Well, I've been looking for a machine to work on and although not the plan now have three. A La Marzocco Linea 2 group, Brasilia Century 2 group and a Astra automatic that I'm not particularly interested in but was included.

I've just begun looking into them. All seem to be surprisingly clean and the Brasilia nearly functional. I'm sure I'll have more questions but at the moment mainly wondering where is best to get parts right now ?(Mainly for the La Marzocco). I'm near Denver so a local supplier would be nice. I've obviously come across Espresso parts online, is that a decent source or are there better options?

The Brasilia, I understand the original manufacturer is defunct so availability of parts/support is limited. I don't think I will need much to get it operating but also wondering where to look for more info on that one? I've found posts here but most are quite old so not sure sources mentioned are still useful.

If I remember correctly, https://www.cafeparts.com/ is in Colorado, I think in the Denver area. The website takes a little finesse to navigate, but they've got a fantastic selection of parts from all manufacturers, and the prices are lower than most.

They do indeed appear to be near Denver. Thanks,I had not come across their site yet.

Cafeparts is run by an interesting guy - I typically just bring parts that need replacing to his shop and he helps find what is needed.

I was eyeing that listing on CL btw - looked like a lot for a decent price. Good luck with the refurb!

Haha, yeah, figured someone here may have seen that listing. Pretty distinctive with the three machines.
I have not had a chance to really tear into them yet but at first look they all seem very clean and in good condition. I'll get some pictures up soon.

Progress so far, I've started with the Brasilia as it seemed to need the least repair. Looked it over to start, nothing seemed horridly amiss although the pump was disconnected from the motor and the pressure gauge obviously completely failed(possibly frozen?). Not seeing anything else obviously wrong went ahead and remounted the pump head, hooked up to water and power.

Boiler filled on its own without issue, turned on heater and came up to temp and cycled normally. Steam and hot water worked just fine. And this is when the problems appeared. No water to the group head, also slightly leak from pump. Pulled pump apart, front cap was a bit domed so flattened it and re assembled.(thinking froze like the gauge). Pulled the screens from the group heads, they are torn and the jets were plugged. Cleaned those, reassembled and tested again.

That did improve things, no more leak from pump and briefly had water from the group heads before they inevitably clogged again. At that point decided to do the full tear down and descale. Have it all disassembled, piping appears clean, but did dump a significant amount of scale from the boiler.

Have the piping soaking in citric acid, will clean the rest of the parts and have all new o rings on order from cafeparts(their hours aren't ideal for me to pickup even though local). After the tear down found no damaged parts aside from the already known gauge, group head screens and pump. There is a needle in the water fill valve that is slightly damaged/ bent. I believe I can repair it though. So yeah, that's where I've gotten so far.

Good point, I didn't notice anything, the boiler was completely dry. It appears someone drained the boiler but not the smaller lines.

Well, have it all back together and seems everything is mostly working with the leaks taken care of. I have come across a couple things I'm unsure if the need addressed though.

1. I did find a couple Brasilia manuals saying to set the two expansion valves at 10.5 and 11 bar respectively. I've done that as well as setting the pump valve at the recommended 9 bar. The question I have is the HX loop dose not seem to rise up above the incoming water pressure when not in use. My understanding was when sitting it should rise up a bit being sealed and the water expanding? Is this a particularly problematic issue for any reason?

2. There is a small needle valve in the water inlet valve group seemingly providing flow control to the boiler fill solenoid. It was damaged when I got the machine and dose not seem a available part outside of having one machined. I have been able to install it so as to not be leaking externally but internally it isn't really proving flow control.

I could not find any manual indicating the needle valve's function or how/what it should be adjusted to. Again, I don't notice any operational issues from it but wondering what it's function is and issues that could arise from it being improperly adjusted?