Leverhead's Flue Cure experiment 2013

[leverhead]

Some leaves have green spots. Is it ok?

No it's not, neither is the brown leaves. There is allot of leaves there and they all yellow at their own rate. If I was better at judging the ripeness of the individual leaves it would be better, I have to treat all of them as a batch. The leaves that yellow faster are mixed in with the leaves that are slower, but it's a judgment call as to when to start wilting and leaf drying that ends up with the most good leaf. The more uniformly ripe the leaves are, the easier it is to make the call.

 

[leverhead]

Your 8 and 3/4 inches taller than mine while looking at your pretty photo (your leaf not you) I was wondering if I will be able to run two stacks of leaf like you did.
Think it will be tight for me I lose at least a foot due to duck openings placement.

It really depends on how long the leaves are for the variety you're growing. The leaves shrink allot during the cure cycle, the leaf tips can touch the layer or chamber bottom below some. If I remember correctly, your chamber is pretty large. You may only need one layer and one layer will be easier to watch. My fridge is up draft, the bottom layer is always several hours ahead of the top layer. The way I racked this load it was hard to see the top of the leaf on the bottom layer and I could only see some of the top layer. Well thought out viewing ports would be a real plus, to be able to view along the line of sticks would be nice. Loading the sticks in the direction I did is really the only practical way to go, I have to think about view ports on the sides.

 

[leverhead]

I had One Sucker that did that last year. It taste the same but doesn't look pretty.

You dried it too fast. I think the different names for the different ways of curing are misleading. Air, flue, fire, sun are all doing pretty much the same thing to finish the life of the leaf and each leave their own distinctive "marks" on the finished product.

 

[johnlee1933]

A new thought. I recently had access to some double insulated glass door panels. What if I took four of them, joined three at the corners, converted one into a swinging door and built a top and bottom. I could access for hoses, wires and such thru the top or bottom and be able to see most everything. If the insulation factor was not high enough I could add insulation on most of the outside and still leave or make view ports as desired.

What do you think?

 

[leverhead]

You could do that, but my 2 biggest fixable sources of heat loss are the windows and the door seals. The windows on the fridge are double paned and wouldn't be so bad if the the volume of the whole chamber were bigger. Having 2 doors doesn't make the loading any faster, so having 1 door on the side making the chamber "deeper" so to speak would cut those losses in half. Having plug type view ports,smaller, better insulated and sealed. They could be smaller, more of them and be placed better. It's starting to sound like a scratch-built box more and more.

 

[deluxestogie]

If you place a continuous Styrofoam board over the entire door, you could just remove it when you want to have a look.

Bob

 

[leverhead]

I could do that for this year, but I think the fridge may get retired at the end of the season. Maybe put out to pasture as a kiln only. I don't think I'll need to flue-cure next year, maybe in '15 I'll do an Amax.

 

[leverhead]

I'm pretty happy with the racking system now that I've used it some. A helper and I primed and loaded about 630 leaves in about 4 1/2 hours. It's simple enough to roll right along once we got the moves down.

The hooks shown in post #9 are made from fence wire bent with the tool shown, a block of wood with 2 framing nails set an inch apart. Making a continuous zig-zag and cutting every other leg to make the hooks. Closing the bend by hand on one end to stay on the stick better and leaving the other end more open to stab into the stem of the leaf.

My basic set-up is an edge marked with the placement of the leaves on one side of the stick and a neat pile of leaves handy that I can grab groups of 4 to load one side of the stick.



Then I can grab 4 more leaves to do the other side of the stick by eye while walking to the fridge to load the finished stick in.



This is a side view of the first sticks to go in the back.

