Espresso machine My Philips HD5661 hasn't been used for some months and i can't open the water reservoir. There was a little water in it so i don't think it "melted down".

You are going to struggle finding one of those; where I live here in New Zealand that model has been obsolete for over a decade. You may be better off finding someone who repairs multiple brands of coffeemakers and see if one can be matched up. It is very possible that machines very similar are still being made, just not for Philips.

http://kitchen.manualsonline.com/manuals/mfg/gaggia/gaggia_espresso_maker_product_list.html

Feed some water with some pressure from the water reservoir hole. You have an air bubble. I followed all the solution ideas but no one worked for me until I designed my own idea. I attached a hose to the hole, opened the faucet and then put the nesspreso pump on and instantly the water come out. Solved problem

The pressure is from zero to the opening pressure of the OPV. This should be about 10 bar when the OPV is cold. When the OPV is hot, the OPV spring is hot and a little more flexible. The OPV opens at about 8.5 bar when hot.

When the wand valve is open, you can get a lot of steam or water with not a lot of pressure in the boiler.

Take the lid off the reservoir and watch the hose from the OPV. It's the short hose.
Pull a shot with less than usual coffee in the basket.
If you see water flowing from the hose, the OPV opened.
If it did not open and there is little extract in your cup, buy a new pump.

Either the little magnet in the reservoir is stuck (does it float when you slowly fill up the reservoir?), or the corresponding Reed relais doesn't properly respond to the magnets presence. The latter most likely requires technical attention.

Gary,

I have the same exact problem with mine starting today, did you get this figured out? I'd love to know if it's fixable or not as I was planning on selling my previous machine. If it's an expensive repair, I'll just have to ditch this one and go back to my previous one.

I have the same machine. I just went on the coffee geeks website and it is easily solved. Just add a few grains of salt to the reservoir - the sensor cant detect water that is purified - strange but true as four grains and it fired up just like that.

I think I've figured my yard sale EX 80 out. First, the way I think it works... in the tightly sealed boiler the water is heated to boiling, it must have a pressure release valve that sends the water/steam through the coffee and into the carafe. So dangerously hot and under pressure. Before opening the big round cap at the top (reservoir) relieve pressure at the steam tube valve (right side)

Here's how I made my first batch:

When opening reservoir always turn unit off, let reservoir cool a little between batches or you may get a cloud of steam in your face when pouring in water, might not be good for the heating element to shock it with sudden drastic temperature changes either.

Cleaned by running a couple of jugs of water through, cold water (4 on the supplied jug) into the reservoir all parts installed. I read somewhere online (not specific to any machine) not lukewarm water, if it's online it must be true... right?

Put coffee into filter basket/basket holder, matching amount of water in reservoir, 2 or 4 (markings on filter and jug). Espresso coffee should be very finely ground

Install all covers and the coffee basket/filter basket, close steam tube valve, install carafe and turn on the machine. Should get blast of espresso after a couple of minutes.

The steam tube (operated by the valve) seems a little cheesy on first try but I'll get better with practice. There's no steam to the tube until the reservoir starts to send steam to the coffee, the coffee kinda restricts the steam enough to send it to the tube. I was thrown a little because I didn't get steam when I was cleaning the thing, but I think that was because there was no coffee to block the flow. So I opened the valve at the start of the brew, steamed the milk, closed the valve and then the steam blasts through the coffee, tasted good.

Great $1 find.

Hope this helps.

in the water tank you have a little magnet that magnet need to move up and down shake the water container to see that magnet move .thanks for using fixya

pierre

My husband found in ours that the little float was stuck over the sensor (the little patch) down in the reservoir. The float could not rise with the water, thus, the machine did not know that there was enough water available and it would not stop blinking. He took the dry reservoir out, turned it upside down and shook it! This worked for him, as it unstuck the float. He said that if that doesn't work, the thing is really stuck and you might as well return it.