The S1 Cafe - Helping Your Espresso Dreams Become Reality

I need help once again before I turn my back on this machine once and for all!

I bought a used vivaldi 2 from a closing down restaurant and I thought I’d give the machine a descale after reading the detailed instructions here which I did however every step of the way has been a hassle to say the least.

Whilst trying to remove the steam boiler lid, I managed to break the screw bit of the thermostat inside the thread, thankfully Chas let me know that all I had to do was to stick the thermostat back onto its place with some thermal epoxy.

I managed to descale boilers and the machine was finally ready, stupidly I didn’t get round to sticking the bimetal thermostat down with the thermal epoxy and it was just hanging lose inside the machine with the normal wires attached to it, I had done this a few times before without any problems when attending to the machine however on this last occasion the thermostat’s body was in contact with the edge of the steam boiler lid.

I turned the machine on as normal and it heated up normally and as the steam boiler was heating up I heard an electric bang and the machine instantly turned off and tripped my house RCD also.

I unplugged the machine and noticed what had happened, I was surprised to see that the short circuit had actually made a slight dent on the edge of the steam boiler, the side of the thermostat where it was in contact with the boiler was blackened also.

I inspected the copper cables of the wires which were attached to the thermostat and they were not blackened or discoloured.

I’ve taken the thermostat off and have joined the two cables that normally attaches to the thermostat together with electric cable so that they are connected electrically however when I tried to turn the machine on again it wouldn’t turn on, There was no power and the lights didn’t come on at all.

To make matters worse, after reading some comments here about the master 20A fuse that may have blown, I noticed that this machine didn’t have one! As you can see in the pics, there is an empty hole next to where the plug cable enters the back of the machine however there isn’t a fuse there unless I’m looking in the wrong place.

I just hope that this is a simple fix and hopefully it’s the fuse on the motherboard that has blown and not fried the motherboard.

Any help would be greatly appreciated!

When I had a V1 and then a VII the fuse was in a fuse holder in-line with the power cord just inside the chassis where the cord comes through the bottom. It definitely looked like an after thought rather than part of a purposeful design. Some forum members say their machines don't have this. That's the first thing to verify since it would be the most likely thing to blow.

Hi Chas,

Thanks for the quick reply.

I looked under the machine where the power cable is and there doesn't seem to be any fuses located in this area, as you can see from my pics there is a an empty hole next to the power cord which I imagine is where the fuse should be.

I have no fuse there either, but inside the black control box you'll find a fuse. It's not easy to get out but I've done it several times..... If it was a powerline short circuit from the thermo-fuse directly to ground you might be lucky as your RCD reacted fast and only a small spike went into the controler.


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Look for the 5A fuse called F3

shrewd1 wrote:Hi Chas,

Thanks for the quick reply.

I looked under the machine where the power cable is and there doesn't seem to be any fuses located in this area, as you can see from my pics there is a an empty hole next to the power cord which I imagine is where the fuse should be.

From your response it is not clear to me that you have looked in the correct location. The fuse holder is NOT mounted to anything it is just lying loose and tucked out of sight behind the wires where the green arrow is pointing in the photo below. You will be looking for something like the part in the second photo mounted in-line with the power lead.

Your machine may not have this fuse, but be certain you don't before you remove the controller board which is a PITA! Of all the times the fuse on the controller board has been suspected of causing an S1 to not turn on, it almost never turned out to be the culprit, though if we've learned anything on this forum it's that there's a first time for everything.

Thanks guys for your time and input.

As usual with this machine I went about this the long way round as I thought I didn't have a master 20A fuse so I took the black board out to inspect the 5A fuse there, Chas was right that it was a bit of a pain to get the board out.

I inspected the 5A fuse and it looked completely fine so I put the control board back and put the machine’s panels back together willing to accept a long term fix at this point, Whilst removing the plug I remembered that the plugs normally has a fuse inside them so I took the plug apart and changed the 13A fuse at the plug and re-plugged the machine back in again not expecting much and viola! The standby light was blinking. Thankfully I didn’t fry the motherboard.

I waited for the machine to heat up to check everything was working fine again with no alarms which it did however when the steam boiler heated up and the boiler light for the steam boiler stopped flashing indicating that it had reached set temperature and stopped heating I noticed the pressure gauge was going up and up into the red zone from the green zone whereas on previous occasions it would normally stabilize and max out around the end of the green and start of the red zone, Then I heard the sound of steam hissing even though the steam knob was in the off position and suddenly there was loud steam explosion/release from the top of the steam boiler lid.

This was obviously the steam overpressure valve letting out some steam from inside the boiler.

After reading the possible causes online for this fault I think it may have something to do with the Auto refill/solenoid as the previous occasion when I turned the machine on, it was connected to a Flojet bottled water pump running from a water bottle.

Upon start up that time I could hear the Flojet running making that bbrrt bbrrt sound for over a minute until the vivaldi threw a blocking alarm which it does after one minute if the pump is active and the boilers aren’t full so I turned the machine off and on again and the flojet continued to pump water into the vivaldi like before for about another 30 seconds until it stopped where the boilers were probably full, I thought this was strange and a bit excessive as the boilers were not empty during the previous occasion I used the machine, At the time I just put it down to the Flojet maybe being very slow to pump water into the machine.

Apart from the above I have no idea why the steam overpressure valve would let off like that leaving a small amount of water on the counter.

The journey continues…

Duh.... forgot that some of your big UK plug's contain a fuse(!) Anyway, now you know how to get that control board out ;)
Not sure I can help you with your other issues on the journey :(


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So I guess it's what I thought it was but I didn't know the UK hid their fuses in the plugs. The only electrical items we get in the US with fuses in the plugs seem to be Christmas lights.

