Hello All - Jumping right in and requesting advice!

[kmcogar]

Hello all,

I was recently smoking a cigar and I felt like I was doing it wrong. So I did some research..watched some youtube videos..... and went down a rabbit hole that doesn't seem to end. It brought me to this forum and the start of a new obsession. Smoking cigars is great, but I feel like rolling them yourself creates a whole different type of satisfaction.

I have already competed an abundance of research, but though I would ask some pro's about your thought before I spend too much money on supplies and equipment. Should I jump right in and buy a cigar press/mold, a chalet, and a bunch of tobacco?

I found this site ---> https://wholeleaftobacco.com/cat/cigar-tobaccos/cigar-blends/ <----- It has (what I would consider) a great deal on a starter pack to rolling about 20 cigars. $30. Pretty much everything I need to roll one without the extra equipment.

I wouldn't mind them being uniform. Which is why im thinking about getting a press. Is there an inexpensive option for a cigar press to start off? because I won't be rolling a ton of cigars, I wouldn't need anything too big.

 

[deluxestogie]

Welcome to the forum. Excellent source of tobacco you stumbled into. That's where you end up if you click the banner ad above.

Buy a kit, and give free-hand rolling a try. A cigar mold in the hands of a new roller encourages squeezing improperly rolled cigars into a mold, as well as discouraging your smoking a cigar before rolling the next one. You learn one session at a time, rather than with each cigar you roll. So I suggest "roll one; smoke one", until you get the hang of it.

Those first free-hand cigars will likely be ugly, but the key task is achieving a good draw--not too loose, not too tight.

Once you can roll smokable cigars, then a mold can improve your sense of pride in offering one to somebody else.

Bob

 

[Knucklehead]

Welcome! The owner of this forum also owns wholeleaftobacco.com. Not sure if you made that connection or not but we are all familiar with the quality of his products. You came to the right place. The experts will be along shortly. I’m mainly a cigarette smoker and I do roll cigars but I don’t use a mold, I just wing it and hope nobody looks too hard at it. Best of luck and post up some photos.

 

[pottsS]

You do realize that whole leaf maintains this forum right? Probably all of us here feel gratitude for the service, quality and experience they have provided us. I don't do cigars tho, but I'd trust whole leafs kit...and like anything else, I strongly suspect that it is best to start with the best equipment you can afford. I make my own cigarettes, but I would have given up before the first pound of whole leaf tobacco if I didn't have a decent tobacco cutter and a good injector.

 

[Knucklehead]

Here’s a thread to post photos. https://fairtradetobacco.com/threads/pics-of-your-sticks.3785/. Some will inspire you, some will motivate you, and some are so nice they’ll probably just pi$$ you off. Good luck.

 

[ChinaVoodoo]

Welcome to the forum.

You can roll your freehand cigars in a strip of paper for a period of time before applying the wrapper. This will make them look slightly prettier.

 

[MarcL]

Welcome to Fair Trade Tobacco.
You do sound like you would make a good candidate. About the tools, it seems as if you are one that can appreciate them to a degree, in which case, like myself, I have some. They all can be substituted to a degree as well. .. some not so much.

 

[waikikigun]

Hello all,

I was recently smoking a cigar and I felt like I was doing it wrong. So I did some research..watched some youtube videos..... and went down a rabbit hole that doesn't seem to end. It brought me to this forum and the start of a new obsession. Smoking cigars is great, but I feel like rolling them yourself creates a whole different type of satisfaction.

I have already competed an abundance of research, but though I would ask some pro's about your thought before I spend too much money on supplies and equipment. Should I jump right in and buy a cigar press/mold, a chalet, and a bunch of tobacco?

I found this site ---> https://wholeleaftobacco.com/cat/cigar-tobaccos/cigar-blends/ <----- It has (what I would consider) a great deal on a starter pack to rolling about 20 cigars. $30. Pretty much everything I need to roll one without the extra equipment.

I wouldn't mind them being uniform. Which is why im thinking about getting a press. Is there an inexpensive option for a cigar press to start off? because I won't be rolling a ton of cigars, I wouldn't need anything too big.

Yo. First, terms: A press is a big vice-like number you put molds into.

Two, yeah you can roll cigars freehand. Some people augment that by wrapping a strip of newspaper around their hand-molded bunch, in the same way they will later wrap a tobacco leaf wrapper around it. This evens out the discrepancies in pressure throughout the bunch that a beginner will probably have and smooths out the surface which will improve the contact binder-wrapper to get you a nicer burn.

All you'll need in addition to one of those kits is a sharp knife, e.g. a pizza cutter or an X-Acto knife or whatever, to cut the binder and wrapper strips.

Bliss Cigar Co.

Ultra Micro-batch Boutique Cigars

www.youtube.com

 

[ChinaVoodoo]

I always used scissors when I rolled them at work.

 

[GreenDragon]

Howdy and welcome to the forum. I too started with one of the WLT cigar kits and haven't looked back. You will likely find that, like many of us here, rolling your own is a fun and rewarding hobby. At a minimum you will need:

A spray bottle
A wood cutting board
A sharp knife, chaveta, or pizza cutter
Scissors

I don't recommend a mold until you've rolled 50+ cigars. When you can consistently roll a cigar with a good draw, uniform fill, and uniform diameter down the whole length of the cigar, you are ready to try molds.

There are lots of great rollers here on the forum with a wealth of knowledge, advice, Pics & Videos to help you on your journey. And remember, it's all about having fun!

