After my cheap automatic coffee machine broke (I was secretly happy that it broke so I could have a reason to get rid of it), I was searching for a more interesting coffee machine to use. The Flair was good but it wasn’t enough for the coffee enthusiasm in me. For me, pushing a button and get coffee is so boring. I need something challenging. I need to understand, feeling the coffee in my hands. After some time of googling, the La Pavoni shined on me with its timeless beauty. Many videos about those tasty liquid gold pouring out from the machines, kept me awake all night. I had to have it. I need to experience it or I will die regretting. The new one is totally out of budget. The used one was the way to go. Hours spending on eBay finally got me a La Pavoni in my price range. The machine appeared to be in good shape but I always told myself “too good to be true”. I was prepared for the worst so I spent time on the internet, researching in case there is something wrong and need to be fixed.

Finally, the machine came. It appeared to pack carefully with a lot of padding.

Tada! Here it is! So beautiful and shiny.  It was identified as a Millenium La Pavoni, produced from 2000 and later. It looked almost new! I thought I got lucky. 

Checking carefully, look like the boiler need to descale. Lucky that I still have a bottle of Durgol Swiss Espresso Decalcifier from my old machine.

The base has some rust but it was easy to clean off with some steel wool.

The shower head looks good. It has a lot of coffee stuck in the group head. I cleaned it out while descaling.There is something odd about the steam tap knot. I think it was bent during shipping because I didn’t see it in the seller photo on eBay. I was so worried but it still works, just look ugly. I asked the local service and they wanted $50 to $200 to fix or replace it so I decided to fix it myself. I found an instruction on http://www.francescoceccarelli.eu/La_Pavoni/Faidate/g_rubinetto_eng.htm so I ordered a steam tap to replace it from Stephano Espresso. Wish me luck!

(To be continued.)