Hi I have a 10 year old STL11000M camera. I have used the water cooling feature every summer for the past 9 years, but have discovered that the cooling block is blocked. This happened once in the past and I was able to flush out the deposits using distilled white vinegar. This time I have not been able to clear the obstruction. Can the cooling block be replaced? Are parts available for this camera?
Gregg, Would using a "pressure washer" help push out the blockage? You may have to adapt a pressure hose fitting, even for a short test using a ring clamp, but may be worth a shot, or a few very short "bursts", so as to not disconnect any internal camera hose clamps. May be worth a try before resorting to sending it in for repairs. Then do the vinegar rinse again. I suppose most people use vinegar to "descale" old coffee brewers that used to have aluminum tubes - they are stainless steel now. But here is a suggestion I found for an alternative to vinegar as a descaler - should you manage to blast out a narrow channel in the clogged cooler tubes, for the rinse. re: DavidB77 SomersetDee Nov 28, 2013 03:00 PM No, citric acid is the only active ingredient. It is the safest. A pinch of sodium citrate together with a pinch of malic acid... A pinch of sodium citrate ... together with a pinch of “malic acid” acts as buffer to protect aluminium parts ... if your boiler if has any aluminium parts in it, that's all. Malic acid is similar to citric acid. Safe to keep at home. Sodium citrate (E331) is not a descaler but only added as a protective buffer and such buffers are totally unnecessary if the boilers do not have iron and aluminium parts. Tartaric Acid is safe but more expensive Sulphamic acid is ok on brass and stainless steel but not on aluminium. I don't think any manufacturers still use aluminium thermoblocks. Gaggia did for some of their domestic machines (not in their commercial range). If the coffee machine you have has aluminium parts in the water pathway then use citric acid with sodium citrate and malic acid as buffer. Citric acid, Sodium Citrate (trisodium citrate) and malic acid are all found in fruits. 100% safe to keep at home. Even if your toddler gets to it and eats it, it is nothing to panic about. All these ingredients cost pennies to buy. thanks for reading. ******Just a thought. Good luck, Joe
It's really important to perform regular maintenance when using water cooling. At least once a year flush it with vinegar to remove any biological buildup. We don't have any STL machined parts available, unless Bill has some in his "graveyard" collection that he can salvage. The heat sink block is aluminum for good thermal conductivity.
The trouble is the right angle fittings. It's pretty much impossible to get a reamer through. I've never pressure washed one. I shoot a blast of air through when I check them and if they're clogged, really blocked... ugh, it gets ugly. I can only think of a couple that I've done. Another thing is the fittings can't be removed without removing the heat sink, and removing the heat sink is a lot more detailed than it sounds. Briefly, the cooler sits on the other side of it, the pedestal sits on the cooler and the ccd sits on the pedestal. The light shield, the piece the mirror is attached to, is on top of the ccd. It all comes out, including the circuit board the ccd sockets into, and then has to go back in afterwards. I didn't mention the focus and cleaning. In other words, it's a big job. I don't like the idea of just popping off the heat sink because of the seal with the cooler and the potential for breaking one of the leads if it doesn't come off easily. Plus, I prefer knowing that the cooler is firmly seated against the heat sink versus just kind of "feeling" like it is. Email me if you want to look into it further though, bill@sbig.com, I'm pretty sure I have a heat sink. -Bill
Gregg, You may have already done this - have you taken the back off the camera and checked it where the little hoses connect? Sometimes crud gets in the tubing. Also, another thing that might work is radiator flush. (Zerex or other stuff that is similar and won't attack the aluminum). You could also try a thin piece of magnet wire inserted into the hose connects, and give a swirl in case its blocked near the entrance/exit ports. Good luck Colin
I have tried passing a piece of wire through to ream out the channel but it is pretty much impossible with the right-angle connectors. Not sure if I want to take the camera out of service just for this...
