I am a new S1 owner, and very happy with everything about the machine except for the heat it generates when both boilers are operating. I don't mind the heat, actually, and the expense is not that great; the real problem is that the machine is in close proximity to my upper kitchen cabinets. My approach up until now has been to turn off the steam boiler except when I am using it, which takes care of my heat concern. However, I drink a lot of tea in addition to espresso, and one of the really nice features of the S1 is having conditioned, hot water instantly available if the steam boiler is on.
I anticipated a potential heat problem, and contacted Chris before I bought the machine and asked him if it would be OK to insulate the boilers. He said it would, but would affect the cup warming. After I bought the machine and decided I wanted to do something about the heat, I asked him if there would be any effect on the warranty, and he did not indicate any, but he did suggest that added cups might absorb the heat and eliminate the need to insulate - he obviously was not going to encourage me to modify the machine. Added cups did not solve the problem to my satisfaction, so I decided I would proceed and insulate the steam boiler.
After reading up on insulation materials for this kind of application, I decided to use a high temperature ceramic blanket type that I read about on alt.coffee. - not that this application requires anything near a 2000 deg-F material, but rather becaue it looked like a nice material to work with. I corresponded with a user of this material, who is very pleased with it. This material is not inexpensive, and none is available where I live, making it a special order via the internet.
Not having ever taken the machine apart to closely study what I was dealing with, I decided to just go to Ace Hardware and get some fiberglas pipe insulation and take the machine apart and get familiar with things and see if I would be facing any complexities before ordering the ceramic blanket insulation. I took the machine apart and wrapped the steam boiler with the fiberglas insulation, and I don't think I will have to do anything more than what I have done. The top of the machine is MUCH cooler, yet still warm enough from the brew boiler to warm my cups. Please don't ask me what effect this has had on my boiler duty cycle, as I did not measure a "before" duty cycle; I basically don't care what the duty cycle is, I just want my upper cabinets to be cooler when the steam boiler is switched on.
As to the particulars of wrapping the boiler: The material I got from Ace is just about exactly one third the height of the boiler. So, I used three widths of it, butted up against each other, for the vertical surface. I used a double thickness, and took care to not compress the material, which would result in a loss of its loft. There were a couple of boiler fittings that I had to work around, plus a mounting bolt, and I just did my best to work the material into place and not have gaps/spaces. I stuffed what I could under the bottom of the boiler. The top concerned me, as it is full of fittings and some active devices. I insulated what I could on top, taking care to not cover up any active device; I was concerned that there would be an appreciable heat loss here, as the top is still mosly uninsulated, but as it turns out the area of the top is so much less than that of the vertical surface that it doesn't seem to matter much - the bulk of the head loss is from the vertical surface. Get the vertical surface insulated well, and there will be a major reduction in the temperature at the top of the machine (didn't take any before/after measurements, but there is a marked, obvious difference).
I plan to either leave both boilers on 24/7 or leave the brew boiler on 24/7 and the steam boiler on all day.
Here is an observation/thought/question: The part of the brew boiler that connects to the group is several inches long and is unisulated, and is a significant source of heat loss. It would be simple to insulate it. I did not insulate it, as I don't know what affect it might have on the brew temperature. If there is a fixed 2 degree offset between the brew boiler temperature setting and the actual group temp, insulating this surface may reduce or even eliminate this offset. Has anybody ever experimented with insulation in this part of the machine to see what it might do to the temperature offset?
Insulating My S1 Steam Boiler
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hlsheppard
I'm a new S1 owner as well. When I asked Chris about it (two weeks ago), he specifically said, "no, don't do it."
He mentioned something about increased heat and the effect on electronics... I didn't probe any further.
Sounds like yours is working out great, though...
Do you think that prolonged warming like that will actually damage cabinets?
He mentioned something about increased heat and the effect on electronics... I didn't probe any further.
Sounds like yours is working out great, though...
Do you think that prolonged warming like that will actually damage cabinets?
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BillK
Chris did not ever tell me to not do it. He just encouraged a different option, as I indicated.
Chris may not fully understand some of the basics of heat transfer. One of his comments to me was consistent with what he told you, which is that insulating it may in effect actually cause more heat to be driven upward into my cabinets.
Some people seem to harbor a belief that if you stop heat from transferring in one place it will just find another place to come out, and go - ie. that a certain amount of heat loss is a given, or, "it's gotta go someplace". This is completely untrue. If this was the case, there would be no point to insulating your house, other than perhaps to make it a bit less drafty. When you insulate a boiler, assuming you do it properly, the actual amount of heat that is lost to the environment is reduced and nowhere is the ambient temperature increased. The electonics in my machine are either running at the same temperature as before or at a lower temperature. My concern was to make sure I did not affect the active elements attached to the boiler or elsewhere, as this could screw things up. I have not insulated over anything other than actual boiler metal.
Incidentally, in temporarily removing one of the main power connectors to the boiler, one of the two that are under insulating boots, I found a loose, almost falling off, connection. That, to my way of thinking, is a very bad situation, as a high resistance contact that is carrying this kind of power can be a source on intense heat. I fixed it and hope it is the only thing I will find wrong with this machine. Everything else under the covers looked beautiful.
Chris may not fully understand some of the basics of heat transfer. One of his comments to me was consistent with what he told you, which is that insulating it may in effect actually cause more heat to be driven upward into my cabinets.
