Turned on the Bianca at 1030 this morning to warm up. When I went back to it at midday I noticed water in the drip tray. On inspection I noticed dripping from the outlet behind the group. This was happening yesterday. Is this a fault?

Just spoke with Martin at BB, he assures me this is normal. My inexperience showing!

Penance I would be concerned if nothing comes out of it - Bianca is known to be snotty.

Yep, Martin assured me that unless the tray is filling up it’s nothing to worry about.

If you’re nearby when it warms up you’ll hear and see a big vent of steam from that outlet and subsequently the dripping you’re seeing. Alarming for the first time definitely.

Penance The dripping is caused by the expansion of water on heating in the sealed brew system (approx 4%).. The water comes from the aptly named expansion valve (often incorrectly called the OPV), which is connected by a tube to the outlet. The expansion valve on a rotary pumped machine will be typically set to 11 or 12 bar.. It’s there to prevent super high pressures building up and pipes fracturing at 25-30 bar. Two main use events cause water to drip from the outlet: When the machine is first switched on from cold, around 30 ml may exit the tube as it comes up to brew temp. When an espresso shot completes,…approximately 2-3 ml will drip from it as the cool water entering the boiler expands.

And that’s what I was going to say… Given the machine was turned on at 10:30 and then it was still dripping 2 hours later might not be ideal - unless the vacuum breaker, or the expansion valve or the safety valve are leaking. @Penance - See if this persists. If you see the pattern, turn the machine to be in eco mode (service boiler off) and see if it persists. If it stops, then it’s the vacuum breaker or the expansion valve. Let us know how it goes.

Thanks @DavecUK @MediumRoastSteam Ive just checked an there is no dripping now, though ive been in a meeting so no idea when it stopped. Will empty the drip tray and keep an eye on it this afternoon. I will check again tomorrow when its turned on also, and see if it repeats.

Penance Will empty the drip tray and keep an eye on it this afternoon. Question… Is the machine on some sort of standby mode? If so, that might explain it (e.g.: service boiler cooling down, vacuum breaker opening, user interacts with the machine, service boiler heats up to steam temperature, steam vents, vacuum breaker closes), as what you might be seeing is just residual condensation in the pipes. So all good there.

No, wasnt in sleep mode at the time i first spotted the water

Bianca drip/leak

Penance

The blue tube was the one with water in.
If it happens again tomorrow I’ll pop the lid and have a look.

MediumRoastSteam

Penance so far there’s nothing abnormal. Let’s see what tomorrow brings and go from there. It might have been residual water in the tube from the Expansion Valve (blue).

Penance

I reckon you’re right. Was surprised to see it but after talking with BB and the great support here my worries have abated.

Back to looking at grinders.

SurreyAlan

My little Profitec makes lots of strange gurgly noises and puts a small quantity of water into the drip tray as it warms up, always assumed and hoped it was normal but nice to know it is.

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