Espresso - Diving Down the Rabbit Hole with A Grimac Mia

The Find

 I have been an avid thrift store deal hunter for years. I and my wife are always finding amazing things for pennies on the dollar at the Goodwill, Salvation Army and Thrift World stores in the nearby city of Omaha, Nebraska. A very recent foray to a smaller local thrift store in our home town, found me drooling over what appeared to be a commercial espresso machine. I had seen the machine, sitting in the aisleway buried by a bunch of stuff on one recent trip to the store. Figuring this level of machine would be way out of my price range, I didn't even inquire about it on that trip. These machine can run $1500 and up online new. Plus I was pretty sure the spouse would not be happy I brought home yet "another" appliance for the counter. Especially a very large stainless steel and chrome one. 

I like everyone loves a good cup of coffee or espresso. But the prices are getting ridiculous at the local shops. $6 for a small mocha, ouch! Many times I have brought home an 'espresso' appliance only to be disappointed in the end. Brands like Delonghi, GE, Keurig and Nespresso come to mind. But we will not go there. I pretty much found out those machines are a joke and can NOT make good espresso, which in turn makes it so you cannot make any other good drinks with it either. But that is a whole other blog to be written. 

The Buy

A few weeks after my first sighting of this stainless steel beast, our town was hosting the annual city wide garage sales. I use the term 'city' loosely, as our population has dropped to just under 5,000 people recently. When I drove by this same thrift store, they had a sign out front that read everything in the store was 35% off on our cities special day. So the wife and I dropped in and went treasure hunting. While we were there I noticed that the espresso machine I had seen a few weeks before was still there. I very nonchalantly asked how much the machine was? Expecting a few hundred dollars at least. She came back with $50, and I about choked. I put everything else I had in my arms down, and slowly and carefully picked up the shiny chrome machine and all its accessories that were laying there with it, and got it paid for and out the door before someone came to their senses. She rang it up for $50 at the register, then took the 35% special price off too. I had a grin a mile wide on my face and was just about dancing out the door of the thrift ship. Well...... except for the 50+ pound machine in my arms. I had just got a commercial quality espresso machine for about $35. Now to get it home and see if it works. "Spoiler Alert" It didn't!. More on that in a bit.

Unknown Brand

I should let you in on something about this machine from the start. There were no badges, logos, labels or any other kind of identifying marking anywhere on this machine. So I really had no idea what brand, model or even quality level of machine I was actually buying. I had even tried using Google Lens to find out something about it and it found similar machines, but not the exact machine I had. All I knew was it 'looked' like a commercial machine you would see in a small coffee shop making cappuccinos and lattes. It was also pretty darn clean, like it had been taken care of during its life. 

Does it work?

The short answer is NO!. But that is the risk you take when you buy things at thrift stores, garage sales etc. especially if you don't test them out first. But I was not risking someone coming to their senses and asking what this machine was even close to worth before got it out the door. I also buy these things knowing I have the technical knowledge and skill to repair 'most' things if they need it. Provided the parts needed do not cost more than the machine is worth, then I usually do not get hurt financially on the deal. On this machine I had a LOT of room to work with, a lot more than even I knew at the time. 

The Research

The first thing I usually do with most things I buy is try to find as much information out about them as possible before I dive into either operating or repairing said device. Where I didn't have any manufacturer information to go on. I started looking at the parts of the machine and slowly figuring out where the thing was made, and by whom. I was able to find many of the parts in the machine were indeed manufactured in Italy. It has an E61 Group head, with a 58mm portafilter and baskets. Has a single boiler and looked to be an HX or heat exchanger boiler. 

After a bit of searching, and digging I was able to find a machine that looked very similar to mine. It was a machine called a Grimac Classica. Classica 1G - Royal Falcon Enterprises . Things were moved around a bit, but they looked very similar in design. It was at this point that I realized I had a much more valuable machine that I had thought at first.  List price on this machine starts at $4685 and climbs to $5450 when you add on special features like dose control. With a little more research I determined what I actually have here is a Grimac MIA, manufactured by BFC or British Royal Falcon Enterprises, depending on where you look lol. This company has so many names it was actually baffling to figure out what I had here. 

I was also able to determine I had acquired what was commonly known as a 'prosumer' espresso machine. It was marketed and sold as a high end home machine or a decent lower end to mid range professional machine you might find in a small coffee shop or café.  This machine used a lot of professional parts inside and the weight of the machine showed the quality is pretty solid. 

Fire It Up!!!!

Everyone is tempted when they get something like this home to immediately plug it in and fire it up. There are probably a dozen reasons why you should NOT do that, but it is not for me to teach you that right now. But primarily with anything that uses an electric heating element, that is submerged in water, a couple of things have to happen before you fire it up. If you apply power to a heating element that is not submerged completely in water, you have just created a 1500W light bulb. A very short lived and expensive one at that. These elements can run upwards of 3 to 400 hundred dollars each. That being said it is also just not safe to plug something in without inspecting it first. If you keep reading you will find out exactly what I am talking about. 

The machine I purchased, on the outside looked very clean and neat. Like it had been well maintained while in use. But you will find that clean on the outside does not always mean well maintained on the the inside.  I have gotten in the habit of removing covers and inspecting things prior to applying power out of habit. It prevents damage if things got jostled loose during transport, but also, if someone has attempted to repair it and left loose wires hanging inside (you would be surprised how many times I have found this) it prevents you from getting hurt in the process. This machine was no exception. I pulled the outside covers and top panels off to expose the inside of this machine and found a whole bunch of AHA! moments inside. 

