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Miele CVA 6401 Emptying the drip tray does not work

Probable software error.

JoJa

April 12, 2024 06:25 pm

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Coffee drinker

Group: Mitglieder

Posts: 2

Member No.: 73996

Joined: April 12, 2024

Dear members and others, of course we have another fault in our house, this time it is the Miele CVA6401 fully automatic coffee machine.

The machine was installed in 2017 and until two and a half weeks ago it actually did its job without any major problems. It brews around 5-6 cups a day, every day. At the request of the appliance, both descaling and degreasing of the brewing unit were carried out every time.

I should also mention in advance that we have a couple friend who bought and installed exactly the same machine at the same time (coincidentally). They had the same problem a year ago, which meant that a Miele mechanic had to come out and repair the machine, at a cost of €800 . As the appliance cost around €2000 when new, you would expect it to last longer than 6 years, especially if you have extended the warranty and the fault only occurs afterwards.

Now back to us, two and a half weeks ago just before we went on vacation we had the same problem, the appliance briefly lost power during descaling and when we switched it on again, the problem was that the display said "Empty drip tray" every time.
No matter how many times you switched the power off and on again, it kept coming back.
As I'm now at war with Miele appliances (that's another topic), I tried to repair it myself.
Before someone from the forum starts cleaning the contacts, opening the door and so on, I tried everything and the door was open for two and a half weeks while we were on vacation. Of course, the fault was still there after two weeks.
As for the repair, "I know" the appliance was always unplugged when I was working on it.

The repair is sparsely illustrated but should be easy to understand.

Machine data, see picture one.

Please note that the Miele coffee machine (at least this one) has a special plug (picture 2), i.e. if you have to remove it for repair, the cable must also be removed.
This was a bit tricky with my kitchen cupboard, but I tied a small cable to it (picture 3) and pulled it out downwards so that I could pull the cable back in the other way round (picture 4) afterwards.

The actual problem was that the coffee machine always wanted to repeat the descaling process, but the drip tray had to be emptied. This was of course not possible due to the error.
On (picture 5) you can see the contacts that are responsible for the drip tray.

In the picture, the first one on the left should be ground.
The other two are once (center)+(right).
Responsible for drip tray inside (center+right ), (left+center+right contact due to liquid) tray full.

Important is of course if the device writes insert tray then you have to interrupt the contact once (center+right) and put it back together again (this simulates removing and reinserting the drip tray), as I did for example with crocodile clips.

I disconnected the earth contact (left) during this time.
I was then able to restart and complete the descaling process.
De-energized again. Still in the removed state, of course.
I then plugged the earth connector back in (left).

As a check, I filled the drip tray with water until the contacts were closed, switched the appliance back on and lo and behold, the message appeared Empty drip tray.
I did this and everything was fine again.

The appliance was completely reinstalled in the kitchen.

Since then, the machine has been running perfectly again.

I saved the fitter the journey and the costs.

The fault was probably caused by the fact that the descaling process had not been completed and the appliance had lost power during this time.

I hope my article can help someone who is not experiencing this message due to moisture during descaling or unclean contacts.
Anyone who finds any spelling mistakes can keep them biggrin.gif I don't need them again thanks.

One more request to the administrator if my post is in the wrong place, please move it to the right place, thank you

PS: Picture eight is the pin assignment of the top row.