Behmor 1600 Coffee Roaster - 1st Look - Page 4

[JonR10]

I was talking about the green bean COOP, e.g. http://www.greencoffee.coop/

O.I.C.

I haven't spent much time at the COOP lately, I used to buy most of my greens there but now I can't ever seem to catch an open active offering

[SJM]

Something is going on, but I'm not sure what.

If I was considering this roaster, I'd be looking for more reports from more people (especially people whose taste I was familiar with) before I took the plunge and bought one of these things. The roaster is not all that expensive, but when you factor in your time and effort, plus the cost of beans you might not be happy with, a little more reflection is probably in order.

ken

Thanks Ken.

That's exactly what I'm looking for: information about the results from roasters who have experience with a other home roasters (most relevantly the IR2 since that is what I have).
Jon's experience I am familiar with, so that is definitely helpful.
More will be appreciated as it becomes available; meanwhile I'll keep wrestling with the IR2 and reading everything I can find from old familiar monikers.

And, by the way, thanks for the link to the Green Coffee Coop, although as of right now you are right that there is very little concrete info about the B1600 over there.

Susan

[Ken Fox]

And I have to clarify that my experience to date has been with very straightforward roasting techniques, either (anciently) with a Freshroast+ and a Caffé Rosto, or in the last 5 years or so with a drum sample roaster. All of these approaches have been very much "hands on," and I do have a bit of a fear (maybe an irrational one) about giving over control of the roasting process to a circuit board or a chip

I may get another roaster as time goes on, but I doubt I'll ever change to a roaster that I wasn't operating minute by minute. But that is just me and there are many other ways of doing this.

ken

[SJM]

and I do have a bit of a fear (maybe an irrational one) about giving over control of the roasting process to a circuit board or a chip

which might give even the lowly IR2 a bit of an advantage?

hmmmm....

[JonR10]

which might give even the lowly IR2 a bit of an advantage?

Not in my book. If Ken were to try out the Behmor methinks he'd have a different opinion (although it will never require minute-by-minute "hands-on"). The way it's set up allows the user to control many variables, both in programming and on the fly so you can taylor your roasts how you like once you get the hang of it....

It's much easier than the SCTO to use, and it has WAY more flexibility than the iRoast products for batch size, profiles, roasting times, and cooling cycles/methods. you can go fast&bright or slow&mellowed, light, medium, dark, and even dark-dark if you can handle the smoke.

And it's so freakin' easy to use that I'm actually a little peeved because after years of working on my roasting skills and tweaking my roaster(s) now I can repeatably roast MUCH more easily and with less mess. The only thing that takes getting used to (for me) is not knowing the bean temperatures.

[Ken Fox]

The only thing that takes getting used to (for me) is not knowing the bean temperatures.

You never really know the "bean temperatures," as if there was ONE. All you can really hope to have with any measurement is a constant point of measurement that you are using to control the roast. Over time, you learn what that reference point means.

But, if the roaster did not allow me to follow the roast temp, or if I couldn't easily modify it to do that, than that would kill the deal for me.

ken

[JonR10]

You never really know the "bean temperatures," as if there was ONE. All you can really hope to have with any measurement is a constant point of measurement that you are using to control the roast.

Agreed, and that's what I meant. On my SCTO I have a probe that pokes into the bean mass

But, if the roaster did not allow me to follow the roast temp, or if I couldn't easily modify it to do that, than that would kill the deal for me.

I fully understand, but for me it's a different story. I've done many many roasts with no temp measurement at all (my probe broke one day and it took me months to get around to replacing it). Plus I'm not skilled enough to make small distinctions based on temperatures, so I just use temps as an indicator to monitor the roast.

