Gaggia Cubika Freecycle find

[carreauchompeur]

Folks,

Picked this beauty up today after seeing an advert on Freecycle.

Described fault is "t works occasionally but often it just won't put through any water. Also it has got slower and slower at heating up, so I suspect the heating mechanism(s) is knackered. It probably also needs a good descaling."

Wonder if a good descale will do the trick...

Watch this space. I love bargains, and free bargains are the best!

[Tickle]

Good grifting!

[scottri]

I have one of those which stopped drawing water though. Replaced a few gaskets and descale and it was up and running again. I just took a few pics before I started working on it and it was easy to put it back together.

[Pferdestarke]

Full refurb photos please.

[carreauchompeur]

Great, sounds promising photos will be furnished, I'm intending this to become the office machine.

Lovely build quality for a 'budget' machine. Very solid.

[Hoover.]

Yep..... I reckon an overhaul of gaskets, and a good clean/descale will do the trick.......... did anyway on La Pavoni Professional

Good luck, and hope you get it up and running as there is something really nice about having a fresh coffee on weekend morning

[carreauchompeur]

All sorted!

It actually seems to work fine now with minimal intervention.

Cleaned everything up, the water tank and hoses were particularly grim. I found one of the main problems straight away, a badly clogged group head:



I had to run a lot of descaler and then water through, took ages until it ran clear. And a quick polish later:



Taking it to work later for the benefit of the office as my Jura is still doing a sterling job at home!

[Hoover.]

Love hearing thing like this, things be resurrected and rescued rescued from the scrap heap...... we throw to much away just because it either needs a little tlc to get it working, or it is last years model/must have

[carreauchompeur]

Definitely.

For all of the (admittedly hilarious) tales you hear about Freecycle freeloaders, actually I really like the concept and have started to use it a lot more. It's satisfying bringing something like this back to life. I may keep an eye on eBay for other broken ones as the pump looks very simple to change...

[Dr G]

I acquired a Gaggia Classic for free from a family member after it broke. New 3 way valve from the internet, a good clean and it was fine for years.

Espresso machines need regular maintenance for reliability and people very often just don't bother. They don't die as such, they just need some love. A bargain hunters paradise

[21TonyK]

Inspired by the OP I just picked up the same machine off ebay for £12.50, described as "working with a leak" so hopefully a proper coffee machine for work on the cheap

[carreauchompeur]

I was a bit hasty.... Now the pump doesn't seem to come on. Will be taking my tools into work to see what's up, it's either one of the pipes gummed up or a cutout. Definitely still heats up though which is good. No doubt one of my monkey colleagues has just run it dry or something!

[21TonyK]

carreauchompeur said:

No doubt one of my monkey colleagues has just run it dry or something!

Exactly why I'm not buying an expensive machine for the kitchen at work. Once people know its there...

[21TonyK]

Did you get anywhere with it? I've now got two sitting in my kitchen, one working like new again and one missing part of a valve that I am going to replace with parts from another ebay sourced machine.

[carreauchompeur]

No joy yet. A colleague mentioned it smelling something like a clutch when someone was making a coffee so I suspect they ran the pump dry. Need to remember to take some tools into work when I go next.