffee again.

There is something called the Bezzera/Pasquini Pro diffuser, that I would guess helps with channeling. I opted for the IMS diffuser screen but left the original diffuser.

I have an adjustable opv valve right at the pump output, that diverts water through a short hose to the pump intake. I guess from other descriptions, the Livia version may not have that. I think it is an option on the Fluid O Tech vibe pump. They have an office in Connecticut, will sell you a pump cheap directly, and can sell you an opv as well.

Well I got all of the new parts in and it's been trouble free for almost a week now. I wonder if any of the parts I replaced have anything to do with the pressure in the tank, the pressure on the gauge that is on the front of the machine seems to be a little bit lower than it was in the past. I haven't had any pressure blow off as of yet. Also it corrected something else, before when I power the machine on from a cold start all of the lights with blink and it would do that thing where it just continually pumps water out of the porta filter unless I held all three buttons down at start up. Now I flip the power switch on from a cold start and it does nothing other than turn on the heating element, or pump water into the tank if it's slow. No blinking lights no weird behavior.

I guess the next thing to do would be to do improvements, would anybody be able to post links to possibly the best options out there as far as shower screens, dispersion plates, gaskets. Maybe go IMS, or whatever is suggested, I just want to make sure I order parts that will fit. I only have a bottomless portafilter, I think I'd like to get a regular portafilter, suggestions?

Dan