Some people seem to harbor a belief that if you stop heat from transferring in one place it will just find another place to come out, and go - ie. that a certain amount of heat loss is a given, or, "it's gotta go someplace". This is completely untrue. If this was the case, there would be no point to insulating your house, other than perhaps to make it a bit less drafty. When you insulate a boiler, assuming you do it properly, the actual amount of heat that is lost to the environment is reduced and nowhere is the ambient temperature increased. The electonics in my machine are either running at the same temperature as before or at a lower temperature. My concern was to make sure I did not affect the active elements attached to the boiler or elsewhere, as this could screw things up. I have not insulated over anything other than actual boiler metal.
Incidentally, in temporarily removing one of the main power connectors to the boiler, one of the two that are under insulating boots, I found a loose, almost falling off, connection. That, to my way of thinking, is a very bad situation, as a high resistance contact that is carrying this kind of power can be a source on intense heat. I fixed it and hope it is the only thing I will find wrong with this machine. Everything else under the covers looked beautiful.
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padillatim
Bill,
Have you noticed that the boiler cycles less frequently? I leave mine on for 24/7 and the noise of the boiler and the fan that comes on... the worst is when the fridge is doing it's cycle at the same time.
On the loose wire, I reccomend taking the covers off of this type of machine before plugging it in. I know mine was bench tested at EPNW for several days before shipping and it arrived very safely on a palette, but planes & trucks shake... Too many wire & fittings that may rattle loose - as you mentioned many of them carrying juice.
Thx,
Tim
Have you noticed that the boiler cycles less frequently? I leave mine on for 24/7 and the noise of the boiler and the fan that comes on... the worst is when the fridge is doing it's cycle at the same time.
On the loose wire, I reccomend taking the covers off of this type of machine before plugging it in. I know mine was bench tested at EPNW for several days before shipping and it arrived very safely on a palette, but planes & trucks shake... Too many wire & fittings that may rattle loose - as you mentioned many of them carrying juice.
Thx,
Tim
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bobroseman
Congrats, Bill. I think that what you have done will work and not damage your machine. In my opinion insulating the brew boiler connector would be a good thing. My only concern is that the inulation that you have chosen withstand wetting without deterioration.
Give us periodic reports and let us know how things hold up. I may want to insulate my machine when I rip into it next.
Bob
ps here is a thread on the S1 temperature that might be of interest to you.
click here
Give us periodic reports and let us know how things hold up. I may want to insulate my machine when I rip into it next.
Bob
ps here is a thread on the S1 temperature that might be of interest to you.
click here
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BillK
Hi Tim,padillatim wrote:Bill,
Have you noticed that the boiler cycles less frequently? I leave mine on for 24/7 and the noise of the boiler and the fan that comes on... the worst is when the fridge is doing it's cycle at the same time.
On the loose wire, I reccomend taking the covers off of this type of machine before plugging it in. I know mine was bench tested at EPNW for several days before shipping and it arrived very safely on a palette, but planes & trucks shake... Too many wire & fittings that may rattle loose - as you mentioned many of them carrying juice.
Thx,
Tim
As I indicated, I wasn't much concerned about duty cycle before and after the insulation job, so I took no measurements of the "before". In response to your question, I spent about 20 minutes tonight getting a rough idea of the duty cycle of the machine when it was stable after not being touched for several hours. The boiler light came on every 4 minutes, with very little variation, and the on-time duration was 13 seconds, with very little variation. You might compare this with your machine to get a general idea of the difference.
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BillK
Bob, it is not clear to me after all this discussion just what flushing procedure would be best for me to achieve a good first shot. This is important as I am the only coffee drinker and normally do only one shot. Do I understand correctly that a single, 6 oz shot, followed by an actual shot, gets me the right result? Also, how soon after the flush must I do the real shot?bobroseman wrote: ps here is a thread on the S1 temperature that might be of interest to you.
click here
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BillK
Hi Scott,sbarry wrote:How about just lining the bottom of your cabinet with formica?
In my situation, the machine sticks out from the upper cabinets a bit and it is actually the front of the cabinets I have been concerned about. The machine I replaced sat in the same spot and got rather warm and the heat began to dry out the wood and the joints were beginning to open up a bit. The S1 was hotter than the old machine, so I knew it was not a good situation. Now the S1 is cooler than the old machine. In summary, formica on the bottom would not have fixed my problem
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BillK
Oh, and Bob, two more things:bobroseman wrote:Bob
ps here is a thread on the S1 temperature that might be of interest to you.
click here
First, relative to flushing the group, I meant to explain that what I have been doing is a couple of 2 oz shots a half a minute apart, which is what I gathered from the Dan Kehn review. Even with this procedure, Dan seemed to think it was marginal and you had to really keep moving in order to have a hot enough head. I have done this with the first one with an empty portafilter in place and the second one with no portafilter. I have no idea if this gets things warmed up properly. Do I really need to gin-up something that will give a 25 second warm-up shot? I am confused on this point.
Second, given that I do an appropriate, TBD "best warmup shot" shot, will my actual shot temperature still be 1 deg. C lower than the machine setting? I think the answer is "yes" but it is really confusing. All of this discussion, of course, is assuming that I do not insulate that extended part of the brew boiler.
Third, relative to your comment about the insulation holding up, I still think that the real deal is that 1/4" ceramic blanket stuff I read about on alt.coffee.