[floydpink]

Well, after much thought, I decided to give the Behmor 1600 a try.

Most of the "limitations" I read about aren't an issue at the moment for me and the other, like limited visibility to the roasting drum seem to have been addressed with the new chaff collector.

I was very close to the Hottop B programmable, but was having a hard time letting go of 1000 bucks so easily with the economy being bad and all.

Roastmasters included a 5 pound bag of Brasil Beija Flor and free shipping, so the price was a lot easier to swallow, although I am sure the Hottop is better built. I pushed my luck a little bit and asked if they could keep the 5 pounds of Brasil and substitute just 2 pounds of Kona, which comes out about the same pricewise.

I'll do a review on the machine once I get it and roast a few pounds and can give it a relatively fair assessment.

I always seem to see very limited praise around here regarding Behmors, but CG has a real loyal following, which is interesting.

I will definitely keep the Freshroast around for small batches and a change of roast, but it had gotten to the point where the small roast size and my espresso consumption was requiring a half day dedicated to roasting, which lost its fun after a few months.

Having a drum roaster capable of 1 pound roasts and some flexibility in roast times is very appealing to me, although perhaps all the extra tweaking of the Hottop will be something I crave in a year or so. If so, I'll buy the Hottop or whatever may come out by then.

The "famous" smoke suppression on the Behmor will also be a welcome addition for the couple weeks a year it's too cold on my patio to roast and am stuck in the kitchen.

Quick question for Behmor owners; do you have a preset roast profile you normally use for a dark espresso roast?

Most of the stuff I read over on Coffeegeek seems to have P3 as the most popular..