Brasilia Opus Troubleshooting

[lusty void]

Hey guys I'm rebuilding a 2008 Brasilia Opus espresso machine and I need some advice. I have basically rebuilt the boiler, group heads, pump, and pressure valve but still having issues. Anyone mind helping me diagnose the issue?

Main issue is it wont make espresso, haha. When I start the shot cycle the pump turns on (pretty loud) but nothing comes from the group head. However the drain starts outputing water instead of the head.

I'm to kind of verbal vomit all of the information so hopefully there is something helpful

1. Essentially when I start the machine with empty tank, tank fills up automatically and to the right level. During this process water trickles out of F in diagram 3.B (silicone tube in the photo), but the tank still fills. After the pump shuts off water stops trickling
2. Water heats up well, eventually the coils shut off. During this time the groups are not heating, however, despite it looking like they're supposed to based on diagram 3.B
3. When I start pulling a shot, water starts pouring out of F, nothing comes out of the group head, and I'm not sure if the solenoid is on or off. Will be testing that soon. also my pressure gauge is broken so that's not much help... This happens on both group heads which leads me to believe it's not a group head specific issue

The thing labled DP in the picture has not been disassembled and cleaned, so I'm assuming that that's the trouble. One of the solenoids is completely new, and last I checked the water flow sensors were working just fine. When I got the machine I was able to get a tiny amount of water out of the group before it stopped. I took out a huge amount of scale from the boilers and the lines, but it's possible that something got into a different line that I didn't clean or something. Any ideas where to look? There is a list of troubleshooting steps in the document that I will list off now and what I've done

The group does not deliver water:

1. the jet is obstructed: I have already cleaned and rebuilt entire group head
2. the injector is obstructed Not sure what "injector" means here but the entire assembly (DP) directly after the pump may need to be rebuilt
3. The flowmeter connection is obstructed Haven't checked but will
4. The solenoid valve will not open
   4a. Coil is not getting power. Haven't checked but will
   4b. The coil is broken. One of the solenoids is brand new
   4c. The core is blocked One of the solenoids is brand new

Wish me luck. This 190lb machine has been kicking my butt.

[lusty void]

From what I can tell it looks like a "fill assembly 4th series" So at least I have that to go on https://www.coffeeparts.com.au/418024-fill-assembly-4th-series?___store=online

[rain viper]

1. Good, both?

2. injector is a piece of tubing inside the heat exchanger. You must have a big scale issue if BOTH are obstructed.

3. I have actually obstructed a flowmeter before myself, with loxeal it can be done - but both? No.

4. Remove bit of an odd thing but just remove the group, or the mushroom (the big nut on top of the E61) If there’s water entering the HX but can’t get past the group, you know.

To be honest. Looking at the machine and if you want to use it reliably. Tear it apart, buy all the seals you need, a new heating element and dump everything in a big hot bucket of descaler.

The expansion valve (that’s F) shouldn’t output water when the pump runs. Since the pump should output ~9 bar and the solenoid should only pee at ~11-12.

But that doesn’t explain nothing getting out of the group, unless something is obstructed.

If you’re not getting anything out of both, I’d start at everything they have in common (the non return valve B in DP?)

[lusty void]

Thank you thank you, yeah pretty much everything in boilers and groups has been descaled

I didnt descale some of the lower lines and the water valve so it's entirely possible something got stuck there.

If I can ask, how does the air get bled out of the heat exchangers during first fill? Is it possible theres just air in those? I am not entirely sure how the path works there

Yeah so it's bone dry after I went from empty tank to filled, so my guess is something to do with B just like you said

[rain viper]

It just gets pushed out. The highest point in the boiler / group system is usually that big mushroom but

Nut*

[rain viper]

Yeah, it’s just a matter of going through all..

[lusty void]

Should I try pulling a shot with that mushroom open?

how dangerous is that

I have a feeling that nonreturn is siezed or something so I'll take it all apart

[lusty void]

holy crap.

