Rolling Habanos

[Ben Brand]

Very good video, struggled to watch it on my anceint laptop.
Bigdog also commented on the flatness of the leaf when we spoke the other night, Is it the way they press the tobacco before storage. Do the sort the tobacco before storage? My leaf is not even close to being this flat, all wrinkled.

 

[deluxestogie]

I have seen video of a leaf presser that resembled (may have been) the padded, steaming, double-board clothes press used by commercial laundries. An employee spread, then pressed one leaf at a time. Of course, in commercial settings, the number of leaves of each variety is enormous, so they can be sorted into batches of identical characteristics.

Using purchased wrapper, one of us mere mortals can roll a batch of cigars with perfectly matching wrapper color. But with only a few hundred plants to source my home-grown leaf, it's nearly impossible for me to color match a dozen cigars using my own wrappers.

About flattening home-grown wrappers: Once my wrapper leaf comes out of the kiln, I bring it into case, crudely flatten and stack the leaves, then store the stack in a poly-Nylon bag. The result is a fairly well flattened wrapper. Filler, on the other hand, hardly matters. A filler leaf that is naturally scrunched-up can be considered as auto-entubado, when the time comes for bunching the filler.

Bob

 

[Knucklehead]

To make room in my shop for more green leaf to be color cured, I finished the stem drying of color cured leaf in the house on my propagation mats. I piled the medium case leaf in stacks on the mats, flattened as much as possible, and rotated the leaf once a day, inside out. By the time the stems were dry the leaf was incredibly flat. Dry as a bone of course, but I just moved them outside overnight to bring them back into case. Very flat leaves and no moldy stems.

 

[tronez.spain]

Just a link for you cigar fans. This is related to Maks video "The Casa del Habano" although this is in Argentina . I post it because it explains interesenting points of view about qualities, descriptions, etc...The only problem "All in Spanish" ( translate.google.com is your tool )

http://www.lacasadelhabano.com.ar/

Rolling, rolling, rolling, raw bac...

 

[rainmax]

Tronez.spain, all on this site written in spanish is also in english book The world of the Habano. This is their promotional material.

I believe that we are so tired from work around the house that translating every site is PITA, so I recommend more movies. This one is nice documentary if you didn't see it yet:

 

[deluxestogie]

Very nice video, with a broad overview of cigar tobacco production in Cuba. [Thanks to rainmax, I was privileged to smoke a Robaina cigar last year.]

The gringo narrator is a bit off, in pronunciation of Spanish (and English!) terms and some facts. For example, 1840 is not in the 18th century. But definitely a video worth watching. It fits well with the cigar rolling video that started this thread (though rainmax' video shows far more detail in the subtle aspects of rolling).

Bob

 

[Gdaddy]

Great video. Very much enjoyed it. It's amazing how much work and man hours go into making a cigar.

 

[rainmax]

Ok, thanks.
I give you another one (find out what a la vela Cuban idiom means):

 

[quo155]

Oh Maks...you're piling up some great videos for me to watch when I get back in my shop...with some time! I am looking forward to watching them...like I'm in a theater!

THANK YOU!

 

[deluxestogie]

To avoid interruption, I recommend lighting up a nice size cigar before starting to watch "The Fabulous Story of Cuban Cigars."

Fun video. I'll have to try rolling a cigar on my thigh. I believe the final scenes that show the locked humidor vault are from Zino Davidoff's, in Geneva.

Bob

 

[holyRYO]

Romantic tobacco videos, thanks. Inspired, had to roll one up out of my cigarette leaf. Not bad for only the second try, easier than trying to learn to roll a cigarette imo. I was most interested in the sticks the workers were consuming opposed to the molded... made to perfection export types.

 

[quo155]

Tronez.spain, all on this site written in spanish is also in english book The world of the Habano. This is their promotional material.

I believe that we are so tired from work around the house that translating every site is PITA, so I recommend more movies. This one is nice documentary if you didn't see it yet:

I watched this video tonight. It was very entertaining, informative, easy to follow and a pleasure to watch while smoking a Cuban cigar from their factory. Well worth the thirty minutes!

 

[Ben Brand]

Rainmax, only watched the video properly today, my laptop is from the stone-age. I must agree with everybody, very good. What I like the most is the way she showed how to flag and cap the cigar, that is what I struggle the most with. 10/10 for this video

 

[Gdaddy]

Rainmax, only watched the video properly today, my laptop is from the stone-age. I must agree with everybody, very good. What I like the most is the way she showed how to flag and cap the cigar, that is what I struggle the most with. 10/10 for this video

Agreed. There are plenty of videos showing the rolling process but this video is the only one that closely shows the flag and cap. It really helped. My triple caps are looking pretty good now because of this video.

 

[deluxestogie]

...this video is the only one that closely shows the flag and cap.

That's what you get on camera when the cameraman has actually rolled cigars himself.

Bob

 

[quo155]

That's what you get on camera when the cameraman has actually rolled cigars himself.

Bob

You nailed it Bob!

 

[Ben Brand]

I had a real problem to get my wrapper smooth on my cigars, if you look at the lady wrapping the cigars, effordlesly, and smooth.
I used a Stainless steel sheet to tried and stretch my wrappers smooth before I wrapped them.
Replaced that with a marble slab after reading about marble slabs in a previous post.

What I do now is, wet the slab with a fine water spray, basicly stick the wrapper on the marble with the water, spread it till its nice and smooth, cut the edges to where I want them, and start wrapping. Sometimes I dont even have to stretch the wrapper tight when I wrap. The results are very good, and I can wrap much quicker! The ONLY drawback is the soaking wet wrappers on the cigars. Let it dry out outside the humidor for a day or two, and Bob`s ( not you Deluxe) your uncle.

 

[rainmax]

When you finish wrapping roll it into newspaper for few hours. It will soak the water from wrapper. Than you place it in humidor. I know it is not smokable for at least a week.

 

[Knucklehead]

When you finish wrapping roll it into newspaper for few hours. It will soak the water from wrapper. Than you place it in humidor. I know it is not smokable for at least a week.

Today is my day for disagreeing . I roll with a wet wrapper and can smoke right away, but my filler is really dry but not crumbly. Fifteen more minutes and it will crumble (slight exaggeration).

 

[Gdaddy]

I had a real problem to get my wrapper smooth on my cigars, if you look at the lady wrapping the cigars, effordlesly, and smooth.
I used a Stainless steel sheet to tried and stretch my wrappers smooth before I wrapped them.
Replaced that with a marble slab after reading about marble slabs in a previous post.

What I do now is, wet the slab with a fine water spray, basicly stick the wrapper on the marble with the water, spread it till its nice and smooth, cut the edges to where I want them, and start wrapping. Sometimes I dont even have to stretch the wrapper tight when I wrap. The results are very good, and I can wrap much quicker! The ONLY drawback is the soaking wet wrappers on the cigars. Let it dry out outside the humidor for a day or two, and Bob`s ( not you Deluxe) your uncle.

I also like to wet and stick it to the marble then gently stretch it out as far as possible then cut the wrapper shape (filet) and leave it stuck for a few minutes to let the wrinkles relax. Take a paper towel and blot away the moisture from the leaf and it's ready to go. So it's not sopping wet when it's rolled just damp and stretchy. Comes out much flatter and smoother. Drys out over night. If it's too wet it seems to be more delicate and wants to tear more easily.