 

[AmaxB]

It really depends on how long the leaves are for the variety you're growing. The leaves shrink allot during the cure cycle, the leaf tips can touch the layer or chamber bottom below some. If I remember correctly, your chamber is pretty large. You may only need one layer and one layer will be easier to watch. My fridge is up draft, the bottom layer is always several hours ahead of the top layer. The way I racked this load it was hard to see the top of the leaf on the bottom layer and I could only see some of the top layer. Well thought out viewing ports would be a real plus, to be able to view along the line of sticks would be nice. Loading the sticks in the direction I did is really the only practical way to go, I have to think about view ports on the sides.

You could use small toaster oven doors like the one I used mounted to the inside wall for windows. Finishing the cutout in the chamber wall with wood or angle. I stick a piece of foils insulation in mine when I.m not looking through it.
Mine worked out pretty good.

 

[AmaxB]

I was thinking of the slats with twine looping the twine around the stem like the gal in the video I seen here in a thread (sorry don't remember which thread.)

 

[leverhead]

I was thinking of the slats with twine looping the twine around the stem like the gal in the video I seen here in a thread (sorry don't remember which thread.)

You could try it! Last year I tried a few different ways that I wasn't very happy with, varying levels of understatement. The leaf size is so large compared to the size of the cabinet that too much uncertainty in leaf orientation makes a difficult situation nearly impossible. This is very small scale! Add in a little pressure to get the job done and you can have a real mess. You'll see what I mean.

 

[holyRYO]

Nice racking system. Dying to find out, did your last batch come out sweet? Did it do what it is suppose to do?

 

[leverhead]

The last batch came out better than I expected. It's in bags staying warm for a few months before I really try it, It is smelling good already though.

 

[Fisherman]

Leverhead........... what if you shot a few brads on each hanging slat and push leaves on them as you needed them. Would save the skewering with the clips on each leaf. Space like 3 inchs apart or so?

 

[johnlee1933]

Leverhead........... what if you shot a few brads on each hanging slat and push leaves on them as you needed them. Would save the skewering with the clips on each leaf. Space like 3 inchs apart or so?

I did exactly that a couple of years ago and gave it up as a bad idea. The leaves kept falling off even tho the air flow was very gentle. For my small crop stringing and hanging on my sun porch worked best. I do kiln a small amount each year. I am planning on moving the kiln into the garage this year and with the thus reduced heat loss may kiln more. I don't think I'm ready to try flue curing yet.

This year I am considering discarding leaf too small or damaged not to be wrapper. My leaf sucks as filler.

John

 

[leverhead]

Leverhead........... what if you shot a few brads on each hanging slat and push leaves on them as you needed them. Would save the skewering with the clips on each leaf. Space like 3 inchs apart or so?

I thought about doing that, I shot it down for a couple of reasons. When not in use, most of the year, the sticks would take up too much space. The other reason was it wouldn't be very flexible to use, I may still want to change the leaf spacing (count) for different varieties. I think I'm ready to try Gold Dollar next, new things to learn.

 

[leverhead]

I did exactly that a couple of years ago and gave it up as a bad idea. The leaves kept falling off even tho the air flow was very gentle. For my small crop stringing and hanging on my sun porch worked best. I do kiln a small amount each year. I am planning on moving the kiln into the garage this year and with the thus reduced heat loss may kiln more. I don't think I'm ready to try flue curing yet.

This year I am considering discarding leaf too small or damaged not to be wrapper. My leaf sucks as filler.

John

Isn't this small scale stuff a PIA!

 

[johnlee1933]

Isn't this small scale stuff a PIA!

Yep! But the smokes I get make it all worth while.

 

[leverhead]

Yep! But the smokes I get make it all worth while.

I agree!

 

[deluxestogie]

This year I am considering discarding leaf too small or damaged not to be wrapper. My leaf sucks as filler.

John,
You generously sent me some of your CT Shade "seconds." Although some worked well as wrapper, those that were too fragile were used between a sturdy binder and a wrapper to add a nice complexity to the taste and aroma. I would suggest keeping them. They might also serve well, when cut in half, as the starting binder for rolling cigar scrap.

Bob