In practical terms, I roast to only a few different completion levels:

1. Pull the roast just as first crack completes - this is my "light roast"
2. Pull the roast just at the very first snips of C2 - this is my "medium roast"
3. Pull the roast just as C2 begins to roll - this is my "dark roast"
4. Pull the roast with C2 going full blast - 30-60 seconds into a rolling C2 - "too dark for me"

The fourth level is just for a certain friend who likes charcoal-flavored coffee

[stevendouglas]

Mike,

A few questions for you when you have a moment:

1. Where do you put the thermocouple? Do you have a picture of this? Or, how do you mount it in the Roaster?

2. Do you have any pictures of the wiring for the main heater element?

3. What profile are you using for the Kona coffee?

Thanks for your help.

Steve

[mike]

Just got my Behmor yesterday, and did my first roast loads today using P1 and just taking the time out and manually starting the cooling.

Actually got to do my first at CCC with the guys there, roasted up some Mexican organic with some really loud cracks and a nice span between first and second. We let second get rolling just so we could gauge the coast on the roaster: seems like about 30 seconds of coast, give or take. It agtron'ed at 40/50, 10 is a nice spread and very comparable to CCC's main roasters. At light vienna it might make for decent SO espresso, but it won't be as good for press as if we weren't horsing around

Once home I put 4 additional 1/2lb loads of some Nic that Peter Giuliano had given me a while back - somebody on the importer end had mixed a bunch of lots together into a kilo bag - not exactly helpful for Peter to cup out, so he gave it to me. I did notice that the loads took progressively longer to hit first crack (9:00 to 9:40) as I went along, the opposite of what I would have expected. Two other things that hit me:

1. I really miss being able to immediately dump the beans like with a popper. Trying to hit any shade of roast between City+ and light Vienna requires some timing and experience with the beans. I don't know how easy it will be to recreate with different ambient temps on different days, but we'll see. There is a significant coast.

2. Lack of ability to directly probe the beans. Related to the first. If I could determine the temperature rise during the coast, I could easily start the cooling cycle at X degrees less than my target. Especially for espresso, I found more success going by probed temperature for the stop than by pops.

Those are the two things that stand out as losses from moving off the popper. Without a doubt, at the cost of tiny batch size, there is some real beauty to being able to probe, see, smell and hear the beans with absolutely nothing in the way. From what I hear about bbq roasting, the Behmor is similar. You can hear the pops relatively well, but sight and smell are definitely harder obviously.

The other thing I really miss is greater control of the heat levels. It sure would be nice to be able to take the heat levels up and down manually as the beans move through different stages. P2 is a fairly useful profile in a lot of ways to stretch between first and second, but I'd prefer to trigger those temperature changes myself based on what the beans are actually doing rather than based on time parameters that may or may not end up being correct when the beans are actually roasting. Anybody who is using a variac on a popper is especially going to miss that (or running a real roaster where you can turn the gas up or down).

I await the day when somebody brings out a new control board or something that reprograms the buttons on the front to give full control to the person roasting - a serious warranty breaker that would be

On the positive side, I'm really impressed by what Joe has done for $299. This is an amazing piece of machinery for the cost. I never immediately grind and drink anything I roast, but based on some comments a while back about waiting being nonsense, I gave it a shot and aside from a bloom in the press that looked like the Blob ready to attack, the cup was actually really gorgeous all things considered.

I'm looking forward to doing some espresso roasts next week. From what I can tell, if I get it into second crack, the coast will take me into my typical light Vienna. I'll still need to figure out whether I want to open the door a bit to slow the roast between first and second, or try a different profile. I've always used something similar to P2 done manually, but I use quite a variation in reduced heat time esp for Indos, and I won't have that control with P2.

Joe, if you are reading this: well done. It says a lot that you were able to do all that you did for $299. I can't believe that you were able to get this to market with all the liability issues today, and I'm quite certain that half of the limitations on programing come down keeping people from burning their houses down!

[prof_stack]

Mike,
A few questions for you when you have a moment:
1. ...
2. ...
3. What profile are you using for the Kona coffee?

