Cigar charring

[buck]

You may benefit from making a "dry box" to dry down your freshly rolled cigars. You can pick up an empty cedar wood cigar box from a local store or a small cooler. Put some desiccant or oven dried kosher salt in a container inside. Let your ciggies rest in there for a few days prior to smoking or moving to your humidor.

Yes, I have a few cigar boxes and just put the sticks in there.
I thought that 3-4 days for drying would be enough but I guess not, in the past I didn't experience this but maybe I let them dry longer not sure can't remember.
I'll smoke another in a weeks time and provide an update

 

[deluxestogie]

Charring is a chemical process of incomplete combustion. [definition]

Certain, highly hygroscopic leaf (like some Habano 2000) can go from nice burning to nearly fire-proof and charring from one day to the next, depending on the ambient humidity.

Bob

 

[ChinaVoodoo]

There's a range, right? I can plan out cigars so that I can smoke them within an hour, but If I'm rolling leaves that are a bit more moist or over-hydrate a thicker binder, 4 days is kind of the minimum.

 

[buck]

On March 22'd the day after I posted the issues with my cigar I smoked another , same blend , I had rolled 4 of the same. The results were the same as the first as would be expected, at least my rolling seems consistent.
I have since dry boxed the rest of them at %51 humidity (22c temp) and smoked another today humidity outdoors %63. The results better but still has some issues, the cherry becomes hard and charred and cigar goes out. I had to retouch a few times and the issue repeated again at the second third, after that the taste went south. Near the end I decided to unwrap it, the leaves were moist, not sure if this is expected as I never did this before. I'll let them rest for another week and try again. I have some other sticks different blend resting in the same dry box , I'll wait a few more days and try one of those.

 

[ChinaVoodoo]

Man, that's just strange. I mean, we're mostly using the same tobaccos, and I haven't run into this problem with anything but my homegrown Turkish.

Umm.... Uhhhh, do you have a water softener in your house by chance?

 

[GreenDragon]

Have you checked the calibration of your hygrometer lately? Also remember that what you are measuring is relative humidity. Simply put, cooler air has less drying capacity than warmer air at the same relative humidity. I find that my cigars take significantly longer to dry in the winter/spring than they do in summer/fall.

 

[buck]

Man, that's just strange. I mean, we're mostly using the same tobaccos, and I haven't run into this problem with anything but my homegrown Turkish.

Umm.... Uhhhh, do you have a water softener in your house by chance?

No I don't. I use distilled water for my leaf if that's what you implied.

 

[buck]

Have you checked the calibration of your hygrometer lately? Also remember that what you are measuring is relative humidity. Simply put, cooler air has less drying capacity than warmer air at the same relative humidity. I find that my cigars take significantly longer to dry in the winter/spring than they do in summer/fall.

I have two and both show the same value +- 2. Tested with a Boveda pack.
I'll just wait one more week before smoking another, after that I'll need to try another blend I have drying and see what happens with that one.

Second blend is
Piloto seco/Dom Seco
Corojo Viso
Corojo Lig
Equador Madoro wrapper/binder

I also have a similar blend with corojo oscuro wrapper/binder but I don't think that I have wrapper/binder issue, that burns okay.

 

[ChinaVoodoo]

No I don't. I use distilled water for my leaf if that's what you implied.

I didn't think you would have a water softener. It's like a thing people with wells use that uses salt buffers to remove calcium from their system. I just thought it was worth asking.

 

[deluxestogie]

Try smoking one of your cigars at 4:00 pm on Friday (3 APR). Your humidity then will be below 50%.

Bob

 

[buck]

I smoked another today and I did not experience the same issue but burn line wasn't very good and needed touch ups, that's expected from being stored in a dry box.
I have one left from the same batch, I'll put that in my regular humidor for 2 weeks before smoking which should fix the burn line.
With my current method of rolling and case I would need to let my cigars dry out for about 2 weeks. My filler is in good case , binder and wrapper are too wet.
I'll play around with that and roll with dryer binder/wrapper.