# 2005 Classic Gaggia back from the dead



## AndyDClements (Aug 29, 2016)

When I introduced myself I said I don't drink espresso, but it made me think about trying it again. The stuff from poorly maintained B2C machines and cheap home items is not a fair way to judge coffee. And so eBay beckoned, and for £45 I acquired a Gaggia Classic which had seen better days. It was advertised as having started loosing pressure, so with my vast knowledge (I looked at one video on Youtube) I set about resolving this issue and servicing it back to working order. Seals ordered (well,almost) and a sunny Saturday outside meant it was time to get cleaning the Gaggia.

It was a little dirty outside, had a little scale where water is added and moderately dirty inside the case.









The wiring was then labeled (those things where you type the label and print) and a photo taken just to be sure I could reassemble in roughly the right way.

The parts came apart quite easily, no bolts too tight and so I get to see the inside of the boiler and grouphead.









I'd researched before starting and having come to the conclusion that the citric acid I already have is too harsh, I purchased some tartaric acid, I think it did need descaling.

While that's cleaning time to clean the shower head carrier, well if it needs cleaning. I think it needed it. Of the four holes through it, three were blocked fully and the other restricted. It had a solid chunk of residue filling the gap between carrier and shower, with approx a 1cm diameter circle around that one functioning hole.

The pipes needed cleaning also, having scale inside them, ditto the valves.

So, one day spent cleaning (I even took off the badge and cleaned behind it), polishing etc, and it's all back together except the seal that I forgot to order.

New seals arrived for the portafilter, and the new naked portafilter (co MR Shades) and having run a fair bit of water through, and one extraction (thrown away as directed to following de-scale) I've now made an espresso with it.

Grabbed coffee, made espresso, decided too strong to start with for me, so add hot milk and taste. Mmm, I taste caramel, look at coffee bag and sure enough tasting notes confirm it. I've had that same coffee before but not noticed the caramel anywhere near as pronounced.

So, perhaps I'll try an espresso and like it from this machine, it certainly looks that way. Now to think about PID.


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## AndyDClements (Aug 29, 2016)

Thought it worthwhile posting up so that others can appreciate how important it is to clean the machine, the descale that I did was more physical than chemical and so would require disassembly, but could have instead been done with descaling solution if done regularly. Now, to the shower area, hopefully it's apparent from the images just how bad the shower head etc can get, and that doesn't need a lot to strip out and clean, a Philips screwdriver, a (5mm? 4mm?) Allan key/ hex key and something to scrape away the residue or in the case of this one perhaps a pick or dynamite, oh and a new seal if you really want to do a decent job.









The shower screen gives a good idea of at least how much of it was completely blocked with no chance of water getting an even distribution, but actually by the time I took the photo some had fallen off, it was more blocked than the second image suggests.


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## jimbojohn55 (Jan 15, 2016)

More power to your elbow - love to see a gaggia brought back from near extinction -

Just curious - why would the citric acid be too strong - could you not just use the 1 teaspoon to a litre mix?


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## AndyDClements (Aug 29, 2016)

Re Citric acid, just seemed to be quite a bit on the web where people seem to think it's better to use tartaric because of the reaction between aluminum and the acids and the resultant salts, rather than any destruction of the boliler.

There's a good thread on this forum as well, where it starts the thought proccess, enough to make me look a bit wider.

http://coffeeforums.co.uk/showthread.php?5489-Gaggia-Classic-cleaning-tartaric-acid-or-citric-acid

It seems that the salt from tartaric's reaction isn't very soluble, whereas the one from citric acid is a bit more soluble, so it's all about the amount of aluminium that we absorb into our bodies over a long time (horror stories of nobility poisoning themselves when aluminium was a newly discovered and so expensive metal to have dinner plates made from it, ditto stories of army plates being scraped by cutlery).


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## AndyDClements (Aug 29, 2016)

Well, it's had real use. A mate popped round, he drinks espresso and espresso derived drinks. The grinder is yet to be fired up on beans so I used some pre-ground from Coffee Bean Shop, that I purchased for cold brew.

So, 21g used in the naked portafilter, tamped to 25lbs thanks to stage.2, with MrShades PID in control of heating and pressure turned down to 10lbs/insq(wanted 9, but haven't yet adjusted it down that bit more), milk foamed with the Silvia wand (again steam control care of PID). Verdict- he liked it. So, I think it's all come together quite well.

42g (approx) extraction is still way too fast (think it was approx 10 seconds) so need to adjust the pressure down more (to 9) then play with grind and tamping force. That's all just part of the fun.


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## GrahamS (Aug 27, 2015)

the biggest plus points to the classic is that it's very simple inside and spares are easy to come by. good work getting this one going.

your pouring speed will be down to the coffee more than the pressure.


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## jimbojohn55 (Jan 15, 2016)

agree - don't worry about the 1bar 10-9 for the moment , its the grind fineness that will make all the difference.

my preference is for 14g in 30g out in 30 seconds then experiment with extraction times by altering the grind, extraction time, volume out - but keep notes


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## AndyDClements (Aug 29, 2016)

Thanks. I had suspected the grind is the key, but secretly hoped the 10% reduction in pressure would give a 66% reduction in flow rate. Once the last few bags or ground are used I'll be moving to purchasing beans and putting through the LaPavoni Zip. Hopefully that will have no problem getting much finer than that of the pre-ground (accepting it's not an error by the suppliers, they have to supply a mid-grind that suits a wide range of machines, it's just the classic seems to demand finer than many).

I suppose I could run some pre-ground through the Hario to make it finer.


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## jimbojohn55 (Jan 15, 2016)

hi, pre ground is always a mile off what is needed to get the right extraction times, for example the 10sec extraction your getting will be under extracted you need at least 25 + to get the full range of flavours possible and balanced - once your zip is dialled in to say 30 seconds try extracting into different espresso cups at 0-10,10-20 and 20-30 then tasting each cup - they should be quite distinct,

ps dialling in can take a hole bag of beans 250g to get the grinder set up

hope this helps, cheers Jim


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## seeq (Jul 9, 2011)

wonderful job. With all the work done that will be a bargain of a machine. There is always something really nice about putting that kind of love and attention into refurbing it. The downside is when its eventually time to upgrade its really hard to sell on the old one without shedding a little tear!


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## AndyDClements (Aug 29, 2016)

Well,I'm really happy today.

Strangely, I'm happy because of a failure to make a coffee, and not because it means I have an excuse to upgrade already.

The zip grinder had its first use today, and put the resultant grinds into the Classic. The pre-ground by Rave (so not supermarket suits-anything rough stuff) gave me 2x extraction in c10 seconds, the grinds from the zip gave me 0x extraction in 30 seconds. No, not a typo, 0x, technically not really 0 but one drop in 30 seconds is close enough. The beans were only supermarket ones but it was to prove a point, that the grinder would do the job.

So,why am I happy?

This means that 1) the zip grinder with its new burrs etc is more than capable of grinding fine enough for the Classic, 2) the Classic now needs me to start dialing in the grind, so an excuse to make more coffee.


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