JFitzpatrick Senior Member Joined: 8 Feb 2012 Posts: 17 Expertise: I love coffee
Posted Wed Feb 8, 2012, 10:17am Subject: Estro Vapore Suffering From Massive Steam Wand Pressure Loss. Where To Start?
I have an old but (up to this point) dependable Estro Vapore. It's a simple machine, I've often thought about upgrading it, but since it has kept plugging along I've resisted spending the money. A few days ago, however, it started acting up.
Here are some of the symptoms my potentially dying machine is experiencing:
When you turn it on, the green "ready" light no longer turns on. It will brew espresso fine, but the light never turns on.
When you turn on the steamer function, again, the ready light never turns on. It will not steam. If you turn on the steam wand it will spurt out water for a few seconds, then it will sputter for 30 seconds or so with pretty good pressure, and then the steam pressure will die down to the point where it will barely make bubbles in the milk, let alone froth it.
The steam wand is not obstructed in anyway. Not only can I feed a cleaning wire up it with no resistance but if you turn on the brew cycle while the wand valve is open, it pushes out a clean and unimpeded stream of water from the wand nozzle.
I have no idea where to begin trouble shooting the problem. It seems like it could be nearly anything within the machine: a bad seal, a malfunctioning temperature sensor, an over zealous pump filling the boiler too full to accommodate the steam, etc. I've tried reading over any forum post I could find that related but none of them seem to fit my situation exactly. Where should I start? I'm happy to go mess around with the machine and report back the results of further tests are needed to clarify exactly what is going on.
calblacksmith Senior Member Joined: 25 Nov 2007 Posts: 4,017 Location: Riverside, Ca, U.S.A. Expertise: I live coffee
Espresso: ECM Veneziano A1 Grinder: 2many I need to thin the... Vac Pot: 40s era Silex Drip: Milita, Bunn&Curtis... Roaster: Cast iron pan, gas burner
Posted Wed Feb 8, 2012, 3:14pm Subject: Re: Estro Vapore Suffering From Massive Steam Wand Pressure Loss.
Interesting problem.
It sounds like the machine is not getting hot enough to even turn the ready light on for brewing. The water could be getting hot but not hot enough to kick the brew thermostat. The pump will cause the machine to have pressure so it will go through the motions of brewing espresso.
The non steaming also sounds like a cooler than normal boiler. What you described about how it "steams" sounds like a boiler that has some pressure (through being hot) but not enough to turn the water to steam fast enough, thus the spitting, quickly running out of steam etc.
I wonder if the heater is dying. Normally when they go bad, they just stop working though. I guess it could be a bad connection to the heater causing a lot of resistance to the circuit and lowering the amount of heat that the heater can produce.
As you said, they are pretty simple machines so my guess is that once you open it up, you might just see what the issue is.
JFitzpatrick Senior Member Joined: 8 Feb 2012 Posts: 17 Expertise: I love coffee
Posted Wed Feb 8, 2012, 4:48pm Subject: Re: Estro Vapore Suffering From Massive Steam Wand Pressure Loss.
Yeah it's the somewhat of a phantom problem.
After reading some more posts, I noticed that there seemed to be a trend of people getting some sort of resolution after running hot water through the boiler. I turned on the pump with the brew function and ran about 3 ounces of water through the steam wand. After that I turned off the pump, left the steam function on and, shockingly, after a few minutes the green light came on and I was able to froth milk normally--same pressure, same sound, same froth the machine was giving before it gave up the ghost a week or two ago.
I'm waiting to see if this is some sort of fluke or if "flushing" the boiler solved the problem. I'm hoping it wasn't a temporary fix.
calblacksmith Senior Member Joined: 25 Nov 2007 Posts: 4,017 Location: Riverside, Ca, U.S.A. Expertise: I live coffee
Espresso: ECM Veneziano A1 Grinder: 2many I need to thin the... Vac Pot: 40s era Silex Drip: Milita, Bunn&Curtis... Roaster: Cast iron pan, gas burner
Posted Thu Feb 9, 2012, 7:01am Subject: Re: Estro Vapore Suffering From Massive Steam Wand Pressure Loss.
You may have forgotten to fill the boiler, low water level could do the same thing and refilling the boiler will fix the issue. Low water level is the main reason heaters are burnt out, they get too hot without being surrounded by water to heat.
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