How Do I Get More Flavor Out of My Roasts? - Page 2

#11: Post by **yakster** » March 28th, 2019, 6:42 pm

Honestly, I'm using the same Variac now with my Aillio Bullet. I may not need it with a dedicated 20 A circuit run to the roaster, but in my case it really helps.

March 28th, 2019, 10:07 pm

Chris, would you say that of all the things that worked to improve roast flavor on the Behmor, by far the one thing that had the biggest impact was to add the Variac? In other words, if you were to list all the things that worked and assign a percentage to each adding up to 100%, what would your list look like? The percentage represents the share of the overall improvement with the total adding up to 100%.

March 29th, 2019, 11:23 am

i just tested the kitchen wall outlet my Behmor is plugged into. It's 120.6 volts. Does that mean that a Variac wouldn't do me any good?

#14: Post by **yakster** » March 29th, 2019, 3:29 pm

DavidZ wrote:Chris, would you say that of all the things that worked to improve roast flavor on the Behmor, by far the one thing that had the biggest impact was to add the Variac? In other words, if you were to list all the things that worked and assign a percentage to each adding up to 100%, what would your list look like? The percentage represents the share of the overall improvement with the total adding up to 100%.

The Variac with the Plus board put a bit of a twist on things. I discovered that I was roasting too hot with the combination and missing out on flavor so I had to re-adjust and make sure to lower the Variac.

DavidZ wrote:i just tested the kitchen wall outlet my Behmor is plugged into. It's 120.6 volts. Does that mean that a Variac wouldn't do me any good?

Test this with the roaster running to see how much it drops. This is easy with a Kill-A-Watt inline monitor. If it stays in the 116 - 120 range I think you'll be good. Too much below 116 and I think you'll notice a difference. This is a swag, not a hard number.

June 6th, 2019, 6:37 pm

DavidZ wrote:So far, I've done 7 roasts (all with different beans), only 5 of which I have sampled. These roasts all smell great for the first 48 hours, but that wonderful smell fades after that. My favorite is Columbia Supremo Huila, which is not surprising since I favor Colombian coffees. When I say real coffee flavor, it's probably best represented by Colombian coffee.

My next favorite of the 5 of my roasts I've sampled so far is Brazil Fazenda Passeio Natural. Third, fourth and fifth place respectively are Costa Rica Santa Maria Dota Tarrazu, Guatemala Finca Santa Sofia and Guatemala Antigua Santo Domingo SHB. I wont be roasting or sipping either of the last 2 any more.

I take these comments back. Now that I've figured out how to get great 1/4 pound roasts from the Behmor, I can unequivocally state that all of these beans from Roastmasters are awesome. One advantage of doing 1/4 pound batches is that you get 4 tries out of a 1 pound bag of greens to get it right.

August 26th, 2019, 9:33 am

Do you mind sharing what changes you made to achieve this?

August 26th, 2019, 10:38 am

Behmor - Optimizing 1/4 Pound Roasts