Aromed 4.0

[lazylathe]

Last time my Aromed saw use was September 2014...
Since then it has been safely packed away and I have thought of selling her but she is just too cool to not have in the collection!!

Today was the day i broke her out of confinement!!
A thorough cleaning of everything and we were back in business in short order.
Set the temp to 210 Celsius and loaded up some herb.
Solid light...solid...FLASHING means Go Time!
Awesome flavour and great clouds upon clouds!!
This thing is a beast! Finish off the bowl at Max and sit back to survey the Aromed.
Now i remember why i dislike using this vape!
I bought mine used and it only came with a coarse bowl screen, not sure if new ones come with a selection of mesh sizes.
The mess in the beaker, in the down stem and up the outside of the down stem was all covered in ground bud!
Since acquiring the Aromed i have also acquired numerous other vapes and thus a multitude of spare parts!
Enter the fine screen for my Volcano Easy Valve! Slightly too large though...
I found a washer that fit the herb chamber and bent the edges of the screen around the washer.
Perfect fit with no herb falling into the beaker, there is only a fine dust just under the screen.
Works just as good and produces so many clouds of delicious vapour!

Dammit!!! Now i have to fit another vape into the routine!


PS: My one mod i want to do to my Aromed is to find a different style of goosenesk so as to make adjusting the bowl easier!
Keep tuned!

 

[Aimless Ryan]

UPS brought me this today, maybe 20 minutes ago. I've been waiting nine days for it. Not only is it the first vaporizer I have ever owned, but it is also the first vaporizer I have ever seen. At this moment I am minutes from vaping for the first time, as well as most likely making a permanent conversion to vaporization from combustion.

I never intended to convert to vaping. It's just that one day I accidentally ended up on these boards after Google directed me to a thread about grinders. As I quickly learned, that particular grinder thread is the best discussion anywhere on the internet about anything; largely because it is well over 200 pages long, as well as because it has existed for several years. It is literally "The Book" regarding grinders.

Anyway, while reading that thread day after day, I couldn't help being exposed to the subculture of vaping. It soon occurred to me that essentially no one who leaves combustion for vaporization ever goes back. When something has that kind of track record, it's hard to ignore.

Once I really gave it some thought, vaporizing instead of combusting made all kinds of sense. I didn't really consider converting, though, mostly because I don't have money to spend on this kind of thing. But as I continued reading the grinder thread day after day, I began to consider the fact that using a vaporizer may cut my medication costs in half or more. If that would happen, then a vaporizer could possibly pay for itself in only a few months, then cut the cost of my medicine in half after that. And be healthier for my lungs, which I had noticed were starting to feel pretty crappy much of the time. And all that other stuff.

So I started reading about a few popular vaporizers. I quickly pruned the contenders down to the Volcano and the Extreme Q. I was leaning toward the EQ, largely because it is versatile, has great reviews, and costs hundreds of dollars less than the Volcano. But I hadn't ruled out the Volcano yet.

I think I was first exposed to the AroMed when I watched this "Top 3" video from TorontoVaporizer Canada. Interestingly, the video first came to my attention because it featured the two vaporizers I had been considering up to that point, which TorontoVaporizer ranked at #2 and #3. Their #1 was the AroMed.

While everyone else seems to love the other two vaporizers featured in this video, these guys loved the AroMed. Also, these guys do a very good job of reviewing stuff.

Instantly the AroMed was on my radar, even though I had never heard of it five minutes earlier. Since I had already read quite a bit about the other two vaporizers, I quickly watched another video from these guys, in which they demonstrate and review the AroMed by itself. Then I searched for more reviews of the AroMed.

This thread is where I started, as well as where I ended. In fact, even though much of the early part of this thread is annoying as fuck, I made the decision to buy an AroMed after reading about half of the thread, or maybe a little more than half. (I did continue reading after making that decision, though, all the way to the end.)

The AroMed may not be a popular vaporizer with FC members, but one thing that made this one shine for me is that no one who used it had anything bad to say about it, other than little things like the fact that it's hard to clean, and the fragility of the glass.

I also like the function over form thing. And even though this tool isn't what most people consider conventionally beautiful, I think I do prefer its looks to the other vaporizers I considered buying. I feel kind of like a pathetic hipster for saying this, but the AroMed looks so uncool that it actually ends up looking really cool after you've looked at it enough. I think.

 

[lazylathe]

@Aimless Ryan

Congratulations on your new vape!!!
And welcome to the dark side as well... Once you convert you will find yourself thinking...
Man this is great but now i need a portable... And so it goes! LOL!

I LOVE my Aromed!!!
It does not get used as often as it should but it never lets me down!
Read the manual carefully and let it heat up correctly.
Long, slow draws seem to work the best but keep the blinking light in mind as well.

And also keep an eye on the bowl, between the light and the layer of herb!
You can get some interesting swirls that just draw you deeper into them as the session progresses!!

One more tip is to also try warm to hot water in the beaker, it moisturizers the vapor more and is not as irritating. Although this does not bother a lot of people, it is ice once in a while!

