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Permalink Reply by Brady on July 9, 2011 at 7:33am

I'm not terribly familiar with the Conti machines, so some of these may or may not be relevant. There are a couple of possibilities, speaking generally to the "no boiler heat" problem.

 

BTW, before you or anyone goes poking around under the hood of an espresso machine, please turn off and unplug it. Some machines continue to have voltage present within the machine even when turned off. Please use caution.

 

1. With models that have two "power on" positions (Fill and Heat), verify that someone didn't bump the switch and turn off the heaters. Though this probably isn't what's happening in your case, many people accidentally bump the "heater on" switch while cleaning it. Its an easy fix too, and happens more often than you might think.

2. Your pressurestat may have failed (if your machine has one). These mechanical components control your heaters, and have a lifespan of as little as a couple of years. The contacts may either weld shut or carbon up to to the point that they no longer conduct electricity. If this is your problem, the contacts can be cleaned to get you through the weekend, but will need to be replaced.

3. If the pressurestat welded shut and overheated the machine, your OPV would have blown to release pressure. If that were the case, it would have blown steam until the high-limit popped to shut the heater down. Hi-limits vary, but generally they'll be wired in series with the heater and have a red button that you push to reset. This is a safety system though, so if pushing the button gets it working, your machine is still broken.

4. Check your sightglass. If your boiler is overfilled, that may cause it to not heat quickly enough... which will cause some machines to time out. An overfull boiler can be caused by a slowly-leaking fill valve OR some other fill circuit problem.

5. If your machine has digital heater control, you may be looking at a failed temperature sensor.

6. Other possible problems could include a blown heater or some other electrical issue.

 

Check your power switch. If it isn't that, call a tech.

 

Oh, and while you're at it, turn your pump down. 11 bars seems a tad high.

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Permalink Reply by Brady on July 9, 2011 at 3:53pm

Hey Ron, any updates?

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Permalink Reply by Ron Ingber on July 10, 2011 at 5:38am

I checked in with Todd Millar at the Original Espresso Company (I had to wait until the folks on the west coast wake up.)

Todd is an expert on this machine, and has helped me diagnose other problems and is able to supply parts as well.

After reviewing a long list of potential problems, we tried the simplest thing:

Power off and then turn back on...... for reasons unknown to mortal man, the "error" light did not come back on and the machine started behaving itself. After a couple of minutes, the boiler started getting hot. It is now working ok.

As you know, it's impossible to diagnose a problem when everything is working.

 

I guess I will have to wait until the problem happens again (hopefully never) and try to figure out what is not working 100%.

 

Thank you for your quick original response.

 

"the oldest guy at your party"

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Permalink Reply by Brady on July 10, 2011 at 1:22pm

Hmmm. Glad you got back running. That step is always worth trying, sorry I didn't list it on my list.

 

Sad to say, but like you, I suspect that there's probably still something going on there. It might not hurt to give it a thorough inspection to maybe prevent a recurrence. Like you said, you may have to wait to catch it in the act though.

 

I'll have to remember that name, by the way - one of my customers is opening a second location and is using a Xeos there (he got a ridiculous deal on it). I'll be spending some quality time with one this coming week. Got a kit of parts for it from the guys at Espresso Parts Source, but not sure how much help they'll be at the fiddly details. They certainly are uncommon machines.

 

Glad its working currently.

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Permalink Reply by Mike Sabol on July 10, 2011 at 2:36pm

Mystery no heat problems often point to a clogged water filter.  The CPU will time out if it does not sense the tank being full within two minutes and then cut power to the elements.  You could also have some scale build up on the water probe which could fake the probes out as well.  Make sure your water filters are fresh!!

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Permalink Reply by Brady on July 10, 2011 at 5:52pm

Oooh... I like where you're headed, Mike. The other one that'll kick a code is when it takes too long to heat - as in boiler overfull... but a reboot from cold doesn't "fix" that.

 

Flow rate to espresso machine is straightforward to check. Break the water line somewhere between the filter and machine (turn off the water first!), grab a blender carafe or graduated gallon pitcher, turn the water back on full, and see how long it takes to get a half gallon. If your manufacturer recommends 0.5 gpm, it better take less than a minute to get that half gallon. I prefer 1gpm or more myself.

 

Contrary to popular belief, seeing a good pressure reading at the machine tells you nothing about flow. I've had a machine show 1 bar line pressure with a verified flow rate of 1.2 gpm. However, if you have a pressure gage downstream or on your filter, dropping to zero when the machine pump is turned on is a dead giveaway of flow issues.

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