Breville BES900 Dual Boiler - Owners thread

[neofelis]

Thank you!!! I was confused with it all.

All my other cheaper machines you could fill the basket ALL the way to the top but this one is different!

Im REALLY starting to love this machine.

Also

http://www.ozbargain.com.au/node/74687

I got my BDB + FREE Smart grinder for $1099

Use the receipt to price match

[nickoyang]

For those that have the 1/2 dose button issue (where it's not providing consistent and accurate results):
- was there a solution for this?
- has anyone sent it back to Breville? and if so, was it a firmware thing or a flow meter thing?

I've never really been bothered by this, but there are other people in the household are using this machine now. I think its a great feature for a beginner, except mine doesnt work properly.

From what I can gather, it's pretty accurate if when you use a dual wall filter to program the machine. In this scenario, the pressure goes up to about 7 bar and the OPV never actually opens. 30mls is delivered consistently each time.

However, when programming it using freshly ground coffee to deliver 30mls in 30seconds, I find that the 1-2 cup buttons stops becoming accurate. In this scenario, the brew pressure hits 10 and diverts any excess water/pressure through the OPV. For whatever reason, the machine inst able to accurately work out the amount of water that is being delivered into the cup and keeps pumping water until it thinks it has delivered 30mls.

Hi specialpants,

I admire your observation capability. Yes, I think you pointed out the accuracy of dosing volume is related to the OPV operation. In the BDB machine, there are two flowmeters. One is located between the water tank and the brew vibe pump and the other is located between the OPV high-pressure bypass outlet and teh water tank.

The function of calculating the volume by a flowmeter is detecting how many turns of the number of flowmeter's internal propeller wheel's rotations. To calculate the dosing volume is by subtracting the volume through the OPV flowmeter from the volume through the vibe pump. As you observed, when OPV is not activated, all fluids pass through the vibe pump's flowmeter and the calculation is quite accurate. When OPV is acting to bypass overpressure hot water to water tank, the OPV flowmeter starts to rotate. Remember that OPV valve's openness is jittering naturally due to its sping's behavior, so that the rate of fluid passing through the OPV flowmeter is not steady. Apparently, the DBD controller's software cannot calculate such "jittering" flowing volume by detecting a steady roration of the OPV flowmeter. This ends up the substration of volume flew between two flowmeters varies a lot and you observe the volumetric dosing is problematic.

In my experience, my machine OPV is set at 10 bar and I pour a shot at 9 bar so I can get consistent dosing volume. When the brewing pressure goes up to 10 bar, I do see the dosing volume and shot time vary quite randomly.

Cheers

[John_J]

I am no expert, so this is just my opinion so when the BDB was first shipped most people found their opv was set around 11/12 bar so the opv was not operating in most cases
and I expect the shot volume was correct more often than not,when tested at the factory, then there was a big push to adjust the opv down, a lot of people did it themselves or had it done at service centres, there was such a fuss that I believe Breville had the factories ship new machines set at 9 bar, so now the opv is operating most of the time and as Nick suggests this is affecting the shot volume, so to test this theory I'll set my opv to open at 10.5 bar and make sure the tamp and grind is such that it dosn't go over about 9.5bar and then see if the shot volume improves.

[specialpants]

I'll give it a test tomorrow morning. Thanks Nick and John for your comments; it makes sense what you're both saying.

I'll make my grind a bit coarser and see if I can find a sweet spot where I get a good extraction without activating the OPV. Part of me says this will make my shot come out faster and in doing so, I'll end up with an under extracted shot. I'll report back...

[nickoyang]

I am no expert, so this is just my opinion so when the BDB was first shipped most people found their opv was set around 11/12 bar so the opv was not operating in most cases
and I expect the shot volume was correct more often than not,when tested at the factory, then there was a big push to adjust the opv down, a lot of people did it themselves or had it done at service centres, there was such a fuss that I believe Breville had the factories ship new machines set at 9 bar, so now the opv is operating most of the time and as Nick suggests this is affecting the shot volume, so to test this theory I'll set my opv to open at 10.5 bar and make sure the tamp and grind is such that it dosn't go over about 9.5bar and then see if the shot volume improves.

Hi,

As the spring inside the OPV is not a abrupt ON-OFF switch, when the pressure goes up toward the limit of the OPV, the valve opens more widely. Good OPV valve's spring does exhibit some good nonlinearity so that the valve only opens when pressure approaches the limit. Also, the nonlinearity of the spring varies by the OPV limits. Thus, you will see the limit you sets still varies when you turn the screw of the OPV back and forth a few. After few tries of turning the screw, you can get a more stable OPV limit set point.