[rain viper]

Yeah do that

[lusty void]

I understand why it's not working well

[rain viper]

Not dangerous, water will come out of the nut potentially. But I think not, unless you are running line pressure

[lusty void]

already tried but it did nothing, note I didnt heat the water up

[rain viper]

Yeah doesn’t matter

[lusty void]

pump just ran and a small amount went to the drain pan

i'll take apart that valve body and see what I can see

but 319,753 coffees. that's insane

[rain viper]

I had a mahlkonig K30 with 350k doubles and 100k singles ground

[lusty void]

wow

[rain viper]

I like a machine with experience

[lusty void]

that's a lot of money haha

how many pounds of coffee is that at that point

[rain viper]

Yeah and 100 metric tones of milk

Like

For real

[lusty void]

15432.36 lbs

[rain viper]

Yeah I live in metric so no idea what this is

[lusty void]

100,000 * 7 + 18 * 350000

about 7000 kg

[rain viper]

Not that much honestly

Like 4 burr sets

[lusty void]

eh, that's a pretty good amount of coffee

a couple tonnes

[rain viper]

I’ve only ever done one commercial restoration

Maybe this gives you some inspiration :

[lusty void]

lol they never made te'

[lusty void]

mmmm I had mushroom crusties too

that looks awesome man congrats

I already had the sides powder coated as well

[lusty void]

I wish I knew what my serial number and stuff was, the label is faded

I just sent a message to brasilia to see if they can find out for me

[rain viper]

The process of restoring a machine that isn’t doing so well^

Know that I spend about 1100€ in parts

[lusty void]

yeah my goal is to be all in about $1000

[rain viper]

And powder coated the frame too

[rain viper]

How much is left?

[lusty void]

so far I'm pretty close

$500 for the machine, $250 to get sides powder coated, $250 parts

who knows what's left though, that valve body is $500 new haha

[rain viper]

Oh it’ll survive

Everything that’s brass usually does

Expect to have to replace like boiler OPVs etc

They tend to leak and sneeze

[lusty void]

so far no leaks there

surprisingly, still super smooth

[rain viper]

Did you heat the boiler already?

[lusty void]

I did have to replace the pressure switch though due to a tiny electrical fire

yeah

everything works now, except that it doesnt

[rain viper]

If the mushrooms looked like mine

[rain viper]

Scale is a probable suspect

[lusty void]

current state of my counter

yeahhhhh I cleaned most of the scale

probably got 500g out of the machine

but what I didnt clean may have issues

[rain viper]

Yeah I literally dumped every part in descaler, and blew it through to check

Had a commercial soup pan to dump it in, on the fire with Calcinet

[lusty void]

yup. I may be taking things apart again rip.

[rain viper]

Use loxeal 18-10

Makes putting things together a breeze

[lusty void]

I used citric acid which may not be the best, but it was cheap

[rain viper]

Photograph everything

[lusty void]

yup

[rain viper]

Yeah don’t

Watch out with the groups and chromed pieces

[lusty void]

yeah didnt do it to the groups

[rain viper]

The chrome doesn’t like it

[lusty void]

used descaler that I got at the store for that

[rain viper]

Yeah I do it, but only short

Like 2 mins

I love Calcinet

[lusty void]

can you buff the chrome on the group?

like use a polish?

[rain viper]

Yeah, tin foil, salt & vinegar

You use the tin foil as sort of the thing you rub it in with

[lusty void]

huh intersting, no abrasives like car polish though?

[rain viper]

Nope

[lusty void]

ok

hmm. I may have more questions for you in the future, mind if I shoot you a friend req?

[rain viper]

Usually lots of the not-shiney parts are contaminated, more than scratched up

[lusty void]

gotcha, yeah I tried to clean it and didnt have luck

[rain viper]

Sure, but it’s nice to keep the talk here, for everyone to read

[lusty void]

Yup!

