ACS Vesuvius Evo Leva

kilo

Long time lurking here. But finally bit the bullet and bought the Evo Leva from @NelisB.

Thanks to the mod of Niels, the machine is without pump and silent. Which is for me an inportant aspect of using a lever.

My first shot was at par with my current Bianca. And there is room for improvement.

DavecUK

kilo Welcome to the forum, great machine…hope you love it.

Cuprajake

Congratulations, so you have it hooked up to mains, or do you have a similar setup to nels

kilo

Hooked up to mains. The set up of Niels is way above my pay grade.

I tried the espresso with my grinder and beans at Niels place. I am not reproducing that taste yet. But first day of use, so no conclusions…

Camby

I owe the forum an update on my lack of steam boiler heating reported several weeks ago.

The symptom and Investigation: The heating stream graphic was on but the white LED did not illuminate. Paolo initially suspected the limit switch on the top of the boiler but later I checked with a multi-meter and verified this was operating correctly. Paolo also asked to check the voltage across the heater which required access on the underside via the small panel and great care as the machine was live. Anyway this showed no voltage - in other words the problem was was not caused by defective heaters. I traced the wiring to the lower of two solid state relays in the RHS electronics panel. These are black components about the size of a pack of cards.

Cause: It turned out that the output wiring connections were very loose - in fact it looked like the solder used to join two wires was uneven or had deformed perhaps due to heat. These were re-soldered and a ferrule used to ensure good connection.

If you have similar heating problems or have the side panel removed for some other reason it would be well worth checking that the solid state relay terminal connections are all tight. Be sure to isolate the machine from mains first.

DavecUK

Camby If you have similar heating problems or have the side panel removed for some other reason it would be well worth checking that the solid state relay terminal connections are all tight. Be sure to isolate the machine from mains first.

Also loose connections on the high amperage side can cause arcing…which you don’t want.

Nuttybarista

Does anyone have any tips for a well fitting dosing ring / dosing cup for the 54mm baskets?

Amberale

Nuttybarista

Sworks.

trey_antipasto

Similar to this post Finley-72. I have posted once about this before. My machine pulses anywhere from 10-20 times during pre-infusion. It doesn’t do it at rest. So i’m not that concerned other then it is a little annoying and noisy to have that many pulses from the pump during a shot. For reference the amount the pressure gauge moves is almost imperceptible.

I am wondering if I could make a small adjustment to the deadband so that during shots i’m not getting 20 momentary pump activations.

My machine sounds the same as the video : I can upload one of my own if needed. The difference is that even in the video there are only 3-4 pump chirps and then a bigger adjustment and its done. My machine will sit there and chirp the pump on avg 15 times while it sits at 2bar PI.

DavecUK

trey_antipasto I am wondering if I could make a small adjustment to the deadband so that during shots i’m not getting 20 momentary pump activations.

Absolutely you can.

trey_antipasto

I made a slight adjustment to the deadband screw, I turned it maybe ⅛ turn. When I opened the top of the machine the slot on the top of the screw was pointed directly at the + sign. I moved it to close to half way between the + and - sign.

Initial impression is that the machine doesn’t behave much different. There is a slightly longer delay before cycling the pump. It leads me to think that whatever time interval the pump is running is too low. The pump should run slightly longer per cycle to make a meaningful adjustment in pressure. The pump runs for a split second and the pressure moves very slightly up. So the pump runs up to 20 times per pre-infusion to try and keep at 2 bar. When I grind very fine to the point of nearly choking the machine it cycles less but still at least 10-15 times per shot.

I reached out to ACS to inquire just to see what they might say. I also realize from an engineering point of view that this behavior would actually be desired as its keeping the pressure very nearly constant and replicating line pressure. However from an auditory perspective its a bit annoying.

LMSC

trey_antipasto So the pump runs up to 20 times per pre-infusion to try and keep at 2 bar

It’s normal for it to run a long cycle at the start and a short cycle or two after that. This is what my machine does; and, I haven’t plumbed in.

DavecUK

trey_antipasto I made a slight adjustment to the deadband screw, I turned it maybe ⅛ turn. When I opened the top of the machine the slot on the top of the screw was pointed directly at the + sign. I moved it to close to half way between the + and - sign.

Adjust it again, you may have been at the top of the adjustment where the movement initially made little difference and only the last 30% of the movement made any difference. Move it further to -

Although in fairness, I thought a move to + increased the deadband????

Put up a photo indicating exactly which screw you are turning

trey_antipasto

DavecUK I will experiment both ways. I turned the slot from pointing at the + to pointing at the - and that didn’t make a difference in the behavior so your thoughts about it decreasing the deadband may be right and i’ve maybe just have been reducing it. Small adjustments though so it will take time. Its not a huge issue so I don’t plan on burning through a pound of coffee dialing it in.

I am sure it is the deadband screw, its the one on the outer edge. I’ll take a pic. I also tweaked the center screw previously to play with the preinfusion pressure so I know what that one does 😁

@LMSC , I will check that its touching. I haven’t checked that before.

LMSC

I would also check if the little lever is touching the back of the group. I am sure you have.

We know a lack of it will also drive the pump crazy.

trey_antipasto

Just an update on adjusting the dead band. I have made incremental adjustments over the weekend to the point where i have now turning toward the “+” 1 full revolution. During pre-infusion prior to adjustments the pump would cycle up to 20x making nearly imperceptible adjustments in pressure. After 1 full turn, the pump makes ~ 8-10 cycles during pre-infusion. So it is making a difference, I also wonder if there is some firmware/algo/pid that needs some time to adjust to the changes?

I will make some more adjustments I just don’t want to over adjust or hit the limit and break something. It is a little puzzling that a full turn is making such a small difference compared to how little one has to adjust the pressure screw to see a difference.

Also, @LMSC , there was about 1mm of gap between the lever/group when the lever is in the up position. I adjusted it so there is no gap. I don’t feel like that was a contributing issue but nonetheless I did make the adjustement and I appreciate you calling that out 🙂

LMSC

trey_antipasto don’t feel like that was a contributing issue but nonetheless

Didn’t make a difference to the pump kick-in, did it? It does in my case!

You have plumbed-in, haven’t you? The water goes to the water tank, is it not? If yes, you might try manually priming the pump.

DavecUK

trey_antipasto The preinfusion cycling on your machine is purely controlled by the pressurestat.

trey_antipasto

DavecUK thanks for that insight!

trey_antipasto

Ok another update. ACS reached out to me and advised that I make my adjustments ¼ turn at a time towards the + of the pressure stat dead band screw. I made a total adjustment of approx 1-1.25 turns towards the +. This took my pre-infusion pump cycles down from 15-20 to 6-8. I am happy in this range and the pressure stays steady without the ‘excessive’ cycling.

For reference here is a video I made after making a couple adjustments. I made 2 more after this video to get to my final setting.

« Previous Page Next Page »