Rancilio Silvia V4 Questions & Answers

You may need a new boiler or prehaps a new element.
Give theses guys a call http://dibartoli.com.au/service-centre/ they are at Bondi in Sydney.
There are others https://www.google.com.au/search?q=rancilio+repair+sydney you might find one closer...

You will also need one of these...
http://dogboxaustralia.com.au/products/ <<< for person who left frother on for 2 days...
:)

Yep, bad news, most likely resulted in a burned out element. Pretty costly repair, couple of hundred. Good luck

I had this problem on my 2008 model Silvia a few times and can be solved (assuming the modern versions are similar) by removing the water reservoir and top metal lid. On the boiler there is a little red reset switch which stops the unit from burning out. This has probably tripped. Use a screwdriver to push the button back in. Reassemble and switch back on. This should fix it. Found this video on Youtube to help. Good luck. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zQdJNm9RV68

If you heat your milk before you make your shot of coffee and try to make a shot of coffee immediately after, then the steam in the boiler will blow steam and water out of the handle when you try to make the coffee shot. If that is the problem then you need to bleed the steam off (by opening the steaming wand) before you try to make a shot of coffee - otherwise the pressure is too high and it will blow out (and also cook the coffee grounds by overheating them). If you make coffee first then that is not the problem.
If that is not the problem, overfilling the grounds can make it hard to properly close the handle and it can leak. Also, if the coffee is very finely ground and you tamp it very hard, then the pressure build up is too much and you can blow the water out (rather than it passing through the grounds).
In my case, if it happens it is usually that I steamed milk and forgot to bleed off the steam before trying to make a shot of coffee - so I shoot steam and overheated water through and it spurts and splutters and throws water out (and makes a horrible burnt shot in the process).
Any of that make sense?

Sounds like your portafilter is not sealing properly with the grouphead. I had this problem and found that I wasn't turning the handle far enough when locking the portafilter into the grouphead. Make sure that you turn the handle all the way to the 6 o'clock position or even a bit further to between 5 and 6 o'clock and this should hopefully ensure a tight seal. If this doesn't work, perhaps the rubber grouphead seal deteriorated. It's pretty simple to change out the seal and replacements can be bought fairly cheaply on Ebay.

thanks to both answers- wil give those suggestions a shot