Breville Oracle Owners Thread BES980XL

[RVtech]

Ours is very close. Cabinets vary from 18"-18 1/4". I have to remove the lid of the hopper to clear the cabinet where we keep it. We move the machine out every day for use, and then wheel it back under for storage. I have enough space to place the lid on once it's parked as the cabinets are resessed underneath where the Oracle rests.

[mtlcoffee]

thanks! Is the machine can work without the breville bean hopper. I might guess that I have enough clearance to put the hopper but not enough to lock it (I have a 2 inch decorative trim in front of cabinet) I will need to put the machine under to clear the trim, after put the hopper but its give to me about 1/2 inch to be able to lock the bean hopper.....Or I use something else smaller as bean hopper...Is the lock system needed to the machine to run?

thanks!

[RVtech]

thanks! Is the machine can work without the breville bean hopper. I might guess that I have enough clearance to put the hopper but not enough to lock it (I have a 2 inch decorative trim in front of cabinet) I will need to put the machine under to clear the trim, after put the hopper but its give to me about 1/2 inch to be able to lock the bean hopper.....Or I use something else smaller as bean hopper...Is the lock system needed to the machine to run?

thanks!

Yes, the hopper must be locked or you will get a message to lock it on the display and the grinder/tamper is disabled. You can still make a shot with the hopper removed, but no grinding or tamping is available. Locking/unlocking the hopper doesn't change the height. Obviously, the machine height is much lower without the hopper. The only issue for us is when moving the machine. When the rolling feature (wheel down) is used, the machine is raised slightly. Raising the machine is the difference for clearance for us. The lid of the hopper doesn't clear our cabinet with the wheel down. We can slide the machine with the wheel stored and the entire machine clears our cabinet. We were plenty worried about this before buying, but have found it to be a non issue. Simply remove the lid and it clears our cabinet. Occasionally, we use our machine when it's stored under the cabinets up against the wall. Typically, I keep the water full and bean hopper topped off with enough beans so we don't need to access either to use the machine when it's under the cabinets. We cannot remove the hopper or fill the water from the top access when the machine is stored under the cabinets. You'll need an inch or so of clearance to remove the hopper. We don't have an inch of clearance so our machine has to be pulled away from the cabinet to remove the hopper.

[Shanbran]

I brought my Oracle in Dec 2014 now in May 2015 its broken I did a descale which I have done before with no issues.
to its would not get the the correct temperate took it back to where I brought it from and they have sent it to get repair I was told maybe three weeks
to get it back not happy I paid a fortune to have a working machine. so now without a working coffee machine with no time frames.
This experience I may never buy a Breville product again.

[noidle22]

It's a fact of life that mass produced appliances suffer breakdowns, regardless of how much money you spend.
Some will be lucky and never have a problem, others will not have it so easy. At least yours is under warranty and you don't have to pay a cent.

I don't understand how you can make a judgement of an entire brand on one unfortunate experience.
Three weeks is quite a long time for a repair but you might be surprised and get it back sooner.

[RVtech]

Received an email from Breville yesterday regarding our replacement machine (auto frothing issues and loud pump growling noises). Finally, a replacement machine is available. This is 1 week short of a 6 month time period from our initial issue and related warranty claim. An option with Breville (not known until the email with return procedure instructions was received) is to provide a credit card which will have charges for a new machine placed on hold and shipped immediately. We are opting for this so we can use the box for the return shipment once we have it, and will also provide an overlap with machines so we are not without coffee while we wait for the replacement to arrive. I'll update once our warranty claim is completed. Meanwhile, the original machine has continued to work in the same fashion. We have been able to have our daily coffee and manually froth when desired with a decent result. The machine continues to growl loudly, with no apparent changes for the worse.

[Sogg]

Really disappointed with Breville's warranty service. My machine was sent in 4 weeks ago and still hasnt been looked at! Cant understand how a company like breville can have such a horrible turn around time!

[TC]

In the case of my local service centre, it's a separate business to which Breville outsources their repair work.

It's possible that your local centre operates similarly and may be overwhelmed with work. Nature of the beast with appliance repair I'm afraid.

We have times where our service blows out beyond a week, but they're rare.

Ultimately though, better the right job rather than a rush job.

[Sogg]

In the case of my local service centre, it's a separate business to which Breville outsources their repair work.

It's possible that your local centre operates similarly and may be overwhelmed with work. Nature of the beast with appliance repair I'm afraid.

We have times where our service blows out beyond a week, but they're rare.

Ultimately though, better the right job rather than a rush job.

