Bluenoser wrote: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..

Wow! I didn't think of that... that's a really good idea. I'll have to do some weight comparisons next.

So it seems in your case you start with 200g and end up with a final weight of 220g?

Very interesting...

DaveB wrote:
My takeaway is that it might be a combination of purging air from the device as well as cooling the wand, which is super-heated as it's in direct uninsulated contact with the boiler.

I'm genuinely curious why the cooling of the steam wand would help in creating better steamed milk? I really don't know too much so just wondering why or how that would affect things.

I can imagine that a hot steam wand tip would lead to a faster steaming milk since the milk temp would increase faster? If so, then I can imagine the primary (or only?) difference between a hotter vs a colder steam wand tip means that you would have less or more time to add air respectively?

Bluenoser wrote: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..

Thought I'd give your test a go this morning with the BDB, so I steamed 150g of mIlk to my usual 135°-140° and ended up adding 15g - which coincides with your 10%. Not bad for a "disposable" machine, eh?

Napy123 wrote: I'm genuinely curious why the cooling of the steam wand would help in creating better steamed milk? I really don't know too much so just wondering why or how that would affect things.

I can imagine that a hot steam wand tip would lead to a faster steaming milk since the milk temp would increase faster? If so, then I can imagine the primary (or only?) difference between a hotter vs a colder steam wand tip means that you would have less or more time to add air respectively?

To be honest, it's been so long since I started the thread that I don't remember where that come from. Rereading the thread, it seems the water was used as a gauge to judge the dryness of the steam. Anyway, I think the best tip was to have the steam valve open while heating, which I confirmed in my subsequent posts.

DaveB wrote:Thought I'd give your test a go this morning with the BDB, so I steamed 150g of mIlk to my usual 135°-140° and ended up adding 15g - which coincides with your 10%. Not bad for a "disposable" machine, eh?
.

That disposable machine performs better than most $3k+ machines. The 'big iron' manufacturers don't seem to really focus on performance and, as such, you'll see no marketing info about such data. But the BDB, from what I read, is extremely temperature stable, while adding preinfusion and, with a simple mod, some pressure profiling, a fast warmup and the ability to pull shot after shot.

Good timing on the thread getting bumped the other day. I haven't used the Bellman in quite a while, and skimmed over the entire thread again to refresh. Then this morning woke up to a power outage...

Filled the Bellman half way to the handle with water, leaving the steam valve open. Let it hiss for a minute or so, then closed the valve. Once the relief valve went off I turned off the burner. Purged for two or three seconds, and then began steaming. Here's the result (4oz milk for 8oz latte):

I've had my stovetop steamer for about a month now and figured I'd resurrect this thread with my limited experience. Like others here I was getting big bubbles and foam was too big, but that was 1000% user error. Figuring out the exact placement of the tip, and the very minute movement to go from stretching to mixing was the key, and I've been getting (what I believe to be) perfect foam ever since.

I have been heating on med high heat until big hiss, then purging for a few seconds and turn down flame to low and get a steady light hiss and let it do that until I've prepared my shot. Glad I read this post, I will try leaving the valve open tomorrow, seems a bit safer, and less stress on the system.

I have been filling to the mid point line. Is there any benefit or detriment to filling to 1 inch? Does it heat faster?

I have to say, now that I've gotten used to this in my morning mix I absolutely love it. Adds a few minutes to the routine, but totally worth it. Highly recommend with whatever manual coffee maker you use (I have/love the Robot).

...or EspressoForge

Good call, updated my post

Have had a bellman for about 1.5 months now to pair with my 2 year old Cafelat Robot. Tested the preheat with valve open until it started steaming good and then closed it for a couple of min until relief went off. Purged quickly and then did 4 ounces of milk. Works really well even though my process before was not too bad. This will be more consistent I think n