What I found inside

Inside the machine I found the usual dirty interior parts, though not bad for its age, which I have estimated to be 1999 into the early 2000's. But what I did find was a bit alarming. Had anyone but me bought this machine, and took it home and plugged it in. It may have been a pretty bad day for them. Check out the pictures below for the full story. but it had bad wire connections everywhere. exposed mains wiring that very well could have electrified the water supply inside the machine. 

Burnt connection ends that would have for sure made the machine operate intermittently at best, or started a fire at the worst. This machine is a great example of what to look for prior to operating any older electrical device. 

I spent the better part of an afternoon just repairing electrical connections inside the machine that were either completely melted down, corroded or had disintegrated, or looked like they would be a problem in the future. The connections that were the worst were actually the most important. they were on the heating element itself at the bottom of the boiler. someone had attempted a repair to these connections and to be completely honest made a dangerous mess out of the connections. They had soldered one wire lead directly to the spade lug on the element itself and basically destroyed the element connection in the process. I am guessing that corrosion had caused a failure at some point and they decided soldering was a good solution. The problem with soldering the feed wires onto the heating element is that some point, the element may reach a temperature above the melting point of the solder, which in turn would allow the wire to disconnect from the element and fall off. Where it could contact the metal in the unit and cause someone to be electrocuted.  Which in this case was actually what happened. The wire from the heating element had come loose from the solder and had fallen off. Luckily not touching any metal, and no one got hurt that I am aware of. 

I ended up having to re-solder the wires back to the element since the previous repair had damaged the spade connectors. But when I did the repairs I used silver solder, which has a much higher melting point than regular lead solder and should hold plenty strong enough for the time being. Sometime in the near future I intend to replace the heating element and then repair the ends of the wires with proper spade connectors. For now this will work for my needs. 

When all was said and done I found 8 complete connections that needed cut out and replaced and 4 or 5 that just needed repaired or re-insulated. 

I also had to move the switch in the back bottom of the machine for the water reservoir. Someone at some point had replaced the reservoir with one that is not the original and it did not fit correctly. You were required to put the reservoir in it at a wonky angle to get the switch to activate even when the reservoir was full. So I relocated the switch to allow it to work correctly. 

Now We Fire It Up!

Not quite yet. One thing I have learned over the years is that you want to actually know HOW something works prior to turning it on for the first time. Especially something that has a high pressure water boiler inside that could potentially explode if something is not right. RTFM is not as dumb as most guys make it sound. 

So I did a few things. I searched for and found a manual (sort of). I found one that was pretty close to this model, and read it cover to cover, all 10 pages of it. Something you will learn with commercial grade machines is that operator manuals pretty much suck. They count on in person training and videos to teach their owners and staff how to use them. 

That was actually my next step was finding videos on YouTube and finding machines similar to mine and learning about their operation. If you start searching for Espresso information on YouTube, eventually your brain will just explode. There is SO much information there and SO many experts, and SO many different ways of doing something. Even when you become somewhat efficient at making espresso, there will be 10 people in a video on YT that will tell you that your way is wrong. 

Now we fire it up???

Yes!!! now we actually do fire it up. I was probably being over cautious. But fortunately it was a nice summer day outside. So I took my newly repaired Grimac Mia espresso machine outside and put it on a table on my deck.  At least this way if it exploded the wife wouldn't kill me for destroying her kitchen, if I lived through it. I left the top covers off so that I could observe everything inside the first time I fired it up.  I had to put the interior divider and sides back in so that I could put the water reservoir in and fill it up.  I carried some water out and filled up the reservoir. 

I turned the machine on, and wallah, the pump kicked on and started filling up the boiler. I depressed the water switch on the front to make sure most of the air got bled out of the boiler and the group. In a few seconds you started to hear it heating inside, the little tinking and popping sounds of hot water being created. 

Much to my surprise everything appeared to be working.  All the switches on the control panel were in working order. The controller seemed to be timing the dose shot buttons as it should. I did have a few drips to start off. I tested the steam wand valve and the hot water wand switch and both were working fine. 

 
The overpressure vent on top of the boiler seemed to be stuck and was leaking a bit. But after a little while and a few taps with a screw driver it decided to seal up and start building pressure on the gauge on the front of the machine.  I found no leaks in any of the copper lines or fittings. No damage to anything as far as I could tell. 

Once the boiler had come up to pressure I did notice there was a slow drip from the group head. Not bad, but definitely dripping. Later I figured out that everything was just dry. After using it for a while everything apparently got lubricated and started sealing the way it should.

What's Next?

I was simply elated that I had gotten this machine that I had acquired so affordably running with no other expense except for a few wire connectors. 

At this point I didn't even have any coffee in the house that would be good for a cup of espresso. The grinder I had at the time was grossly under capable. I didn't have any espresso cups, no tamper. Basically what I had was the machine, 2 portafilters. 2 baskets, a blind basket and a milk frother jug. 

So I started slowly collecting the things I needed to get ready to make that first amazing cup of espresso. Boy did I have NO idea what I was getting into here. This machine could possible be the most expensive $35 I have ever spent. We'll call that $35 the seed money that fed the rest of the companies that I purchased items from. Once you actually have a good quality espresso machine, you will find you cannot just settle for mediocre espresso anymore. It has to be right, and it has to taste amazing. I have been able to accomplish that task, but I can guarantee you it was NOT for $35. The rabbit hole under this espresso machine is deep, and paved with shiny stuff all the way down. 

My next write up will explain the things I had to acquire, and reacquire. Mistakes I made and learned from. And maybe even share some tips on how to NOT spend more than you have to to get the best espresso you have ever tasted, right in your own kitchen.

I will also delve into what this little electrical device on the left does, and why it may be a good thing to just replace right from the get go with an older machine like the Mia.

Till then, thanks for reading and enjoy your morning coffee in what ever form you can. Coffee makes the world go round, and saves more lives than any ER in the world.