I understand delays can happen, but 4 weeks without the machine even being looked at to diagnose is rediculous and considering all the issues breville is having with getting parts out, who knows how long it will actually take to for me to get the machine back. Look at RVtechs post above...6months to get a replacement machine.... Pretty poor service

[TC]

I understand delays can happen, but 4 weeks without the machine even being looked at to diagnose is rediculous and considering all the issues breville is having with getting parts out, who knows how long it will actually take to for me to get the machine back. Look at RVtechs post above...6months to get a replacement machine.... Pretty poor service

Best bet you call Breville rather than the service centre and express (politely) your concerns.

[RVtech]

Finally.......replacement machine arrives. We were fortunate the original machine issues allowed us to keep using the machine. 6 Month wait without coffee wouldn't be good. The new machine is up and running. Inputting the settings from the original we found worked for us allows us to make successful cups straight away. We will be shipping the faulty machine back today for a credit. Hopefully the new machine keeps working and the auto frothing feature doesn't fail again. I don't see any difference in the appearance. The new machine is quieter, more like the original when it was new. The grinder/tamper never gave us any trouble, but the new machine grinder is much quieter. After this experience, it's really hard to say whether I would purchase another Oracle. We love the features, especially the grind/tamp and very little mess. We don't like the "big company" service we received from Breville. We have many Breville appliances in our home. I'll think twice about purchasing any more. Next, we will find out how the warranty period works with the new machine. After waiting 6 months, will we get a complete new warranty for the new replacement machine, or just the finish of the original warranty period?

[Sogg]

My machine was returned yesterday after being away for 4 weeks for a warranty fix. Not sure exactly what was done exactly, but when i spoke to the tech said something about a Power board being replaced.
In the box there was some documentation about a new firmware that was installed on the machine. Seems like there is changes to descale, long black and also auto off.
Auto off can now only be set to 5,10 or 20 minutes. Not sure why they have reduced these options?
Machine seems alot quieter now aswell.

[lombers]

First time poster, but been reading these forums a while.

The Good:
Love the machine, love the coffee it makes and very happy overall with it (when working)

The Bad:
I'm on my 2nd machine after my original twice went back for repairs and wasn't fixed. Shocking customer service to be honest, 4 week wait times for the first repair and then my machine was returned damaged (dints and scratches) and the auto milk texturing was still broken. Second time around the machine went back to Breville, all the damaged parts were replaced but after two weeks the auto milk feature stopped working AGAIN!
Finally after repeated complaints Breville sent me out a brand new machine.
Got the new coffee machine, re-programmed all the settings in and it WAS working perfectly for the last two weeks until yesterday.
Auto frothing completely broken, no texturing it just heats the milk exactly the same problem that @RVTech described. Can froth milk manually but talk about disappointed...

I think this is an ongoing issue for Breville. I just can't understand why they continue to sell the product if the steam wand problems are as widespread as this forum indicates.

I've never had an issue with the machine making coffee, I still love the auto grind / tamp functions but I bought the machine for the complete package. I think I'm at my wits end now and will ask for a refund... Breville have already indicated to me that I need to do this through the store I bought it from (HN), so who knows how that's going to go down...

As I said great product when it's working but unfortunately I have to say I can't recommend it given the ongoing issues I've had plus what's been posted in here. Just severely disappointed...

[RVtech]

After approximately 3 weeks our replacement machine has similar auto frothing issues. No froth, just heated milk. The froth was incredible at first and then diminished with each batch until completely gone. I'm now wondering if there is an issue with the water/steam somehow clogging the wand passages internally where we cannot see it. I keep the tip immaculately clean and I'm certain there is definitely not a problem in the tip area. Our water is treated "city" water with an AquaSana filter system in our house. It still contains minerals, but tests very good on hardness. We see light white deposits in the front water fill area when it dries. We keep the water filter cartridge in the machine's tank replaced frequently. This is disappointing. We still love the coffe this machine produces, but perhaps it's less valuable without the auto frothing feature. The slow service from Breville on repairs/replacement tend to make me not want to deal with this again. I'm now confident they don't have a solution.

[lombers]

After approximately 3 weeks our replacement machine has similar auto frothing issues. No froth, just heated milk. The froth was incredible at first and then diminished with each batch until completely gone. I'm now wondering if there is an issue with the water/steam somehow clogging the wand passages internally where we cannot see it. I keep the tip immaculately clean and I'm certain there is definitely not a problem in the tip area. Our water is treated "city" water with an AquaSana filter system in our house. It still contains minerals, but tests very good on hardness. We see light white deposits in the front water fill area when it dries. We keep the water filter cartridge in the machine's tank replaced frequently. This is disappointing. We still love the coffe this machine produces, but perhaps it's less valuable without the auto frothing feature. The slow service from Breville on repairs/replacement tend to make me not want to deal with this again. I'm now confident they don't have a solution.

Obviously in the exact same boat RVtech. I've tried everything but I can only assume this is actually a serious design fault.

Have logged a call with Breville Oracle and they told me their service department would contact me back. That was over a week ago...