 

[kmcogar]

Welcome to the forum. Excellent source of tobacco you stumbled into. That's where you end up if you click the banner ad above.

Buy a kit, and give free-hand rolling a try. A cigar mold in the hands of a new roller encourages squeezing improperly rolled cigars into a mold, as well as discouraging your smoking a cigar before rolling the next one. You learn one session at a time, rather than with each cigar you roll. So I suggest "roll one; smoke one", until you get the hang of it.

Those first free-hand cigars will likely be ugly, but the key task is achieving a good draw--not too loose, not too tight.

Once you can roll smokable cigars, then a mold can improve your sense of pride in offering one to somebody else.

Bob

Bob,

Thanks! lol yeah.. I noticed the link I provided was part of the site afterwards, but I couldn't edit my comment. I'm glad everyone was so nice and didn't beat me up too bad on that! I will be buying a kit and doing my best to perfect this craft.

Kyle

 

[kmcogar]

Welcome! The owner of this forum also owns wholeleaftobacco.com. Not sure if you made that connection or not but we are all familiar with the quality of his products. You came to the right place. The experts will be along shortly. I’m mainly a cigarette smoker and I do roll cigars but I don’t use a mold, I just wing it and hope nobody looks too hard at it. Best of luck and post up some photos.

My mistake on the link. Im a bit dense at times. Hopefully just like the cigars im about to roll. I tend to smoke cigarettes on occasion and would much rather prefer smoking ones I made myself. Seems to be very cost effective as well. For some reason I find it easier and more welcome to smoke cigars with people than cigarettes. Pretty dumb if you ask me but its the world we live in.

 

[kmcogar]

Here’s a thread to post photos. https://fairtradetobacco.com/threads/pics-of-your-sticks.3785/. Some will inspire you, some will motivate you, and some are so nice they’ll probably just pi$$ you off. Good luck.

Well, so far those pics make me pretty happy. It helps me to know I have a good place to start.Thanks for that!

 

[kmcogar]

Welcome to the forum.

You can roll your freehand cigars in a strip of paper for a period of time before applying the wrapper. This will make them look slightly prettier.

I will definitely give that a try

 

[kmcogar]

Yo. First, terms: A press is a big vice-like number you put molds into.

Two, yeah you can roll cigars freehand. Some people augment that by wrapping a strip of newspaper around their hand-molded bunch, in the same way they will later wrap a tobacco leaf wrapper around it. This evens out the discrepancies in pressure throughout the bunch that a beginner will probably have and smooths out the surface which will improve the contact binder-wrapper to get you a nicer burn.

All you'll need in addition to one of those kits is a sharp knife, e.g. a pizza cutter or an X-Acto knife or whatever, to cut the binder and wrapper strips.

Bliss Cigar Co.

Ultra Micro-batch Boutique Cigars

www.youtube.com

Ahhhh, the press makes sense. I was googling "cigar mold" and I wasn't getting what I was looking for. I was getting..well...mold. So i added press and it got stuck in my head. Thanks for the info!

 

[Alpine]

Welcome to FTT

pier

 

[kmcogar]

Howdy and welcome to the forum. I too started with one of the WLT cigar kits and haven't looked back. You will likely find that, like many of us here, rolling your own is a fun and rewarding hobby. At a minimum you will need:

A spray bottle
A wood cutting board
A sharp knife, chaveta, or pizza cutter
Scissors

I don't recommend a mold until you've rolled 50+ cigars. When you can consistently roll a cigar with a good draw, uniform fill, and uniform diameter down the whole length of the cigar, you are ready to try molds.

There are lots of great rollers here on the forum with a wealth of knowledge, advice, Pics & Videos to help you on your journey. And remember, it's all about having fun!

Thanks! I have most of that equipment. so that's a good start. I pride myself on my sharp knives. I tend to get ahead of myself so my first attempt is the best it can be. I'll hold off on the mold for now until I finish 50+ cigars.

 

[Mathaious12]

Welcome to the forum!

I'm still a newbie to rolling cigars. The path I took when first starting out was to buy a pound of seco and ligero and to practice construction. I felt this gave me the best bang for my buck. After talking to a few people I wanted to focus on construction at the begining and not worries about blending until I could consistently make smokable cigars. After the first 10 to 15 I started using the paper mold method mentioned above, you can get some pretty decent looking sticks with just that. At that point I also started using wrappers to play around with blending.

It's funny @GreenDragon set the number at 50+, as I hit stick 50 last week and celebrated the landmark by purchasing my first mold. I agree with GreenDragon that 50 is a good benchmark for getting a mold.

 

[kmcogar]

Welcome to the forum!

I'm still a newbie to rolling cigars. The path I took when first starting out was to buy a pound of seco and ligero and to practice construction. I felt this gave me the best bang for my buck. After talking to a few people I wanted to focus on construction at the begining and not worries about blending until I could consistently make smokable cigars. After the first 10 to 15 I started using the paper mold method mentioned above, you can get some pretty decent looking sticks with just that. At that point I also started using wrappers to play around with blending.

It's funny @GreenDragon set the number at 50+, as I hit stick 50 last week and celebrated the landmark by purchasing my first mold. I agree with GreenDragon that 50 is a good benchmark for getting a mold.

Thanks for the tips. I need to google the paper method and see how that works. I ordered the Honduras Gran Habano blend kit. I like a full bodied cigar, plus it was the last kit they had for that particular leaves. So I pulled the trigger and now wait to start my journey. Congrats on your 50+ mark!

 

[Charly]

Welcome to FTT.
Have fun with your blending kit !