Started a few years ago with a Stilosa and cheap burr grinder from Amazon. This hobby got me good 😅
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Goddamn, it’s beautiful, congrats on getting to endgame, even if it is temporary, haha. I started with a Dedica, currently on a Bambino Plus and was looking at the Profitec Go for when it dies but I’d completely forgotten the Elizabeth exists!
Bambino Plus gang 💪
The Go looks like a good machine. A dual boiler was important to me because I make a lot of milk drinks so being able to steam milk while the temperature stabilizes for the next shot is really nice. Other than that my requirements were temperature control and a relatively small footprint (though I have to say, upgrading from the Bambino Plus to the Elizabeth was still quite a shock as far as the size difference)
How does this compare to the stilosa? Currently that’s what I’m using with a JX pro grinder. I’ve been trying to find a good upgrade but nothing seems to really catch my eye for the money.
Are you using the Stilosa stock, or do you have a bottomless portafilter etc.? How long have you had it?
For me, I wouldn’t have wanted to upgrade to the Elizabeth directly. After the Stilosa I moved to a Breville Bambino Plus. That solved my biggest issues with the Stilosa (lack of temperature stability and a crappy steam wand), and let me get a bottomless pf and unpressurized basket and learn how to get really good puck prep and dial in by taste. Plus the steam wand was good enough to really learn latte art.
My main reasons for the upgrade to the Elizabeth are to have more fine-grained control over temperature, pressure, etc. for better shot consistency and control when dialing in, plus an even better steam wand. But back when I had the Stilosa, personally I wouldn’t have known what to do with that level of control. Obviously your experience may differ, but I wouldn’t change my choice of the BBP as the second step on my espresso journey.
I’m using stilosa with bottomless pf. So far my main issues seem to be inconsistencies across my workflow. Using same grinder settings and puck prep, shot times are almost always different. Sometimes it will just decide to choke the machine, other times what used to be a 30s shot will turn into a 25s or lower shot.
I know that some of this can be attributed to the beans themselves as they age, but I still feel like the machine is what’s causing most of my headache.
However from what I’ve learned, the stilosa uses a boiler where as some other espresso machines use an induction heating mechanism? I’ve read that while boilers take longer, they’re supposed to have more consistent temperatures. Not sure if that’s true.
I’m worried that if I go to the BBP, I’m mostly going to run into the same issues.
Gotcha – yeah I can confirm the thermocoil (at least in the BBP) isn’t very stable. If you don’t care about simultaneous steaming & brewing, to get good stability you could go for a single boiler machine with PID like the Profitec Go, Lelit Victoria, or Ascaso Steel Uno. Note the PID is important – it’s basically a smart controller to avoid the boiler overshooting the target temperature, so you get much better consistency.