A cuber in a coffee-and-donut shop. The complaint: less ice than there used to be, and the cycles taking forever.

This is the water pan. The brown is mineral scale, plus the slime that grows on it. NYC water is soft compared with most places, but an ice machine concentrates whatever’s in it. Every cycle freezes the pure water out and leaves the minerals behind in the sump.

The distribution tube is where it hurts. Those holes spray water across the evaporator. Scale narrows them, then plugs them. Half the evaporator gets water, so half the sheet forms, the machine waits for a thickness it never reaches, and the cycle runs long. Production falls off a cliff before anything actually breaks.

The water inlet valve had scale on it too. Solenoids don’t like it. They stick open and flood the sump, or stick shut and starve it.

We did a proper descale: cleaner through the water system, distribution tube out and cleared, pan and sump scrubbed, then sanitiser, then full rinse cycles. Around two hours. Machine back to full sheets.

The maintenance answer is every six months, minimum, for a machine that runs all day. More often if it sits near a fryer or a bakery oven, where the air side loads up fast. We put it on a schedule so you don’t have to remember.

If it heats or cools, we handle it. 📞 718-802-1700