Why are so many Cubans badly rolled / blocked?

[reigndrop]

It's unfortunate, I heard that Habanos SA does draw tests right? They need to ramp that up some more.

[Drewmidorn]

I have to be totally honest and say I have, touch wood, had very few problems and I probably smoke ten cubans a week. I always buy boxes, but i can't see how that would make any difference unless its because they sit for a while in my humi. However i usually buy larger gauges and like a firm draw although i do hate a plugged cigar, but I can't say I've had that many over the past few years. Sorry to hear you've had some bad experiences.

D

[whisky77]

Plugged?

I also have been very lucky, in that I have had very few plugged cigars recently.
I always buy boxes and the only negative feedback would be in relation to a box of Punch i purchased a few years ago which were almost all plugged.

[celsis]

I, too, have been very lucjy in that very few of my stogies have been plugged. As for quality control, I think it would be very hard to install quality control on a hand rolled product. Machine rolled - no problem but hand rolled?????

[misterbulgarin]

Tbh...can it really be controlled?

[Deano]

I don't think I've had any problems with cubans in my first 18 months of smoking, it's very rare.

[Big Al]

Perhaps some of you lot have powerful bellows! More than I can manage.

But to answer the main points - most of the cigars I am talking about have been in the humi a couple of months. But please bear in mind that IMO a cigar should be smokable (note that I am not talking of taste here and ageing) from out of the packet it arrives in. If it isn't then the vendor hasn't kept it right OR the product was faulty in the first place.

Either I am extraordinarily unlucky (and I may be - luck never has followed me around) or, probably more likely, my standard of a decent draw is different from many others. Maybe that is it. I don't know. I do know that what I am smoking (or not smoking) is really not up to my mark too much of the time.

[spacemonkey_no9]

dry boxing???

one for the wiki maybe?

[SteveGriff]

I've been lucky myself IMO in the last few years of smoking to have dodged badly plugged Cigars as well as I have done.

From my experience I think the ones I have had issues with are from the early 2000's. But the last couple of years have been excellent.

[Simon-JG-hr]

I heard that Habanos SA does draw tests right? They need to ramp that up some more.

I'm more than happy to offer my consultancy services at a very reasonable rate...

[snooky]

I think be a little more patient, store another 8 weeks and try. For comparison buy your self a few aged cigars. It is unusual to get plugged cigars. All the best

[TJCoro]

Dry Box Anyone Lately?

dry boxing???

one for the wiki maybe?

Awww com'on mate. Everybody knows about "dry boxing"

You know, like when you were a young lad and used to "dry box" the birds.

Ray Jay

[cj121]

My only expereince of 'unsmokably' blocked or plugged sticks came in cuba earlier this year when a 3 pack of RyJ No1's saw two absolutely sh!te. Could I get them going properly? Awful. Taste was there, but they just wouldn't smoke properly at all, you'd have needed the lung power of a freestyle deep diver to get anything out.

Problem with them was that they were fake. One smoked beautifully. Bought off one of the stewards at a bar. I'm not saying any of the poor ones you've bought were fake, but it goes someway to explaining a quality control issue. The fakes I bought were perfectly packaged ATs in a perfectly printed box, they all looked spot on too.

I'd probably be right in thinking that counterfeiters are not going to go to the trouble of using long fillers in Cuban fakes (might be wrong, depends on their concience) so from my experience I feel that they must have overfilled the sticks with lots of sh1t, hence the burn, draw, blocked and plugged issue.

Take this overfilling theory into a genuine stick and it may explain things a tad, and like mentioned QC on such a product is going to difficult working with a natural product. Folks earlier thoughts on lower RH, say 65% would be heading in the right direction, I reckon.

EDIT, in answer to Al later in thread: not implying your cigars have been fake, just highlighting overfilling as a possible problem.

[Paulie]

Just had a thought on this, how much of the cap are you clipping off?

I have had a few experiences of not cutting high enough and struggling to get a good draw through. The next time I had the same cigar I clipped a little further up and it made a huge difference to the draw. Now depending on the type of cigar I have, I clip them at a specific point in my mind as I know that to be good for that particular shape.

A specific case being the RyJ SC, where I go slightly higher than I do for other Robustos as I have found them to be better with a bigger cut.

[Big Al]

No, CJ the cigars I'm talking about come from highly reputable sources. If they are fakes then a LOT of people are getting taken for a ride. But I don't believe they are fakes.

And I am certainly clipping enough off Paulie.

But the saga goes on. Earlier today I tried to smoke a Partagas Serie D. I bought 10 a month ago from a highly reputable source. I have already had one and found it delicious. Not the one I tried to smoke earlier. Plugged to Kingdom come! I have it sitting now with the drawpoker in it. Now this is what I mean. Pricey cigars should not be faulty like this. Yes, of course once in a while it is going to happen.

As things stand right now - from now on the only Cubans I will smoke are Cohiba and Hoyo de Monterray. The rest can go hang. (I await judgement on the Gloriosos!). To be honest, I enjoy well rolled cigars better and Cuban Crafters and Cigar.com know how to roll 'em. Cuba doesn't.