Ok guys. Sorry for the delayed response and thanks for the riveting conversation. I am 99% of the way to 'fixed' the only thing missing is my own understanding. I got an element and the correct socket delivered, waiting in my holster. All set to replace except that every time I went to diagnose the machine it would start working again.
Then had a fortuitous accident, my wife didn't know that the wall timer had a switch on top so she removed timer to make coffee in the afternoon. Next morning machine is tip-top, same the next day. I noticed that the timer was gone after 4 days, plugged it in and next morning the machine wouldn't reach temp... So... looks like problem was my wall timer. I'm not sure why I couldn't diagnose an issue, the voltage and resistance all read fine, everything pointed to there being something was wrong with pid. Appears the pid problem was caused by the timer. I got a new wall timer and machine has been 100% fine for weeks. Cheers, Eric > I had the same problem recently, and tech support at WLL thought it might > be a failing PID because the element was not entirely out, but the machine > would still get hot -- although not hot enough by a few degrees. I ruled > that out with a little testing, including a nasty jolt when I touched the > brew boiler and ground and popped the GFCI. Resistance was about 800 Ohms > across the element, and I was getting 20 ohms from one element lead to the > boiler wall -- and 120v from the boiler wall to ground. So, the element > was in the process of failing and was shorting. I bought a new element > (with a daily discount, which was nice), bought a 37mm socket for my air > impact wrench. My 1 1/2" socket was sloppy, and a 1 7/16" heater element > socket I used for sizing didn't fit -- but it was a cheap stamped socket > and not a precision tool by any means. WLL recommended a 1 7/16" socket, > so I suppose a good one would work. 37mm is right on the button, and I got > one pretty cheap off Amazon. > > The recommended removal process is to use a standard socket wrench while > holding the boiler with a oil filter wrench, but with all the gunk used to > seal the element, I didn't think that would do the trick, and a WLL tech > said that an impact wrench was best -- as others on this NG have written. > Worked like a charm, and he element was split. I used the oil filter > wrench and socket for reassembly with some Teflon thread paste, which I > like better than tape. The machine is up and running and working > beautifully. My only screw up was that after I popped in the element and > turned on the machine, the steam boiler automatically filled -- and I > forgot that I had to fill the brew boiler and about cooked my new element. > But I was watching it heat up and realized my mistake before the element > got too hot. Its funny that I should forget since this all started with me > trying to fix the problem with descaling, which involves a lot of brew > boiler filling. > > As for scale, the inside walls of the brew boiler and my split heater > element were clean, but there was about an ounce of white, non-adherent > material just sitting in the boiler. I suppose it was calcium carbonate, > but it flushed right out. > > -- Jay Beattie. > > > -- You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups "Brewtus" group. To unsubscribe from this group and stop receiving emails from it, send an email to [email protected]. To post to this group, send email to [email protected]. Visit this group at https://groups.google.com/group/brewtus. For more options, visit https://groups.google.com/d/optout.
