Alan, the hat turned out great. I agree that a steamer of some sort is a great addition for caring for our hats. I happened upon this vintage model.
B
Hi,
Fortunately, all water on this space rock is auto-recycled and therefore always very, very vintage!
I have one of these Jiffy Steamers as well, along with quite a few other hatter tools. It does work quite well, although I can do equally well with an old style tea kettle on a gas stovetop.
The best features are that it heats quickly and produces a large volume of steam for as long as you need it. You can get there using an old-style large teakettle on a gas stove if you use a small amount of water in the kettle.
Using a small kettle or an electric stove does not do well by comparison. Electric has too much latency (heats too slowly and won't change heat quickly enough to set the steam volume as needed). A small teakettle can't hold enough volume of water with low enough depth to heat quickly and yet have enough water to run long enough to do the job.
I mention the teakettle as I have an old one and a gas stove and used it with success equal to the Jiffy for quite a while. I happen to have a gas stove, and found an old, large, kettle at a yard sale. Eventually, though, I went for a Jiffy as I was setting up a hat workbench in the corner of the garage and didn't want to have to trek into the house for steaming duties.
Once you have a Jiffy, you won't want to revert to the stove and kettle method. Being able to just flip the switch and have steam in under 20 seconds, and having the steam run without fear of running out of water for as long as you need, will spoil you.
Just make sure to use distilled water in the Jiffy. The heating element is small and will quickly crud up using tap water. That, BTW, is a feature of a kettle - it can use tap water as it's slow to crud up and easy to clean with a little vinegar. The Jiffy is pretty unforgiving in this respect. Fortunately, distilled water is cheap and on the shelves of every grocery store.
later!
Stan
