ignazthecat hi, thanks for that.
@DavecUK @John_Yossarian turns out my gic was dirty in the end!! So, thanks to Paolo, he suggested removing the gicleur and operating without it to prove the brew circuit wasn’t the issue. When I did remove it I noticed the orifice was very small indeed, simply blowing through it from either side seemed to remove some debris leaving the central hole much bigger. There was also some debris around the sides of the gicleur which I removed. The machine has worked fine since then.
I don’t know how this debris got in as I only use remineralised osmio zero water and carefully refill the supply tank each time, and there’s the inline filter on the end of the supply tube in the machine. But, I guess it can happen..
When I removed the mushroom the other day I also removed the top pin from the group. it had some scale around the circumference of the seat. This explains the issue for the past while of the group feeling stiff when lowering the lever to finish a shot as it’s much better now since cleaning the seat. I’m puzzled, as I’ve never had an issue with the osmio, I’ve tested it for TDS and hardness regularly and it’s always within spec. I change the filters at one year even though I’ve never been prompted by the machine. Apologies I didn’t get any pics as I was being pressurised by two demanding infants!
