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La Marzocco 2 Group Linea AV overhaul

Manufacturer:                La Marzocco srl., Florence, Italy Model:                            Linea, 2 Group Semi-Automatic, 220V, Single Phase.  3700W Approx Date of Manuf:   End 1999 serial 189XX Date acquired:               December 2004 Working condition:         Yes, taken as working condition, all handles, trim and pump in place. Notes:                             Part of a maintenance agreement to overhaul the machine completely every 36 months.

Basic condition Again the machine was running well but it has been in operation for 3 years and was due for an overhaul.  What looks like a machine in working order needs some attention if it has been in operation and on for more than 2 years. As with other machines my main concern was of course the dirt and limescale which was in evidence in the usual places such as the sight glass, hot water spout and from the vacuum breaker.

Before and After shots I will do something different with this rebuild.  I will just do some before and after comparisons.  Remember all parts (with the exception of safety valves) are reused, refurbished and repolished.  I haven't cheated at all!

Before pictures

After pictures

To be fair the owners of this machine have looked after it very well. Apart from the numerous scratches it was clean, no insects, no crusty milk deposits and no rancid smell.   The top cover over the groups took me 2 hours to polish since the scratches were very deep.  But it was worth it.

The sight glass is as I always say a great indicator of what is the true condition of the machine.  What I do is take it apart, remove the scale from the unit, ultrasonic the glass and then assemble using new gaskets. Removing the bezel from the sight glass body is difficult since they normally bond together.

The side panels and base unit were scratched as was the main brushed body.   It was not too much trouble to get them back to factory condition though.

The first thing you notice with an AV machine is the dust inside.   This is caused by the PC cooling fan sucking in and blowing the dirty polluted HK air.   However the cooling of the fan and the dirt it caused is certainly preferable to an overheated PC unit anyday.

The good thing about having top-class material to work with as used by Marzocco is that you can restore it with hardly an fuss or effort.  Everything you see on this machine was just refurbished and repolished.   The steam valves are tricky to get back to as new condition but it just takes patience to remove all the dirt.

Again a typical picture of a machine that has been in use for some time.  The expansion valve (left) does not look too bad but it did require a good descale and a new gasket.   On the right is the 3-way valve from the groups drain.  That was very tricky to clean as it was a combination of scale and dirt.   The scale would suggest that the plunger seals on 3-way valve was defective.

This is the main reason for overhauling.  Over time that gasket deteriorates - especially that silicone one.  The scale will break it down and come through.  The flowmeter is just a bit dirty and cleaned up well although the citric did remove some of the nickel plating.

Steam valves are easy components to diagnose and repair - but they are damn hard to clean.  The trouble is that they require a lot of lubrication which gets very dirty over time. One of the main reason for my super-duper ultrasonic bath is to clean the steam valves.

One of the few parts that I replaced was the Sirai p-stat.  I have been gradually phasing these out with my customers and replacing them with the current CEME models.   The contactor switch is securely mounted on a DIN rail.

Another picture of the dirt that builds up in steam valves.   Believe me it is very difficult to strip these down.  Actually it is easy to strip them down but getting rid of the grease and dirt that accumulates is the difficult part.   Once I have cleaned the steam valves in the ultrasonic bath I then manually have try and unblock the shafts of the steam wands since ultrasonic baths don't really work well on pipes. Usually the steam wands are all scratched and dirty so I also polish those on my polisihing motor.

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