How Can I Make Flakes Burn More Evenly?
- Thread starter carolinachurchwarden
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Sounds interesting. I might give this a try and see what shakes out.
One last question I have is if you had to guess how much a flake expands, what would say? Double the size of a strand? Triple? If I had to guess, I'd think a little over double. Placed some loose bits on top of my bowl that had burned down to below halfway just get rid of them as they had dried almost to a crisp. I watched as I lit it up and I was amazed at how much they expended under the flame.
I know it can be a challenge early on when trying to find a pipe that works for you and also in trying to determine just how much flake is enough to create the balance between too tight and too loose once flame hits the tobacco. Thanks for all of your ideas, it's given me quite a bit to try and play with to figure out what works best for me.
Tobacco is a very organic thing, and not all flakes are made the same way, so it would probably not be a very consistent answer. Even among the same exact tin, you will probably get variations, but I don't think it doubles in size.
Even when I choose to rub out and even grate flake, I do it only a bowl or two at a time, and to me, it seems to have kept better, and in fact aged better, so the constituent tobacco is more melded together. As mentioned in the earlier post, I understand that many flake smokers like to leave the flake as much intact as possible, but it retains some of its desirable characteristics even when prepped, or over-prepped, more.
I do the same, Tom, just playing with one flake at a time. Trying this, trying that. Just might have to go ahead and order myself a pound of ODF to keep practicing until I get what works best for me, right. I just leave all the flakes in a jar and pull out one at a time when I want to do something different. I have been folding and stuffing different ways, then yesterday, decided to cube cut one and let it dry a bit. I plan on smoking it later this evening in my Peterson 999 Christmas pipe. Maybe I'll like it enough to just start cube cutting it as a I go. I also think I want to try Mac Baren's Vanilla Flake as I have been wanting to try me a new vanilla tobacco. Just love the aroma it gives.
I think it's the way you're packing it; generally, there are two popular ways--one burns the way yours is, the other burns more evenly but retains a flavor from your hands (what I call hand funk 
. The former you simply fold them up and pack them in, the latter you put a flake between your hands and rub them together until they break apart...i.e., looking more like a ribbon cut. I don't do either. I break my flakes down into long strips about an 1/8" wide, then fold them and pack them in one by one. The benefit from doing this is (1) the tobacco gets all the way to the bottom of the bowl and as you fill it there are no air pockets, and (2) you aren't getting as much hand funk on the tobacco from rubbing it out because you are only using your fingertips. Maybe give this a shot?
. The former you simply fold them up and pack them in, the latter you put a flake between your hands and rub them together until they break apart...i.e., looking more like a ribbon cut. I don't do either. I break my flakes down into long strips about an 1/8" wide, then fold them and pack them in one by one. The benefit from doing this is (1) the tobacco gets all the way to the bottom of the bowl and as you fill it there are no air pockets, and (2) you aren't getting as much hand funk on the tobacco from rubbing it out because you are only using your fingertips. Maybe give this a shot?
Interesting. And welcome.
But my hands are usually clean, so, no funk. Or maybe I just can't taste it - kinda depends on what I ate last night.
But my hands are usually clean, so, no funk. Or maybe I just can't taste it - kinda depends on what I ate last night.
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