Also, the OPV limit set point does change the operating noise of the OPV valve. When it gets closer to 9 bar, the valve jitters more frequently, a higher pitch noise will be. When the OPV is set too high, such as 12 or 13 bar, due to the nonlinearity of the spring, the vibe pump can just pump up to the limit when the grind size is too fine or the filter basket is overdosing. In this case, it is very hard to find the best grind size and dose volume to keep at 9 bar brewing pressure. When the OPV is set to 10 bar or 9.75 bar, the pressure region of the valve starts to open gets smaller, so the OPV is more sensitive to the grind size and dose volume and you can easily find the sweet spot of grind sise, dose volume and tamping to get a more stable 9 bar brewing. In this condition, if the OPV spring still has good recoil force, the OPV valve will not open too wide so generally very small amount of hot water bypass from the OPV to water tank. This is said, setting OPV to 10 bar will easily "decouple" the OPV clampig at its limit from other grind size, dose volume and tamping so that you will not get the brew pressure just goes up to 12~13 bar or below 9 bar as the OPV limit is set too high.

Cheers

[argus]

John_J, I'm no expert either but I seem to recall that the machines that were adjusted by Breville agents were set to around 10 - 10.5 Bar (i know that's where they set mine). I don't think Breville has ever suggested they should be set at 9 Bar.
The delivered volume problem seems to be more of an issue with the early machines. A Breville rep commented on another forum that:

"I can confirm that there is a firmware update. This primarily deals with managing programmed shot volumes at varying rates of flow. Thats how its related to the OPV. Other parts of the update relate to backend management of small stuff, all the major stuff was well sorted before the software was signed off prior to production. Cheers, Phil"

Of course we don't know when this firmware fix was implemented or if the fix also involved changes to hardware. Unless Breville confirm that there is a fix available there is probably little point giving your BDB a vacation at the service centre since it is unlikely anything can be done. In the end you can get around the problem by using the manual button but really for $1300 the machine should do what it says on the box and as specialpants said when other people in the household are using this machine its a great feature for a beginner.

Of more concern imho seems to be the way Breville has dropped the ball on support / warranty. You'll see by reading back how responsive Breville were when the BDB was first released and I had nothing but praise for the way the opv issue was addressed on my machine, but now we are seeing reports of weeks at the service agent, lack of parts, this thread where swamprat96 has waited days for a call back or this one where Angelo's machine has been back to the service centre 5 times and they still can't stop the portafilter falling out.

[nickoyang]

John_J, I'm no expert either but I seem to recal that the machines that were adjusted by Breville agents were set to around 10 - 10.5 Bar (i know that's where they set mine). I don't think Breville has ever suggested they should be set at 9 Bar.
The delivered volume problem seems to be more of an issue with the early machines. A Breville rep commented on another forum that:

"I can confirm that there is a firmware update. This primarily deals with managing programmed shot volumes at varying rates of flow. Thats how its related to the OPV. Other parts of the update relate to backend management of small stuff, all the major stuff was well sorted before the software was signed off prior to production. Cheers, Phil"

Of course we don't know when this firmware fix was implemented or if the fix also involved changes to hardware. Unless Breville confirm that there is a fix available there is probably little point giving your BDB a vacation at the service centre since it is unlikely anything can be done. In the end you can get around the problem by using the manual button but really for $1300 the machine should do what it says on the box and as specialpants said when other people in the household are using this machine its a great feature for a beginner.

Of more concern imho seems to be the way Breville has dropped the ball on support / warranty. You'll see by reading back how responsive Breville were when the BDB was first released and I had nothing but praise for the way the opv issue was addressed on my machine, but now we are seeing reports of weeks at the service agent, lack of parts, this thread where swamprat96 has waited days for a call back or this one where Angelo's machine has been back to the service centre 5 times and they still can't stop the portafilter falling out.

Allow me to tell you the truth...
The ODM of Breville is actually a Taiwanese espresso/home appliance machine makers, called "Tiamo". Tiamo's factory is in Mainland China. Due to the business model between Breville and Tiamo, Breville normally will not place order too much spare parts to Tiamo and mostly Breville is dealing with a whole machine based business with her ODM. So that is not surprising, no spare parts availble from Breville. Please note what the spare parts I refer to are not the water tank, drip tray but the internal key components such as vibe pump, O-ring, silion group head seal, flowmeters, OPV and custom design 3-way solenoid base from OLAB.