Thanks for your help. Steve

Steve, although this question was directed elsewhere, I'll chime in:
The Behmor manual recommends profile P5 for Hawaiian, Island, Jamaican beans. The 1/2# Kona I roasted today started with: 1/2#, P5, D (15:00 start) and at the end I added 2:15 so that the first crack would finish. Awesome aroma from the beans.

[stevendouglas]

The 1/2# Kona I roasted today started with: 1/2#, P5, D (15:00 start) and at the end I added 2:15 so that the first crack would finish. Awesome aroma from the beans.

Thanks Prof. I tried it today and the Kona looks terrific.

I have a temperature monitor hooked up to the environment, and the temps I'm reading are very consistent with the temps Mike first reported during the early testing (i.e., peaking at around 330F). I cannot find any location where the temperature reaches 500+F and I'm using an Omega HH506RA and a K-Type Thermocouple, as Mike documents with the Fluke.

I'm also curious about connecting the main heater to a variac. I have the Behmor connected to a variac. P5 cycles too much to use a variac. Basically, heaters and afterburners are cycling once a minute or more and I don't think it's good for the roaster to have such large variations in voltage (112v with everything on TO 125v when it all cycles off).

With P1, it's fairly easy to keep the voltage at around 120V. Basically, the voltage drops 3 times during a P1 Roast.

1) Initially when it's turned on (120v to 114v, then I bring it back to 120)
2) Around 7:30 into the roast when the afterburner cycles on back to 114, then I raise it back to around 120
3) Finally it drops and rises a number of times as the heaters cycle.

This final cycling does worry me, because the voltage jumps to 130v when the heaters/afterburners cycle off. I haven't completely documented it, but it seems to cycle about 20 to 30 seconds OFF and then 60 seconds ON.

I don't imagine (but don't know) that 130v is good for the motor, fans, or control circuit that might be connected to it even though I quickly drop the voltage back to 120 when it spikes.

I think that the main heaters would be more of a consistent load and therefore a more consistent voltage.

Any thoughts anyone has would be welcome.

Steve

[stevendouglas]

Here is the profile from the P5 Roast. I've tried to document the setup and the roast in this video. I have more, but I don't want to be excessive.

[gvideo]http://video.google.com/videoplay?docid=4122301561669056948&hl=en[/gvideo]

[prof_stack]

Very impressive, Steven!

How does your temperature plot compare to the P5 plot in the manual?
How close do you think you are to the internal bean temperature?

Thanks!

[Ken Fox]

Here is the profile from the P5 Roast. I've tried to document the setup and the roast in this video. I have more, but I don't want to be excessive.

I'm sure everyone appreciates the effort you put into this.

The temperatures you plot out are not even close to what one would expect from coffee roasted properly. Oftentimes using an offset will give more reasonable numbers, but these temperature numbers you show are so far removed from what I would consider a typical roast profile that either the thermometry is not valid or the roast product is not going to be good.

In addition, the timings shown correlate only with what is to be described as the "baking" of coffee, not the proper roasting of it.

I have spoken with people I respect who have either used this Behmor roaster or have tasted the roast product. They were not complimentary of the roaster or of the roast product.

I don't want to be confrontational, but I do want to point out to readers who may not be familiar with what constitutes normal roast parameters, that the graphs you show are anything but representative of what is normally considered to be optimal roast profiling. I also want to point out that critical acclaim of this product, at least from people I personally know and respect, is anything but universal. Pictures of roasted beans do not tell you all that much about how they will taste, either.

ken

[stevendouglas]

Very impressive, Steven!

How does your temperature plot compare to the P5 plot in the manual?
How close do you think you are to the internal bean temperature?

Thanks Prof. With respect to your second question, I don't think the temperature plotted is close to the bean temperature (or even relative to it). I was trying to see if I could duplicate the temps that Mike recorded earlier in this thread.

