Meet my Breville espresso machine. Hello, machine.
This machine does not work--possibly through a combination of things its owners have done and things its manufacturers have done. So who is more to blame? Hard to say, really... but if it came down to a legal battle, it would probably be the human's fault. It's always the human's fault.Regardless, this is my dilemma. I'm putting it out there because the machine looks nice enough on the outside, and I want to believe that what it has on the inside counts just as much as its appearance. I want to give it that chance. So if any of you are espresso fiends or machine techy, let me know if you know what I should do. This particular espresso machine was purchased several (many) years ago for my papa. It worked great. Since I no longer lived with my parents when it was purchased, I assumed that it continued to work great, but I really have no idea how well it continued to work/how often it was used/if it was regularly cleaned (it wasn't)/etc. After reading the brief (novel) book of instructions, I noticed instructions for decalcifying--something I have an inkling has not been performed on this machine. When I try to run it now, it makes that sweeea-reeeeeee-kkkkkkkkk noise that espresso machines make. Then it does that chug, chug, chug sound it used to make when the pump was pushing water through the filter/beans. And yet..... nothing is coming out. No water droplets. The beans aren't even wet. So what do you do to an espresso machine that doesn't have water coming through the brew head?My first reaction was that I should decalcify. It must be clogged, I thought. But then I remembered that I can't decalcify if no water is going through. I have seen reports on message boards from some people saying their pump stopped working after a year. If this is what happened to me, is it fixable? If so, how and for how much?Help meeeeee...Yours Truly,Decaffeinated in Michigan
