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Mikewood

Mikewood

Well-known member
Sales
Got my fist pressings out of the dappress and it’s a nice crumble cake. I learned a lot, crunched some numbers and thought I would share. My target goal is macbarren English #1 CC. Because that’s the only Crumble cake I have on hand at the moment. It seems the right consistency. Easy to break up and process. Here are its specs of thr macB.
L,W,H wt.
2.65,5.10,0.275, 1.56oz.
That’s 3.71 cubic inches
1.56 oz/ 3.716 gives me .5oz per cuin density.

My 2x4 press makes 3.34,1.57,0.27
1.45 cuin of space.
So based on the Macbaren density I should use 0.75oz of tobacco. I tried half an oz to start, 24 hour press with no heat and got a good cake that is holding its shape. Density seems fine. I will repeat the test again with different amounts, this is at dead or full compression of the form, since I can’t measure compression force in psi I am using weight of the tobacco and the volume Of the cavity. It’s imprecise I know due to the delta of the moisture content of the tobacco but cheaper than buying load cells. Yea, I am an engineer and a nut.

It did smoke very well.
Cheers.
 
JamesM

JamesM

Uninformed Expert
Patron
Mikewood said:
Got my fist pressings out of the dappress and it’s a nice crumble cake. I learned a lot, crunched some numbers and thought I would share. My target goal is macbarren English #1 CC. Because that’s the only Crumble cake I have on hand at the moment. It seems the right consistency. Easy to break up and process. Here are its specs of thr macB.
L,W,H wt.
2.65,5.10,0.275, 1.56oz.
That’s 3.71 cubic inches
1.56 oz/ 3.716 gives me .5oz per cuin density.

My 2x4 press makes 3.34,1.57,0.27
1.45 cuin of space.
So based on the Macbaren density I should use 0.75oz of tobacco. I tried half an oz to start, 24 hour press with no heat and got a good cake that is holding its shape. Density seems fine. I will repeat the test again with different amounts, this is at dead or full compression of the form, since I can’t measure compression force in psi I am using weight of the tobacco and the volume Of the cavity. It’s imprecise I know due to the delta of the moisture content of the tobacco but cheaper than buying load cells. Yea, I am an engineer and a nut.

It did smoke very well.
Cheers.
Click to expand...
Good analysis. I go mostly by feel of my clamp as I twist it and by the oz of tobacco I loaded. Not precise but been getting good results on my pressings thus far!
 
Lee D

Lee D

Nothing for sale
Sales
Mikewood said:
Got my fist pressings out of the dappress and it’s a nice crumble cake. I learned a lot, crunched some numbers and thought I would share. My target goal is macbarren English #1 CC. Because that’s the only Crumble cake I have on hand at the moment. It seems the right consistency. Easy to break up and process. Here are its specs of thr macB.
L,W,H wt.
2.65,5.10,0.275, 1.56oz.
That’s 3.71 cubic inches
1.56 oz/ 3.716 gives me .5oz per cuin density.

My 2x4 press makes 3.34,1.57,0.27
1.45 cuin of space.
So based on the Macbaren density I should use 0.75oz of tobacco. I tried half an oz to start, 24 hour press with no heat and got a good cake that is holding its shape. Density seems fine. I will repeat the test again with different amounts, this is at dead or full compression of the form, since I can’t measure compression force in psi I am using weight of the tobacco and the volume Of the cavity. It’s imprecise I know due to the delta of the moisture content of the tobacco but cheaper than buying load cells. Yea, I am an engineer and a nut.

It did smoke very well.
Cheers.
Click to expand...
Now I understand the direction of your earlier question. My mold top, when fully inserted into the mold, leaves approximately no interior volume.

My hard cakes are about 1.3oz/cuin. I heat those to make them easier to break them up. The ones that are reasonable, but not easy, to crumble, are about 1.0oz/cuin.

I have some MacBaren flakes on hand. I'll stack some up and see what their density is. Watch City Slices are (were) much less dense, and easy to rub out.
 
JamesM

JamesM

Uninformed Expert
Patron
Mixed up a new blend. This one will tentatively be called Little Red Wagon. It's a VaPerBur that consists of the following...

4 parts - Sutliff 515RC-1 Red Matured Va
3 parts - D&R Ryback for Burley
2 parts - Sutliff TS20 Louisiana Perique
Lightly cased

Pressed down tight and currently baking in the oven at 200°F for 200 minutes.

20230313_200316.jpg
 
Jaypipe

Jaypipe

Well-known member
wow , this tread still going 😂, I will never catch up, with all this reading I am a slow English reader this is a book .


I am goin to jump tread , not sure if someone made this already , I was able to load 260 grams in a single load on the pasta press , I divided in 4 portions , I loaded the first and pressed , and than I opened the back , placed 2 circle of parchment paper , and loaded the second load. Open again , repeat load , press , ; and for the fourth time , so I pressed 4 pucks in a single load , hope that increase production here , 😂

C2DA94C9-87A2-4D9D-A845-A0ED30D53357.jpeg8613F282-EEAE-4496-AAFE-0948FD69A878.jpeg
 
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SwampWeed

SwampWeed

Black Twist & Black Beer
Patron
Sales
AceFour

AceFour

ceboyrz fbyire
Patron
SwampWeed said:
I'm going to be doing this with aluminum tube, though not as much. Interested in your results.
Click to expand...
I have a shorter tube about 10" x 3" x 3" which is the bulk of the results I post on here lately. You can stuff 200g of whole leaf and it is tight. Frame press makes it easy or you can do a manual C-clamp. The C-clamp takes about a week to crank down to final size and I have bent the tightening bar and pulled muscles doing it.

Nice thing about those spacers is you put the whole thing in the oven to stove at 200F
 
dobbs

dobbs

Well-known member
Patron
I pulled my whole-leaf, va-per plug today and here's the result:

055D4F24-8327-47B1-BE9A-D80CC0881D00.jpeg

It's 2-1/2" x 2-1/2" x 2" and weighs just over 8oz. I had to cut it in half to fit in a widemouth jar, so now it will rest for a few weeks before i try smoking it.

This whole process is interesting, but unless it blows my mind, I probably won't make a habit out of it.

-dobbs
 
JamesM

JamesM

Uninformed Expert
Patron
dobbs said:
I pulled my whole-leaf, va-per plug today and here's the result:

View attachment 193463

It's 2-1/2" x 2-1/2" x 2" and weighs just over 8oz. I had to cut it in half to fit in a widemouth jar, so now it will rest for a few weeks before i try smoking it.

This whole process is interesting, but unless it blows my mind, I probably won't make a habit out of it.

-dobbs
Click to expand...
Looks fantastic! What press did you use?
 
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