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Has anyone on here done the pid mod on the rancillio Silvia?
Yeah. I followed these instructions and bought the parts from AliExpress. The actual PID was £20 but you also need the case (£10) and the other bits so it ended up costing ~£40.
I also fitted a Shelly Plus 1PM inside which is connected to Home Assistant so I can include it in automations. It turns on 20 minutes before we get up in the week to get it up to temperature, we've got an Aqara smart button by our bed to turn it on at the weekend and it turns off automatically after an hour in case we leave it on.
While I had it open I did a wider refurb, replacing the chassis as we had one of the old pig iron ones that go rusty (orange one in the pics) and replacing seals/o-rings/pump as a preventive measure. I also redid some of the wiring with spade connectors and heat shrink because the original plastic connectors were end of life and took the boiler apart to remove the limescale (check the picture below - everyone with a Silvia should do this every few years IMO!). I've had it 11 years and we bought it secondhand so this was all par for the course.
The PID isn't beautiful, it's true, but I bought it to improve my espresso consistency and make my espresso process easier and it has. It also massively improved my steaming, which I didn't expect. It can't control the steam temperature but just knowing what it is does it - I purge the wand at 115° then start frothing at 125° and this has massively improved the consistency of my flat whites (see last pic).
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Fox
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Wow you really pulled that apart!
I’ve not taken any of it apart yet. But will do. The guy I got it from seemed very very clued up and had been descaling regularly. I descaled it when I got it home just because.
There’s a gaggiaiuno not sure of the spelling mod I’m very intrigued about but I thinks it’s a bit beyond my capabilities.
Light_EDDed
Has anyone on here done the pid mod on the rancillio Silvia?
Why is the unit so fugly