I've tried my previous repair methods several times now and it worked for different lengths of time but a couple of weeks ago no matter what I did after only 1 or 2coffees the machine kept asking to ventilate. I bit the bullet and dismantled the cabinet to have a look for myself to see why the machine thought it needed to ventilate and to my suprise the pipe feeding the pump had a clip at the pump end but no clip at the water container end. It was a bit of a fiddle to fit a cable tie up into the machine and over the pipe but so far it's worked, dozens of tankfuls of water and not one ventilate.
Is this a manufacturers fault? Save 1p by not fitting a clip but risk alienating there customer base because the product fails to deliver?
I'm not holding my breath on this but it would appear that the lack of a clip was allowing minute amounts of air into the system and causing the machine to fail.
I will be keeping a close eye on it and any signs of failure I will post ASAP.
bj
August 2011