Newcomer (Newbie) Q&A

[Akela3rd]

Ive read a lot different views on storing tubos in your humidor. In sealed tube, out of tube, leave lid off... 
 what’s your guys take on it?

I leave them in the tubos but crack the cap a little. Worth checking on them every few months. A little tighten up if you're taking them anywhere and you're good to go.

[MDC81]

Is it necessary to segregate boxes that have white mold? 

I’m curious how the community proceeds with such boxes. I’m just asking about storage, not about smoking.

P.S. They are BPC with almost two years on them and are smoking beatifully. They’re currently staying in their own tupperdore at 65/65. Yes, I wipe the mold off before smoking. 

[Diabolicalpherpher]

It appears that wrapper shade (dark and oily vs pale and dry) is one of the key factors in PSP/HQ/PE grading of a box.  Obviously everything comes down to personal tastes but this suggests more people are willing to pay a premium for the darker oily wrappers. Why? Do these dark oily wrappers equate to better experience in majority of the people?

[El Presidente]

1 hour ago, MDC81 said:

Is it necessary to segregate boxes that have white mold? 

I’m curious how the community proceeds with such boxes. I’m just asking about storage, not about smoking.

P.S. They are BPC with almost two years on them and are smoking beatifully. They’re currently staying in their own tupperdore at 65/65. Yes, I wipe the mold off before smoking. 

If you wipe it down, there is no reason to segregate. If you have the right conditions, it shouldn't come back. 

[El Presidente]

46 minutes ago, Diabolicalpherpher said:

It appears that wrapper shade (dark and oily vs pale and dry) is one of the key factors in PSP/HQ/PE grading of a box.  Obviously everything comes down to personal tastes but this suggests more people are willing to pay a premium for the darker oily wrappers. Why? Do these dark oily wrappers equate to better experience in majority of the people?

Thin dark and oily is no better than thin, light and oily.  Pale and dry has no redeeming features.  Thick and dark has no redeeming features. 

In quality wrapper you find more thin dark and oily than thin light and oily. 

Thin dark and oily imparts a sweetness to the smoke. It is enhances cigars with a cocoa note. Goes great with Monte's etc. 

Thin light and oily imparts a hay/nuttiness. great with Upmann and Cohiba

Beautiful Rosado wrapper has a red hue. Imparts a cherry like note. R&J benefits immensely from it. 

Like food    Oil = flavour. 

 

 

[jay8354]

Quality and Consistency is key to the grading.

I believe (and I could be wrong), Rob looks at the mastercases, checks the samples he picked out of in random. He looks at the size and shape, checks for hard or soft spots and other defects, the looks of the cigars (whether they all looks the same).

He may go back to his notes on previous visits. He will check whether he had a recent smoke of the cigar.

There are many things but it is this level that inspires the confidence from us to buy from him.

[cookj1]

12 hours ago, Luca said:

Plastic is also porous and humidity will eventually escape/come through. 

What plastic are you referring to?  I’ve never heard of such a thing.  ...not saying it cannot exist, but my understanding is that plastic is only porous to certain gases and solvents.  Plastic water bottles would be useless as you describe, and that’s just not true.  Would you please explain?

[El Presidente]

3 hours ago, cookj1 said:

What plastic are you referring to?  I’ve never heard of such a thing.  ...not saying it cannot exist, but my understanding is that plastic is only porous to certain gases and solvents.  Plastic water bottles would be useless as you describe, and that’s just not true.  Would you please explain?

Zip Lock bags and tupperware will take on the ambient humidity. A decade ago we run some tests where we prepped a zip lock bag and a tupperware dish with a digital hygrometer. We the them stabilise over night (reading 42%) and then brought them into the humidor.  The ziplock hit 68% three days later from memory and the "tupperdor"  hit 68% just on a week later. 

.....we had a lot more time on our hands in those days. 

[jay8354]

Assume nothing, ask questions, question everything. There are no stupid questions, only stupid people with stupid answers.

 

[cookj1]

2 hours ago, El Presidente said:

Zip Lock bags and tupperware will take on the ambient humidity. A decade ago we run some tests where we prepped a zip lock bag and a tupperware dish with a digital hygrometer. We the them stabilise over night (reading 42%) and then brought them into the humidor.  The ziplock hit 68% three days later from memory and the "tupperdor"  hit 68% just on a week later. 

.....we had a lot more time on our hands in those days. 

These are both plastic products that are mass produced and probably meant for purposes other than retaining a constant humidity level for cigars.  I’d argue they are imperfect and inadequate, by design and by production, at keeping air in and/or out.  

As a material, I’m still finding it hard to accept that plastic is porous to water/humidity.  I can’t think of any scientific reason why it would be.

[El Presidente]

Just now, cookj1 said:

These are both plastic products that are mass produced and probably meant for purposes other than retaining a constant humidity level for cigars.  I’d argue they are imperfect and inadequate, by design and by production, at keeping air in and/or out.  

As a material, I’m still finding it hard to accept that plastic is porous to water/humidity.  I can’t think of any scientific reason why it would be.

 

You may be completely correct!

I was just trying to work out what to tell mates when they asked me "Robbo....how long can I keep these in here before I start having a problem". 

[cookj1]

2 minutes ago, El Presidente said:

 

You may be completely correct!

I was just trying to work out what to tell mates when they asked me "Robbo....how long can I keep these in here before I start having a problem". 

I really have no clue.  I always thought plastic was water resistant.

