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My shop got a 30 year old espresso machine back from the dead last week

A neighbor brought me a 1992 La Pavoni lever machine that had been sitting in his garage since 2005. The boiler had a thick layer of scale and the gaskets were basically dust. I spent three evenings taking it apart and cleaning every piece with citric acid. After I replaced the seals and did a few test pulls, it made a shot that tasted better than my home machine that cost $800 new. There's something about how those old lever machines build pressure that newer ones don't quite match. Anyone here ever restored a vintage machine and found it worked better than expected?
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2 Comments
eric359
eric3597d ago
Ha! 30 year old espresso machine wakes up and starts making better coffee than your modern stuff. Guess some things really were built better back then.
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holly47
holly477d ago
Nah, hard disagree here @eric359. Modern machines have way better temp stability and pressure profiling, that vintage stuff is just nostalgia and survivor bias.
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