We have 4 guests online





Lost Password?
No account yet? Register

Whole Latte Love!

What's New?

EspressoTec.Com


Baratza Inc.

Baratza.com - Creators of the Virtuoso!

Transcend Coffee

Home
Welcome to the CoffeeCrew forum for registered users. - feel free to make yourself at home. This forum is dedicated to coffee and espresso based issues.

Forum spammers, link referrers, link placement, scam artists, confidence artists, crooks and obvious commercial shilling is discouraged. Violation of this one simple rule will result in you and your immediate geographical region being banned from the site so do not post ads or links to your site here unless approved by me! Violators of this one simple rule will find their firm, employer, and your pitiful self invoiced $1000 per violation of this simple rule. Enjoy!

The coffeecrew guestbook and forum has been alive for more than 10 years! Please consider it your one-stop resource for finding out about all things coffee, espresso, specialty coffee and all associated gear and equipment.

We welcome long posts - there is no word limit in fact. Keep in mind that you can only type for 15 to 20 minutes in the forum-post submit window (session timeout)- so consider composing your posts or responses in a text editor - then cut and paste! Thank you and enjoy the forums!

CoffeeCrew.com Discussion Forum and Guestbook  


Boardwalk :: Forum List Under the Hood... and beyond! Machine Care and Maintenance
Bobby
User

Senior Barista
Posts: 26
graphgraph
Karma: 6  
Re:Cleancaf - 2008/01/30 16:06 Whole Latte Love has a good demonstration video on how to descale the Sivlia:

How to descale the Silvia

+1 Colin - CleanCaf is harmless. According, to Jim Schulman's Insanely Long Water FAQ it's just citric or tartaric acid. It's harmless though it may come out of the machine with a greenish tinge due to dissolved copper. In case you don't want to check out the whole FAQ here's the relevant bit:

Descaling Solution
Generally, a flush through descaler uses about .5 to .75 fluid ounces (1 to 1.5 tablespoons, or 8 to 12 grams) of citric or tartaric (grape) acid powder dissolved in 1 liter of water. This is a 2.25% to 3.5% solution, equivalent to 33% to 50% dilute lemon juice. Cleancaf and other coffee manufacturers' descalers use this formula. Theoretically, these amounts will dissolve about 12 to 18 grams of scale per liter, but that would require leaving the solution in for several days; in practice, it is used for an hour or two to dissolve up to 5 grams of scale.

The formula is mild enough to be harmless to espresso machine components, but it will come out of brass or copper machines with a slight greenish tinge. This comes from milligram levels of dissolved copper and is no cause for alarm.

Five pound bags of citric or tartaric acid cost about $10 at home brewers' or soapmakers' supply stores. This is roughly a 20 year supply

Descaling Intervals Know the hardness of the water you're using, and how much you use the machine. Descale when accumulations are between 2.5 and 5 grams. More often is a waste of time, less often may result in scale build up. Check out section 1.7 for instructions on determining your set up's scaling rate.

Single Boiler Machines
For single boiler machines, preventive descaling is no problem, just follow the instructions given by the manufacturer. In general, this involves filling the boiler, letting the solution work for about ten minutes, and replacing it by running it out of the steam wand under pump pressure. This procedure is repeated three to five times, until about a liter of descaler is used up. Then the machine is flushed with water until any taste is gone.

Manufacturer's recommendations differ on whether the brewhead should be flushed or not. This is not surprising. The water's temperature drops and LI rises as it moves from the boiler to the head, so scale won't form there. In scaled machines however, fragments can move from the boiler into the head, fouling the gicleur valve. My guess is that with regular descaling, flushing the head is unnecessary but harmless.
  | | Forum posting/replies are available to registered users.

      Topics Author Date
    thread link
Cleancaf
cappuccino1 2008/01/30 13:24
    emo
thread linkthread link Re:Cleancaf
colin 2008/01/30 15:21
    thread link
thread linkthread linkthread link Re:Cleancaf
Bobby 2008/01/30 16:06
    thread link
thread linkthread linkthread linkthread link Re:Cleancaf
cappuccino1 2008/01/30 16:35
    thread link
thread linkthread linkthread linkthread linkthread link Re:Cleancaf
colin 2008/01/30 20:38
    thread link
thread linkthread linkthread link Citric acid is not dehydrated lemon juice
Setting it straight 2008/02/25 05:03
Boardwalk :: Forum List Under the Hood... and beyond! Machine Care and Maintenance

Joomlaboard Forum Component 1.1.2 Stable
Two Shoes M-Factory
How is the current economic crisis effecting your coffee habits?
 
Powered by Joomlaboard

EspressoTop50.com