Yes we have our 3 pronged plugs fused over here which turned out to be a good thing for me in this occasion.

I was looking in the wrong place for the master 20A fuse inside the vivaldi like you mentioned chas.

Any ideas on why the pressure valve went?

I'm thinking that the overfill solenoid valve may have had some scale build up something and that I should take it apart for a soak in citric acid, I hope it's a similar job to taking out the hot water delivery solenoid valve out to clean which I did as that was blocked not letting out any hot water through the hot water spout and worked okay after a soak in citric acid.

By the time I'm finished with this machine I'll be a qualified plumber and electrician

Okay, I found out what was causing the steam boiler to overfill and thus blow the pressure relief valve, The wire for the boiler refill had snapped off whilst descaling so I crimped it with the a female spade connector that was too loose and wasn’t making proper contact with the boiler refill connector, This is what was makings the boiler to overfill so I crimped another connector and made sure the connection and crimp was made securely and tightly this time.

I plugged the machine in and now for some reason whilst the machine is on standby mode before turning on the machine, the machine seems to be on and both the heaters are heating up at the same time straight away as soon as the machine is plugged in.

What normally should happen is once the machine is plugged in then the standby light should blink without heating the boilers, Then once the machine is turned on, the group boiler should heat up first and then the steam boiler should heat up after the group boiler’s temperature has been reached.

Apart from the steam pressure relief valve popping letting out a plume of steam from above the machine and the short circuit which occurred that blew the fuse inside the plug that I changed I have no idea what is causing the machine to be on and both of the heaters to be active whilst in standby mode.

When I turn on the machine from standby mode then the usual temperature and boiler light blink indicating that the boiler is heating up to reach the set temperature of the group boiler and there is no blocking alarms, I cannot wait to see what happens as the steam boiler is still quite full from the overfill from the last time and if I wait too long then the safety pressure valve will probably blow again as I can see the steam pressure gauge increasing.

Any input would be greatly appreciated.

Did you forget to reconnect the control wires that go to the triac boards when you reinstalled the controller board?

Hi Chas,

I didn't disconnect the control wires to the triac or anything else for that matter whilst I removed the control board, maybe I disconnected a wire accidentally whilst I pulled out the control board so I'll check it again later and report.

You mean you were able to open the controller box and check the fuse without disconnecting any wires?

I tried to go over all the connections to make sure the wires were plugged in tight and not hanging out anywhere and plugged the machine back in and the same thing happens as before where as on standby the steam boiler heats up straight away.

I feared from reading the other forums on the s1 site that I may have blown the triac or ssr in my case so I dismounted the SSR which was a bit fiddly to see if I can see any discolorations or anything and it seemed okay to me.

I’ve taken some pictures of the SSR for the forum and am wondering what to do now, Should I swap the connections around at the SSR end from the group boiler and the steam boiler? If so then what am I looking for?

I was thinking you had an older machine with the dual triac boards and thought it unlikely that what you did would take them both out. However, now that you indicate you have a newer one with the one SSR module, I am guessing that you fried it in a way that both devices are shorted on.

Essentially the 220V inputs to the SSR module are getting passed through to the outputs and thus powering up both boilers in the absence of a control signal. This is a true "runaway" condition in that the boilers will not turn off until the S1 is unplugged or until both boilers' protection valves pop open, and flood your kitchen. Then both heater elements will melt down until they short out and blow that fuse in the cord again.

For the interest of the forum the brand and model number for the SSR is CARLO GAVAZZI RA2A23D25

Your descaling operation is getting expensive. However, by the time you are done you should be able to open your own S1 repair shop.

Thank you for your input again Chas, I really don't know why you you're not running for president, you'd certainly get my vote!

I would've gladly handed over the machine to a qualified technician to save myself all this trouble however I took the machine to two la spaziale approved coffee machine repair centres and both didn't have a clue and couldn't even be bothered with the machine saying it was far too fiddly to work on, all they want to do is charge me £450 for a descale.

I'm very grateful to this forum and your input chas for helping me along so far and hopefully soon the machine will be up and ready so that I can retire my silvia/pid and get on the next level with the vivaldi.

I've already bought my kony after taking note of your grinder chas and reading the glowing reviews for it by Greg Scace.

I'll order a new SSR and fit it place and will update soon!

Before I bought the Kony I was getting a new grinder every couple of years. Now that I've had the Kony for over 6 years I must be happy.

When I first bought the Kony, I discovered the wires from the two programmable buttons were reversed internally at their connectors. Other that that I have done nothing but clean the burrs periodically. The Robur would probably have been even better but it was just too big for home use. The one mod I made is to retrofit it with a half sized bean hopper to make it even more home friendly.

I managed to fit the new ssr on the inside of the machine which was a bit of a tight fit but at least it has fixed the issue and the boilers are operating normally now.

As usual with this machine, onto wrestling with the next fix

The steam boiler takes too long to fill resulting in the machine throwing a blocking alarm, during the first 30 seconds or so when the steam boiler is trying to fill sometimes there is a strange unusual metallic sound and then it goes away but the noise going away doesn't speed up the filling process as it keeps trying to fill until the machine throws a blocking alarm and I have to turn the machine off and on again so the machine can continue trying to fill the steam boiler.

I've read the posts regarding this and the usual caveats with gicleur, inlet valve and 90 degree bend at the steam boiler inlet.

There's a recent post on this which I will continue this natter there along with pics.

Thanks for your help everyone!

I'm finally set up now! It has been a deep learning curve fixing this machine but defidently not possible without the help from this forum and it's very helpful members.

I'm impressed allready with the level of crema and it is only my first week.

The amount of steam available is scary stuff, nearly blew the pitcher right off my hand! using scot Rao's soap and water was helpful along with reading other members experience's.

Thank you Chas and eveyone else for this great site.