Steam Boiler Issues -- and Gicleur Valve Question

[mdmitch2]

Hello Everyone! I'm the proud new owner of a s1 v2, purchased second hand a few days ago. The original owner purchased it from Chris Coffee in 2007... Anyway, the coffee boiler seems to work correctly, and I'm not getting any error lights. I was able to do the brew group/expansion valve calibrations and pull a shot with no issues. The problem I'm having seems be a result of the steam boiler not filling with enough water. The first symptom was that the hot water dispenser only dispenses a tiny amount of water, and then just steam. Also, the steam from the wand starts strong and then gets very weak after 15 seconds or so. I also drained the steam boiler and only about 12 oz of water came out (rough estimate). There seemed to be a good bit of scale on the boiler elbow connections, so I pulled those off and cleaned them up, but nothing seemed overly obstructed... just a bit gunk here and there. Then, I pulled the water level sensor and it was pretty thoroughly covered in a thin layer of build up, which I was able to scrub off pretty easily.

Finally, per this forum, I decided to check the gicleur valve for any obstructions, but I don't understand how to take it apart... I unscrewed the nut, under which there is a screw protruding which appears to be adjustable via flat heat screwdriver. I was expecting something to come apart when I removed the nut, but nothing did.... I tried wiggling the screw with some needle nose pliers to see if that would cause it to pop out, but it didn't budge. So, how do I actually get the gicleur valve apart? I've attached a picture of the valve with the nut removed.

By the way, the steam boiler inlet tube was seized up with scale at the elbow connection, and I ended up mangling it pretty badly in order to remove it and clean it out. So I haven't been able to verify if cleaning the water level sensor fixed the initial problem. On Monday I'll order a new tube/ferrule/insert from Chris Coffee, and probably go ahead and get some boiler gaskets so I can do a proper descaling.

Also, thanks for this wonderful forum..... it's been a valuable resource, and was definitely a factor in deciding to purchase the vivaldi over other machines.

[Futahaguro]

You cannot take it out with the control board in the way like it is in your picture. That is a needle valve so it requires space to pull it out. Once the nut is removed and the valve is loosened all of the way you can pull it out.