I tried placing the thermocouple in another location at the back of the Behmor just slightly above the upper heating element. See the video here for details.
[gvideo]http://video.google.com/videoplay?docid=-8957412430492559741&hl=en[/gvideo]
The temperature measured there is not bean temperature either, since it peaked at over 750F. I plotted the first 3 minutes here.

As you can see the temps are MUCH higher, although I don't know what to make of this temperature either. I don't know enough about thermocouples to know why they would read inaccurately. I suppose it's possible that the wire running in front of the heating elements for half the length of the element could impact the temperature reading.

The roast hit first crack around 12 minutes into the roast and started second crack about 3 minutes later when I hit cool. I'd like to find a location for the thermocouple that yielded temperatures that would be more consistent with expected temperatures when first and second crack are heard.

[howard seth]

From a not too technical guy. A technical peasant of home roasting.

I have a Fresh Roast '8' that will not last forever - I have been using it regularly for about 2 years, and perhaps sense it's end is approaching. So I am interested in reports on roasters.

What interests me about a new roaster most is 1. How much does it cost 2. Does it look like it is robust enough to last for a while - (my several Hearthware models (Gourmet and Precision) conked out pretty quickly.) 2. How much can you roast at one time. 3. How noisy and smoky is it. and 4. Perhaps, most importantly - Does the coffee it roasts taste good!

I am not interested in temperature graphs/plots, and I am only confused when I read comments on a product that are made by people who have not actually used the product.

Am I the only 'non-technical' roaster out there scratching his/her head over this Behmor 1600 Coffee Roaster 1st look?

Howard

[prof_stack]

From a not too technical guy. A technical peasant of home roasting...
... 4. Perhaps, most importantly - Does the coffee it roasts taste good!

I am not interested in temperature graphs/plots, and I am only confused when I read comments on a product that are made by people who have not actually used the product.

Am I the only 'non-technical' roaster out there scratching his/her head over this Behmor 1600 Coffee Roaster 1st look?

Howard

Howard, good post. I just re-read the entire four pages of this thread and even found a post I made in July that I had forgotten about. The early testers helped shape the final product but many of their findings are accurate today. After roasting for 3.5 years, and recently getting the 1600, it is clear to me that the Behmor is a darn fine roaster, period.

I don't know Ken Fox but have noticed that his posts have a nice pragmatic air to them. He seems like a debunker or perhaps mythbuster. Nothing wrong with that. When he has had some actual time with the Behmor his comments will hold more weight. Perhaps Ken's hands-on approach to his own roasting helps him attain a finer degree of roast quality and consistency.

Head over to coffeegeek.com and peruse the home roasting section of the forum. There are lots of discussions about the Behmor and not all are glowing, but most certainly seem to be.

[Ken Fox]

From a not too technical guy. A technical peasant of home roasting.

I have a Fresh Roast '8' that will not last forever - I have been using it regularly for about 2 years, and perhaps sense it's end is approaching. So I am interested in reports on roasters.

What interests me about a new roaster most is 1. How much does it cost 2. Does it look like it is robust enough to last for a while - (my several Hearthware models (Gourmet and Precision) conked out pretty quickly.) 2. How much can you roast at one time. 3. How noisy and smoky is it. and 4. Perhaps, most importantly - Does the coffee it roasts taste good!

I am not interested in temperature graphs/plots, and I am only confused when I read comments on a product that are made by people who have not actually used the product.

Am I the only 'non-technical' roaster out there scratching his/her head over this Behmor 1600 Coffee Roaster 1st look?

Howard

Almost everyone who home roasts went through a "small/cheap air roaster" phase. For many, their experience was with a thrift store popcorn popper, or (like you and me) with a Freshroast, Caffe Rosto, or similar device. Small cheap air roasters fit into what I would call the "what you see is what you get" category of home roasters. They roast quickly, generally evenly, and you can fairly accurately gauge the progress of the roast by simply looking and listening to what is going on. There are a few things you can do to modulate the roast profile, such as using a Variac (or turning off the heat, so called "roastus interruptus,") but that is about that.

