So. All the gear minus the slick pads came in yesterday, as expected. I bought a roll of Reynolds Cut-Rite parchment from the grocery store. I'd think there'd be a more generic Reynolds paper? But that was all they had, so I went with it.
First off, the Proctor-Silex is definitely a no go. Both heating surfaces are significantly recessed to create a lightly-flattening oven for your sandwiches. I thought a bit about using layered or thick silicone to buffer the recessed heating surfaces, but that would increase the cost which is the main reason for buying the thing. I'm also not sure that it could take the pressure anyways. It's bigger than I thought, and IMO a little ugly. It did make some good PB&J, though.
I started my rosin journey with the Conair Infinity Pro, which seems very nice to me who knows nothing about hair straighteners and has never used one before or even looked at one this close… The lowest setting is 338ºF, and it's got four steps above that up to a max of 446ºF.
@Toastface_Killah was right, it's solidly built and can definitely take a lot of pressure.
My first few tries, I had the same problem as
@Quetzalcoatl and was melting my parchment a bit, one time pretty bad. I adjusted by shortening my presses, and started having much better results.
Now, this is my first real rodeo with extracts, so I'm still learning how to effectively collect, handle, and manage it. At first I was using a tiny dabbing spoon/scraper that I got with my V2 Pro S3 wax cartridge, but I've now moved to a careful and gentle scrape with a razor blade, which is working much better (as long as I don't tear the paper…)
After a few presses and dabs, I learned that placing the dabber w/ rosin in the freezer for a minute helps a lot. Really gives the rosin that sap-like consistency.
As for the dabs, the rosin has been hitting and tasting great. I guess I shouldn't call them dabs since I don't have an actual dab rig; I'm using an MFLB w/ PA and concentrate trays as well as my V2 Pro S3 wax cartridge. The MFLB definitely tastes way better, but the first few hits taste good from both.
So, what you all really want to know is how that Cucina Pro 1443 tortilla maker did. Well, I've been focusing my experimentation on single nugs while I work on refining my technique and all, but I've been getting some great presses out of it!
Now, it only has one heat setting. And, the bottom plate gets maybe 25-50% hotter than the top plate. And the heat is definitely stronger in the center of both plates, though the diameter of the prime heating circle seems to be fairly large relative to the total surface.
With all that said, the lever mechanism makes applying pressure much easier and more efficient, and it definitely
feels solidly built and up to the task. I've been putting my weight into it with no issues.
Unfortunately I don't have any means of measuring the exact heat that it reaches, and it's not mentioned in the manual. But, within the center circle, this thing definitely gets "hot enough". Like I said, I've been focusing on single-nug presses with it, but I think you could surely get away with 4 nugs at a time, maybe even 6? I'm thinking something like an eighth of an ounce at a time. I'll let you know when I get a chance to test that out.
I woke up this morning and did a few more single-nug presses solely on the tortilla maker, and I ended up with one of my best presses yet. Now I spent all of yesterday messing with trying to weigh the dabber and then weigh the dabber with the oil on it, with little success. It wasn't until this morning that I had the notion to just weigh the nug before and after pressing.
I gave that a go before and after that last press in the tortilla maker, and the nug went from .63 grams cured to .49 flattened. That's a 22% extraction?? Not that I'm able to get 100% of it off of the parchment paper at this point, and though the nug was cured and fairly dry I'm sure some portion of that weight is water boiled off… I'm not up on the ins and outs of measuring this stuff, yet.
As it stands, I've been enjoying using the tortilla maker slightly more than the straightener, thanks to the lever mechanism. The Conair is definitely a solid iron though, and wins handily in price as well as portability of course. The Conair also heats up more more quickly (seconds vs minutes). The tortilla maker is fairly hefty and has a decent footprint on the counter. But it's doing as good a job at making rosin from single nugs as the Conair is, in the highly inexperienced hands of this newbie at least.
If you're looking at any tortilla maker besides the Cucina Pro 1443, I'd take a real hard look at reviews to get an idea of how much pressure the lever can take. This one feels very solid.
I'm really looking forward to getting my slick pads tomorrow. I think that's gonna make handling the oil much easier, which should up my extraction efficiency a decent amount. No more melted or torn paper!
Thanks for reading, and thanks for the help getting here.
