Ask the Experts Q. I adore my La Marzocco GS/3! What kind of maintenance do I need to perform to keep it working well in the years to come?
A. Just because the GS/3 is one of the fanciest home espresso machines on the market, it doesn't mean the care and feeding of that machine is any more (or less) fancy than other home espresso machines. If cleaning can be fancy, that is.
You'll want to backflush the brew head every 1 - 2 weeks (more often if you're pulling more than a couple of shots per day). You can watch a demonstration of that process here.
Then, if you're not using a water filtration system, you should descale the machine every few months. Since it's a double boiler, you'll need to pull citric acid solution through both the water spigot and the brew head in order to address all of the waterworks in which scale can build up.
Finally, there's brew head maintenance every 6 - 12 months. This involves taking apart the entire brew head and cleaning all the parts, then replacing the brew head gasket. You can watch Gail demonstrate this procedure here.
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