When you "move up" to something larger you generally end up with certain pluses and certain minuses. In the plus column, you don't have to roast as many batches to get the same resulting quantity. In the minus column you generally have more difficulty monitoring roast progress and may have to rely on some additional information, such as what you can gain from thermometry. Roast profiles that will yield acceptable or good results fit certain patterns, depending on the type of equipment one uses. Nevertheless, there are some constant factors.

A roaster bigger than a small/cheap air roaster cannot be accurately evaluated without some reference to the roast profiles produced, be this reference in the form of observed and plotted temperature measurements, a spreadsheet display, a verbal description, or some other presentation of the same data. Without such information, some person's comments about how terrific they think a roaster is, or how delicious they view the resulting coffee, is honestly of no use whatsoever.

I have not used the roaster being discussed in this thread, however the design is such that one can honestly have a great deal of skepticism towards it until proven to be wrong. When one who is knowledgeable about roasting is confronted with a graph of an actual roast that shows that the roast and cooling phase together took close to 25 minutes, with a top temperature reached of 300F, (other than for an immediate spike up to 350F in about 15 seconds), only someone completely inexperienced in roasting could consider this to be a profile they would like their coffee to be roasted under. And I honestly would not care what one or two or 4 people I don't know say about how delicious they think the coffee is roasted in this fashion.

If what you are saying is that you feel it is necessary to own one of these things in order to evaluate it, that you are only interested in reading comments from such people, you are going to get exactly what you deserve when and if you buy it.

ken

[howard seth]

Yeah, what I deserve Ken? To roast in Hell I take it.

Still, I would really like to know from people who have used the Behmor 1600 what their experience is with it - and yes, in particular, about the taste of the coffee - if they have also used other roasters, obviously that would be useful in their evaluations. If a top temperature of 300 is all the Behmor roaster could really muster, and that in turn merely bakes the coffee beans - then that sure ought to be noticed by even a non -expert roasters without charts.

Howard

[Ken Fox]

Yeah, what I deserve Ken? To roast in Hell I take it.

Still, I would really like to know from people who have used the Behmor 1600 what their experience is with it - and yes, in particular, about the taste of the coffee - if they have also used other roasters, obviously that would be useful in their evaluations. If a top temperature of 300 is all the Behmor roaster could really muster, and that in turn merely bakes the coffee beans - then that sure ought to be noticed by even a non -expert roasters without charts.

Howard

There is only so much time one must spend in hell for a mistaken $300 purchase ; should we settle on 3 weeks?

I have made previous posts here (and earlier, on alt.coffee, which I no longer visit) which have tried to debunk the foolishly held idea that home roasted coffee necessarily equals "artisanally roasted coffee," an idea that is often inferred in home roasting forums. I guess it does to the extent that Aunt Tillie's coffee cake is good enough to be on the dessert menu of a French 3-Star Michelin restaurant. You may say that to your aunt, but do you really believe it? But I digress.

We're dealing with a new thing here, people, and just because someone you don't know who used to use a popper but who has now upgraded to this Behmor says it's terrific, that does not necessarily make it so.

The people that I know who have either used this device or have tasted roast product from enthusiastic home users have told me that there are issues with the roaster as a device, and serious issues as regards taste. I trust these people. I would name them however I am not going to betray confidences. What they have told me would not encourage me to buy or use one of these things.

Healthy skepticism is a very good approach to take towards a new device like this, until you can convince yourself that what you read from others' posts on the thing will translate into similar positive impressions on your own part. You risk losing not only $300 on the roaster itself, but also the cost of the green coffee you will roast up until the point where you decide you have made a mistake. When roasting in 1 lb. lots, the cost of the coffee itself can add up quickly.

That is all. Good luck whatever you do. I may end up in hell but I don't expect to see you there

ken