Cheers

[coffeefreak_WA]

BES900 Perth repair agent

Where did you take your machine ? I took mine in today to Swift Appliances who are the Authorized repairer for Breville and it seems just about every other electrical appliance manufacter. They had a huge list. If it comes back faulty or not working, then ill just get on the war path and demand replacement.. I asked them to give me a date i can expect to pick it up. The bloke told me 1 week and i said. Ok ill see you in 1 week. Ill be going in 1 week and expecting my machine to be done.

Did you take your machine to Swift or your not in Perth city?

No, it was a repairer in the Belmont area. To Breville's credits - they came back to me minutes ago and want to send me a new machine next week. Let's see if this nightmare comes to an end.

[johnvelo]

Gday,

We have had our machine for 9months, bought the first one in Wollongong as soon as they arrived we had it in the kitchen ready to go.

It was a great machine up until it stopped last month after a decline in performance for the two months before. Sent for repair as requested. Follow ups with breville was hard finally after a few weeks the machine was found at breville, fixed and returned. Some where between leaving our house three weeks ago and returning the machine arrived very bent after being dropped. Annoying, a little.

After a few phone calls today the sales manger arranged a new machine, that was picked up today.

So the end result was good. But frustrating road to tread.

Once burnt twice shy, I will be selling this machine and buying something else while this is still new in the box.

Something simple in design like a manual la Pavino pro. We have been through five semi machines in the last ten years, time to let it go.

John.

[Vinitasse]

John_J, I don't think Breville has ever suggested they should be set at 9 Bar.

Hmmm.... then why is the following clearly listed as a key feature in the BES900 instruction book on page 7?:

Regulated Extraction Pressure
15 bar Italian pump with over pressure
valve (OPV) delivers water at the optimum
maximum pressure of 9 bars.

[argus]

Hmmm.... then why is the following clearly listed as a key feature in the BES900 instruction book on page 7?: ........... maximum pressure of 9 bars.

....The max you should see with a choke is ~10.5 so when a shot is running at a reasonable extraction rate, then itll sit around ~9-9.5bar...
Cheers, Phil

I think that's the difference between marketing fluff and manufacturing specifications.
The OPV is set at 10.5 bar against a blind filter so you end up with 9 bar during extraction when you have the correct grind and dose.

[Thirteen13]

No, it was a repairer in the Belmont area. To Breville's credits - they came back to me minutes ago and want to send me a new machine next week. Let's see if this nightmare comes to an end.

Are they a recognised Breville repair centre ? Or just a appliance repair centre ?

[Tupinamba]

Harvey Norman 5 year replacement warranty

I have just become an owner of BDB. I was offered a 5 year warranty with replacement for $289, which I initially declined. The seller then cut the price to $200 and I declined again. Then he cut it to $163. I rejected the offer for the third time... but I decided to take it at the cash register when they told me I have a 15 day cooling off period so I can get the warranty money back.

Three questions:

1) in your experience, are those Harvey Norman warranties fairly honoured? The seller told me that if there is any failure (even minor) they would come to my place and replace the machine with a brand new one. They would need to check there is a failure, so there might be a catch there.

2) do you think $163 are worth the peace of mind? Well, I know that this is something I have to figure out by myself, but what do you think?

3) do you think $163 is a good price for the warranty? I managed to get the machine and grinder combo with a substantial discount (alas not $1099), so I am worried they want to recoup some money with the warranty.

Many thanks in advance,

Tupinamba

[John_J]

I think that's the difference between marketing fluff and manufacturing specifications.
The OPV is set at 10.5 bar against a blind filter so you end up with 9 bar during extraction when you have the correct grind and dose.

just to cloud the issue a little more, when I tested my pressure with Greg Pullmans pressure guage, 9bar at the group head was reading 9.6 on the machines guage

[Thirteen13]

Hey mate,

Congrats on the purchase... MMm ive heard mixed stories on those 5 year replacement warranties. Sometimes they dont honour it or will only honor it under certain conditions etc... I bought mine from HN and didnt get the 5 year warranty, cause it comes iwth 2 year Breville warranty, so its like your getting 2 warranties. With the quality of this machine, i doubt if youll ever have to claim on the warranty and if it does die in 5 years, it will still have a certain level of resale value, or otherwise just spread the cost over 5 years. So say its cost you $200 a year for the machine. If you bought the coffee at the shop for say $4 a cup, thats 50 cups a year to make it worth while just to pay for the machine (not including coffee). You get the idea though.

I wouldnt worry about it. Id get my money back as thats $160 you cna put towards your next machine if it decides to die