[rain viper]

So people can learn and fact check whatever people say

[lusty void]

Well thanks for the help, im curious how well it will work

[rain viper]

Haha you’ll find out

It’s pretty fun restoring these old beasts. But you don’t want them in your home

Good luck 🙂 hope you get it going again

[lusty void]

I dont. But I do

I have a bunch of cool things, a 1954 jukebox, a vintage malt maker

it will fit right in

[rain viper]

Ha, be really expecting to pay your energy bill at the end of the month

[lusty void]

if only I could harness THE POWER OF THE SUN to power my espresso

oh well

[lusty void]

@rain viper YES! IT LIVES

And you'll never guess where the clog(s) were

That valve body was completely fine, the flow meters both had clogs in the exact same spot, the inlet. A little needle and the heat exchangers filled right up!

Now my problem is no/very little liquid comes out of the portafilter. It all just goes down the discharge tube from the side of the solenoid

I switched to a coarser grind and managed to get some "espresso" through but it's the most bitter thing I've ever tasted

That's on the fine grind after "pulling a shot" but no liquid actually came out of the portafilter

And that's coarser but barely any came out the first pull, I had to press the button 3x to get the right amount of liquid through, no crema or anything. It seems like the solenoid just let's out all the pressure once the flow meter says it's done

I know I say finer in the video but meant coarser
https://photos.app.goo.gl/NrL7y1om9512GDAc8

Also it doesn't help that I've never technically made espresso before. This was my first 3 shots pulled ever

[lusty void]

Hmm looks like you have e61s but their solenoids are underneath where the preinfusion chamber would be, I'm not entirely sure of my flow path and what's happening

I did calibrate the water dose when the portafilter/grinds were off, I may have to do that with them on?

Looking at the puck I have bigger problems too

My version

[rain viper]

Do you have blind filters? You can check for leaks easily this way

[rain viper]

While the coil is active, there shouldn’t be any water coming from that right plastic tube. Only when you turn it off, it should release the pressure from the pf to that tube (three way valve)

So it’s leaking and needs cleaning / rebuild. That could maybe already be fixed with a good backflush. But since they’re open like this anyway, I’d disassemble them

[rain viper]

I think there’s multiple buttons with multiple volume settings. Before using the machine, you’ll have to set it to the right volume (pull a shot in ‘manual mode’ then stop it manually and it saves the volume) - however many shops program the single button as a flush button (flush 2 sec)

[lusty void]

I'll have one tomorrow

[rain viper]

Piece of tape in a basket works too

[lusty void]

It's been completely rebuilt already, one of the solenoids is completely new

[rain viper]

But yeah, insane they were both clogged. I’ve had it before, but never on both

[lusty void]

Weird but "fixed"

[rain viper]

Is that group also leaking through the three way?

[lusty void]

I don't think they are leaking

Just relieving the pressure

I calibrated it to 36g of water but I didn't have the basket or anything on, it was just open

So the preinfusion chamber didn't fill, etc

My guess is I need to calibrate with all of that on

Current guess anyway, I can check tomorrow

[rain viper]

While pulling, there shouldn’t come anything through under 25 bars

[lusty void]

If you watch the video I don't think they leak

https://photos.app.goo.gl/7tsZ9SpKDwZtfPdU6

[rain viper]

Did you calibrate with open group, or while pulling a shot?

[lusty void]

Open group

[lusty void]

That's probably the issue

[rain viper]

That doesn’t work, there’s a lot of liquid retained in the puck, above it, etc

[lusty void]

Yep that makes total sense

Sorry like I said never made espresso before. I'm learning a lot

[rain viper]

Volumetrics at home suck a bit tho

[lusty void]

Volumetrics?

[rain viper]

Yeah volume based pulling

[lusty void]

How fine of a grind do you typically do?

Gotcha, yeah cause you gotta get the grinds and stuff right

[rain viper]

Frind griner

[lusty void]

I have a baratza encore, will get a dosing grinder eventually

I did the fine on 4 and coarser on 8

[rain viper]

Takes some work to adjust it right, and at home, the shots are too far apart to behave the same. So sometimes you let it run a bit longer (you’ll get feel for it) but the volumetrics won’t allow it

[rain viper]

The ESP?

[lusty void]

Esp?

