Absolutely as I expected, grind adjust finer, smaller dose to accommodate differences in head room between my Quickmill Anita and the VBM. So far my guess on temp is good for the coffee I'm using, like 99 degrees c.
I'm only, ultimately dosing .2 grams less, but the grind is somewhat finer then I use for Anita (with the same beans) on my Macap M4 and I'm going to assume that this is all an issue of headroom between the two group heads. Sadly, all these things are so relative to the equipment and the coffee we are working with - that I cannot say exactly what the magic temp, grind and dose specifics are for everyone!
I am using a Rancilio portafilter cut down to a naked, and I've got a number of Rancilio triple baskets. My scale is a "Toyo" which out of all the scales I've used for coffee in last 3 years, seems to be the most accurate and the most reliable.
A couple of tips on milk steaming which make make the steam tip and steam power (even with the small boiler) a little more manageable and more likely to lead to microfoam.
I steam about 8 oz of milk for my husband's drinks and about 4 oz for myself. I use a thermometer. What seems to work really well, is to only open the valve a little - maybe 1/2 a turn, especially for small volumes of milk until I surf to 80 degrees f. Then I plunge and open the valve several more turns, to really get that milk roiling and steam to 140. So far, so good - nice microfoam, but far faster than I'm used to, so you have to really watch it. My hand on the outside of the pitcher cannot keep up with temp to provide accurate feedback.
What is different than Anita is that I used to just purge the steam wand, stick the pitcher under it with the steam tip just below the surface of the milk, open the valve all the way and adjust the tip to optimal "surfing" position.
And as to eliminating all the vibration - easy!
It seems like there are two sources for the vibration, the plate the water reservoir sits on and the top.
With the plate, you want to deaden vibration, but not limit movement on the plate to activate the micro switch.
I used the loop part of velcro. Its self stick, so I just trimmed it. It occurred to me after I stuck it in there that the hook part would have worked just as well and probably had less friction up against the case. Still, it worked - the microswitch functions and turns the machine on - the plate does not rattle against the case.
The top took more work as there were several more points of contact between the lid, the U shaped outer case and the inner supports.
I tried it at this point (just running the blank disk for a couple of seconds) and it was better, much better - but still, I had to deaden the top up against the back of the case.
There was already a small strip of sticky foam already on the top - but it wasn't long enough or dense enough to really deaden vibration here.
Now its dead quiet, if you don't mind the sound of an Ulka vibe pump.
Oh - slidey furniture feet on the legs are great, if your machine sits on the counter and you have to spin it around to reach the water tank. If you are one of those massively strong people who just slams that portafilter right into the group head and makes your machine skitter across the counter, you could put the slidey feet on the back legs - and leave the front ones with their rubber tips.
I'll try and get some shots of my shots as soon as I'm not crowding two machines into a teeny space. I've got no room to set up my little desktop tripod and d-SLR on the counter.
Ann
If you are thirsty, drink water. If you want a good cup of coffee ...
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