That looks great!
Nice thing about the bellman is that the arm is easy to swap. Where did you buy the replacement two hole wand?

Geoff

After using the bellman for a few months now as my main steamer I can never seem to purge enough with it and it always over agitates, even just a little bit too far, so I end up just skimming the surface stuff off and it seems to be good. The 2nd batch however responds completely different and far less agitation I just rarely make 2 with the bellman.

Damian / Andrew, I'm curious if you've given up on the Bellman or otherwise found your way to this tip that was floating around: Over-Aeration with Bellman Stovetop Steamer

I don't have direct experience with a Bellman but was reading through a few threads considering the purchase.

the bellman and I have made peace. I'm not sure what I was doing wrong before but think it was just impatience. Right now heat until the pressure value goes up, leave the heat on and open value to release pressure for a full 30 seconds, I close the value and reheat to pressure again. a quick purge then I steam while keeping it on the heat. I'm able to get good results that I can control with this.

I revisited the thread linked above, and tried the technique described in this post by Spromance:

The technique I use to rid the Bellman of its residual air is simple: when you heat the Bellman, leave the valve fully open. The water will heat and begin to boil. At a steady boil, steam will begin to be produced and push itself (along with all that residual, and unhelpful, air) out of the open steam wand.

Once there's a steady stream of steam coming out from the wand, I simply close the valve and then wait for the pressure valve to go off. This will probably result in a longer total heat up time, but what it guarantees is that once the Bellman is fully pressurized, it's only pressurized with steam (water vapor), and not residual air. This results in powerful steam, and plenty of it. No need to go crazy with special techniques at this point, you can use the Bellman as you would a commercial steam wand, aerating as much as desired, then lowering the tip to integrate and get silky, smooth textures

This worked great for an afternoon latte, and eliminated doing a lengthy purge before texturing the milk.




I will have to experiment to see what minimum time I can get away with before closing the steam valve to build up pressure. Anyone else doing it this way? If so, how long are you leaving the steam valve open after a good flow starts?

I have a bellman stovetop milk steamer which is grade 304 stainless Steel. Grade 304 is non magnetic so the magnet test for induction compatibility gives a fail, ie the magnet falls off. However, most induction hobs are now compatible with 304 stainless so the bellman should work. The trouble with this pot though is that it is too small for the pot-present sensors of the typical induction hob so placing the bellman will give a no pot error instead of heating. To overcome this (small) problem, I placed a standard larger pot on the induction hob to get the hob started, then quickly remove that pot while moving the bellman onto the hob in one fluid motion. This "fools" the hob into accepting the otherwise undersized bellman and hey presto - the hob will heat the bellman to great steaming output in about 5 - 10 minutes. ENJOY!

Guys n gals! So today I noticed something!

First of all I have a modded bellman with pressure gauge that I've shortened the spring on in order to reduce the max blow off valve pressure from 4 bars to about 3 bars

Anyhow!

So what I noticed is that if I place my hand about 7 to 8 inches away from the steam spout and open the steam valve then initially the heat from the steam valve is able to heat my hand to the point of almost burning it if I keep my hand there long enough however, eventually, after about 30 seconds or so the steam becomes much much colder/cooler to the point where it's just warm and I can keep my hand at the 7-8 inch mark without any concern. Initially I thought it was a bad thing that the steam was getting colder and I bagan to wonder "why is it getting so much colder?!"

I think what was hitting my hand was no longer hot WATER (& steam) and instead it was JUST DRY AIR! And since this air no longer carried any water then it was able to cool down by the time it reached my hand at the the 7 to 8 inch mark!

Now, this is not saying that the steam is not hot at the tip (which is where it matters) because is most certainly is! What I may have discovered is a method to know exactly how long to purge without using a measurable method! In other words: I can just wait until the steam can no longer burn my hand from about 7 to 8 inch mark and then start steaming my milk using the fully DRY steam!


Anyhow let me know what you all think about this...

Napy123 wrote: I can just wait until the steam can no longer burn my hand from about 7 to 8 inch mark and then start steaming my milk using the fully DRY steam!

Anyhow let me know what you all think about this...

If you weigh the milk before and after steaming.. along with the seconds it takes to steam (and the beginning and final temp).. you can calculate the 'dryness' of your steam and compare it to other methods.. Generally I get about 10% water added when steaming to 140F. So for 200g of milk, my Pro500 with 2L boiler and 1.3bar of steam pressure adds about 20g of water.. This is not bad..