# Gene Cafe roaster will not initialise



## John Yossarian (Feb 2, 2016)

Hi All,

I have had a Gene Cafe roaster for quite some time. Last year it stopped working. I bought a new motor from Bella Barista and when I did replaced the old one I noticed that it moved the drum but it would not initialise. Then I checked again the old motor and it turned out to be fine too.

I suspect there might be something to do with the PCB and potentially some of the parts on it but I am not savvy in this area.

Can anyone, and I hope Dave C is reading this, advise on what I need to undertake to get it back to speed?

Thank you in advance for chipping in!

Cheers,

John


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## GerryM (Feb 6, 2016)

John Yossarian said:


> Hi All,
> 
> I have had a Gene Cafe roaster for quite some time. Last year it stopped working. I bought a new motor from Bella Barista and when I did replaced the old one I noticed that it moved the drum but it would not initialise. Then I checked again the old motor and it turned out to be fine too.
> 
> ...


 @DavecUK


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## DavecUK (Aug 6, 2013)

Does it show an error code, do you have a video of it trying to move?

It's possibly the reed sensor (hall effect sensor) on the hot air out side of the roaster. There is a magnet in the large cogged wheel and a sensor fitted to the 6 o clock position on the case/frame. Then that sensor plugs into the PCB. It's there I would start looking for a simple solution, either misaligned, missing magnet, loose reed sensor board, bad connection of sensor wires to PCB.


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## John Yossarian (Feb 2, 2016)

DavecUK said:


> Does it show an error code, do you have a video of it trying to move?
> 
> It's possibly the reed sensor (hall effect sensor) on the hot air out side of the roaster. There is a magnet in the large cogged wheel and a sensor fitted to the 6 o clock position on the case/frame. Then that sensor plugs into the PCB. It's there I would start looking for a simple solution, either misaligned, missing magnet, loose reed sensor board, bad connection of sensor wires to PCB.
> 
> ...


Thank you Dave!

I will disassemble it to check the situation as I might have misplaced the magnet.

I will also make a short video to let you see it.

Cheers,

John


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## Batian (Oct 23, 2017)

You do not say where you are located?

Mine refused to start when I set it up outside on a cold morning (probably about -2C ) and left it waiting for the sunrise.

Big panic.

I took it back indoors and tried it half an hour later and it started up OK. It continued to run when I took it outside again, the roaster providing its own heat!

I assumed there was some sort of temperature sensitive thingy in the electrics?


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## DavecUK (Aug 6, 2013)

John Yossarian said:


> Thank you Dave!
> 
> I will disassemble it to check the situation as I might have misplaced the magnet.
> 
> ...


I'll be interested to see how it goes.


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## John Yossarian (Feb 2, 2016)

DavecUK said:


> I'll be interested to see how it goes.


Hi Dave,

First I must apologise for not being able to do anything for a very long time due to work in the office. I know that this is never an excuse for not mending the coffee gear but it just happened this way.

I disassembled the roaster and checked that, as per your advise, all connections are sound, the magnet is in place and judging by the fact that I was able to initialise the roaster 10 out of 10 times I assumed that the magnet and the detector must be aligned.

I have to clarify that the initialisation was done without the roasting drum in place. Any time I had plugged it in, it would not finish the initialisation.

This made me think that the reason might be a misalignment between both rotating parts that hold the drum.

Before delving into this I wanted to check with you whether you can see other culprit.

I have tried to find replacement of the element and how to align the large rotating parts on youtube but in vain.

Thank you in advance!

Cheers,

John


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