I may have uncovered some information.  I had to Google this because it doesn’t make sense to me.  It turns out there are various grades of plastic.  Ziplocs are actually made from a polymer, which can be porous depending on the grade.  So there we have it.  No doubt there are various grades of Ziplocs as there are various grades of plastic.

That could explain your findings in the past.

[JamesKPolkEsq]

37 minutes ago, cookj1 said:

I really have no clue.  I always thought plastic was water resistant.

I may have uncovered some information.  I had to Google this because it doesn’t make sense to me.  It turns out there are various grades of plastic.  Ziplocs are actually made from a polymer, which can be porous depending on the grade.  So there we have it.  No doubt there are various grades of Ziplocs as there are various grades of plastic.

That could explain your findings in the past.

Think about blowing up a Ziplock as full as you can and sealing the sucker.

You wouldn’t expect it to stay puffed up like a balloon indefinitely, right? It’s mostly airtight, but not entirely.

Atmospheric air is mostly O2 and N2. Water is a smaller molecule than either. If those gasses diffuse across the polyethylene, you would expect the smaller molecule to do so as well.

[Luca]

Exactly. Also loss of air/RH will inevitably occur at the seal too (depending on pressure etc). 

[IanMcLean68]

Ziplock bags are notoriously porous. Try sticking anything stinky inside one, and the smell comes straight through the plastic in no time. Freezer bags are the same, whereas oven bags are far less porous. As for PVC, it tends to absorb and retain moisture. So eventually, anything inside PVC will also come to equilibrium with outside humidity levels.

[IanMcLean68]

12 hours ago, cookj1 said:

These are both plastic products that are mass produced and probably meant for purposes other than retaining a constant humidity level for cigars.  I’d argue they are imperfect and inadequate, by design and by production, at keeping air in and/or out.  

As a material, I’m still finding it hard to accept that plastic is porous to water/humidity.  I can’t think of any scientific reason why it would be.

I'll try here for a scientific explanation. Just like any other material, produced plastics are not perfect polymers.  Defects in the chain have things such as attached OH bonds, which are polar, and attract water through hydrogen bonding. Some plastics "wet" this way more than others.

[MDC81]

Is it usually the case that better quality cigars will be found in the boxes of 25 or 50 as opposed to 10?

e.g. Is the 50 cabinet of Lusitania generally better quality than the 25 and/or the 10? Is the 25 cabinet of Magnum 50’s generally better quality than the cabinet of 10? 

[Ethernut]

19 hours ago, MDC81 said:

Is it necessary to segregate boxes that have white mold? 

 

Just dovetailing off of El Prez's response, if you're getting mold at all, the most likely culprit is your humidity is too high (and likely the temperature of your humidor as well, or at least getting too high for extended periods).

Careful of that. 70 degrees and 65RH and under a suggested range. Cheers!

 

[Ethernut]

22 minutes ago, MDC81 said:

Is it usually the case that better quality cigars will be found in the boxes of 25 or 50 as opposed to 10?

e.g. Is the 50 cabinet of Lusitania generally better quality than the 25 and/or the 10? Is the 25 cabinet of Magnum 50’s generally better quality than the cabinet of 10? 

Absolutely not. Take a look at the video of the lady sorting cigars into 68 different colors in the Noob Thread in my sig. They're running 10's of thousands a week. Some go in Cabs and some go in 25/10'er boxes. 

[MDC81]

Running 65/65 as noted in original question. Mold was present when I received the box. I appreciate the response to both questions! 

[kart339]

I had a question about construction issues in Cubans. I ordered the 2 sampler Montecristo 80th Anniversario a couple of weeks ago from 24:24. They arrived yesterday and I noticed one of the Monte 80th was slightly crooked i.e not straight.

Will the cigar still smoke fine without issues? Is this a normal construction issue for a CC? I don't have that many large Cubans to compare with, so much obliged for your answers!

 

[Ethernut]

1 hour ago, kart339 said:

I had a question about construction issues in Cubans. I ordered the 2 sampler Montecristo 80th Anniversario a couple of weeks ago from 24:24. They arrived yesterday and I noticed one of the Monte 80th was slightly crooked i.e not straight.

Will the cigar still smoke fine without issues? Is this a normal construction issue for a CC? I don't have that many large Cubans to compare with, so much obliged for your answers!

 

Shoot us a photo if you can.

A slightly bent cigar will still smoke a treat. No worries there. Not common or uncommon to get a stick that has a "lean". Hard to picture what you see without a photo though.

[kart339]

Thanks for the heads up. I will get a cell phone pic when I get back home. It was obvious when you placed the two Montes right next to each other that one was curving away in the middle. Weird.

[Martin_F]

Talking about a mastercase. 

How many boxes of cigars does that entail? All of the same macra? Or just whatever they put in a container in Cuba based on current availability?

Is a mastercase the unit distributors deal in?

[cookj1]

19 hours ago, JamesKPolkEsq said:

Think about blowing up a Ziplock as full as you can and sealing the sucker.

You wouldn’t expect it to stay puffed up like a balloon indefinitely, right? It’s mostly airtight, but not entirely.

Atmospheric air is mostly O2 and N2. Water is a smaller molecule than either. If those gasses diffuse across the polyethylene, you would expect the smaller molecule to do so as well.

I wouldn’t be storing cigars in a ziploc.  Now that I know it’s a polymer, and the lowest grade of plastic, I certainly wouldn’t be.

I’ve always known plastic to be porous to gasses, but not water. Given that water has the element of O2, that is understandable given the element.  Certainly moreso depending on the grade of plastic.  

I think we can agree that storing cigars is not ideal long term, or even medium term, for that matter.