Dunno I need to figure out the grinder and why the puck looks so bad. To be fair I don't have a distributor or anything yet. That gets here tomorrow

[rain viper]

There’s two versions. But for the non-esp encore, grind on 1 or 2

Like as fine as possible

[lusty void]

Nope just encore

Wow ok

And then calibrate on that

[rain viper]

It’s not made for espresso, so it doesn’t really have an adjustable range in that fineness

[lusty void]

Gotcha makes sense yeaj

Dude you are so helpful thank you so much

[rain viper]

No just make sure the machine works and get a better grinder

[lusty void]

I just wanted to get the machine working before I bought a better grinder LMAO

Worked well enough for my aeropress

Tomorrow I'll let you know how it works, hopefully I can have my first cup of coffee that actually taste good on it

[rain viper]

Wait where is it leaking while pulling?

[rain viper]

On this one

[lusty void]

I don't think it's leaking

Sorry miscommunication

Based on what you said about the solenoid and how I need to calibrate differently

[rain viper]

The calibration shouldn’t matter for that

[lusty void]

Well I thought it was leaking down the discharge tube

[rain viper]

Oh, well yeah if it’s off, water comes out there as a discharge

[lusty void]

But i think its operating correctly

I just didn't know how it worked

So basically I think problem exists between chair and keyboard

Me 😉

I'll see what I can do! Thank you so much!

[rain viper]

I see now, it’s because it’s set so short it’s quitting all the time

[lusty void]

Yep that's what I think Is happening

So I'll pull a shot manually tomorrow on the scale

Get it dosing right

[rain viper]

I’ll be mostly phoneless from tomorrow on out

So good luck 🙏

[lusty void]

You've been so helpful dude thank you

If you ever need anything from the states let me know haha

[rain viper]

No worries, I fix machines as a hobby which means I dont mind a puzzle 🙂

[lusty void]

https://www.ebay.com/itm/GAGGIA-MDF-ESPRESSO-COFFEE-GRINDER-DOSER-Made-In-Italy-/325692898940?mkcid=16&mkevt=1&_trksid=p4429486.m46890.l6249&mkrid=711-127632-2357-0

What do you think of this grinder?

[lusty void]

I program for a living and then go work on things like this so I'm pretty much a masochist

Doser or doserless hmm

[rain viper]

For grinder advice use #grinders !

But no not something I would buy.

Here we are flooded with used Fiorenzato F64, Macap MXDs, Mahlkonig K30s

I’d look for something like that

Doser less is a must

And here at EAF usually like ‘single dose’ grinders > hopper fed

But if you’re planning to keep the 2 group, get hopper fed

[lusty void]

Hmm ok

Woooooo!

[rain viper]

Ey it’s complete again?

[rain viper]

You prob need some fresh / thicker group gaskets

[lusty void]

Mostly, still needs a bit

[lusty void]

Completely new so no clue

Problem is probably me

I'm going to go to a coffee shop soon and get an espresso grind

[rain viper]

It’s not odd for an old commercial to need 9mm rings. And the porta’s don’t need to be pulled tight

[lusty void]

Hmm ok

Feels like it makes a pretty good seal though

[rain viper]

They’re gonna assume you use pressures portafilters, and grind too course

[lusty void]

I'll show them pictures:p

[rain viper]

And you can’t really dial on a preground

[lusty void]

I won't dial

[rain viper]

It ages super fast

Like, 15min makes a huge difference

[lusty void]

Just want to check and see what I can pull

Hmm ok

I just need to get a better grinder

[rain viper]

Yep, save the money and get a grinder

[lusty void]

Those ones you recommended... Pricey haha

May look for a prosumer or see what I can get used

https://www.ebay.com/itm/Ascaso-Flat-Burr-Espresso-Coffee-Grinder-/155506848236?mkcid=16&mkevt=1&_trksid=p4429486.m46890.l6249&mkrid=711-127632-2357-0

[rain viper]

Look for deals

That aint one

I got my first fiorenzato f64 with a capacitor issue for 100€

10€ capacitor and it was grinding beautiful again

Got a nice ECM Casa grinder for 75€ few weeks ago

[lusty void]

Hmmm ok

I may ask the shop if I can just get a sample of what they use

Try to get my grind that size