Looking forward to your feedback!

 

[Aimless Ryan]

@lazylathe

Quick question. What temperature do you suggest starting out at? I read all that stuff, and I'm in the process of reading it again, but it's been several days and right now I think that's about the only important information I need to know before I start.

Even though I indicated that I was going to try it out in a few minutes (a couple hours ago), I haven't actually used it yet. I want to make sure I know how to do it right before I do anything. Plus I needed to take a bath first.

 

[lazylathe]

@lazylathe

Quick question. What temperature do you suggest starting out at? I read all that stuff, and I'm in the process of reading it again, but it's been several days and right now I think that's about the only important information I need to know before I start.

Even though I indicated that I was going to try it out in a few minutes (a couple hours ago), I haven't actually used it yet. I want to make sure I know how to do it right before I do anything. Plus I needed to take a bath first.

I would go for 195 Celsius or 383 F.
I like the flavour and effects at that range.
At the end i finish off at MAX.

If i were you i would vape and then shower or bath.
Feels amazing! Very relaxing and just cool!
Then brush your teeth!
LOL! Those were all cool back in the day, now i need to vape a harvest to get there! LOL!

 

[Aimless Ryan]

Thank you. That is very helpful (even though I haven't done it yet, as I am giving it a couple minutes to heat up).

You know what's funny? People act like it's so hard to fit the light into the herb holder correctly, yet I didn't have any trouble at all. It just fit right in and clicked, which is obviously what it was supposed to do.

EDIT: At lower temperatures, like 195, should I expect to see any smoke (or vapor)?

 

[lazylathe]

Thank you. That is very helpful (even though I haven't done it yet, as I am giving it a couple minutes to heat up).

You know what's funny? People act like it's so hard to fit the light into the herb holder correctly, yet I didn't have any trouble at all. It just fit right in and clicked, which is obviously what it was supposed to do.

EDIT: At lower temperatures, like 195, should I expect to see any smoke (or vapor)?

I always get vapour clouds at that temp, so expect you should as well!
Any updates?

 

[sweetherb]

I would start at around 175°C and work upwards. Remember to make sure that the red LED flashes throughout your hit. If it turns solid, stop and allow the unit to heat up a bit more.

It will take 2 or 3 decent pulls before you start to see vapor, as you need to get heat into the herb.

My most effective method is to turn the unit on, set it at 210°C and leave it for a few mins, then turn down to 175°C and start taking hits.

This vaporizer allows you to get an insanely large number of hit from a small pinch of material!

 

[Aimless Ryan]

I always get vapour clouds at that temp, so expect you should as well!
Any updates?

Yeah, here's an update. (This is NOT a review.)

I'm really not sure how my session went last night, but I think I feel like it didn't do much for me. Consequently, I had to take a couple hits from a pipe before I went to bed because of spasticity in my leg(s) from multiple sclerosis, which is something combustion seemed to help considerably over the last year and a half. I realize there's a learning curve, so that may have a lot to do with the difficulties I experienced. But overall I feel like last night's session was less efficient than I'm used to with combustion.

I began at around 190 or 195, I think. Started by putting 0.1 or 0.15 g in the herb holder because it seems like I remember reading that other people used a similarly small amount with this machine. It seems like I may have gotten some decent hits from that initial amount, but I really don't know. So I decided to grind up a little more material, in addition to adding the loose material that had accumulated on my tray the previous few days; probably another 0.5 g.

I gradually went up to 235. Even if I did it wrong, the fact that I can remember that much is a good start. Because last night before I used this, I couldn't remember any of the temperatures people mentioned throughout this thread, which means I had no idea where to start. I believe I will probably start out at a lower temperature today or tonight.

One thing that would be nice is if you could switch between Celsius and Fahrenheit without the machine always defaulting to the lowest possible temperature setting. I mean, I would like to be able to program myself to easily convert Celsius to Fahrenheit (and/or vice versa), and that would be a very good way; just as I've programmed myself to convert some weights between grams and ounces, as it has been pounded into my head that 1 oz = 28 g and change. I don't know anything about either electronics or engineering, but that seems like it would be a pretty easy thing to do, and it also seems to me like it should've been an intuitive consideration of the design.

I did experience some feelings that seemed kinda like a different kind of high, but I'm not sure. Right now I'm inclined to think it may have been more of a placebo effect. If it wasn't, though, it sure was nice to feel a little more like a person. I think I even took a few steps without my walker last night, which has become very uncommon. That didn't feel like placebo effect.

I would start at around 175°C and work upwards. Remember to make sure that the red LED flashes throughout your hit. If it turns solid, stop and allow the unit to heat up a bit more.

It will take 2 or 3 decent pulls before you start to see vapor, as you need to get heat into the herb.

My most effective method is to turn the unit on, set it at 210°C and leave it for a few mins, then turn down to 175°C and start taking hits.

This vaporizer allows you to get an insanely large number of hit from a small pinch of material!

I will try starting at 175 next time. Even before you wrote that, I think I was leaning in that direction. Also, I think I already have a pretty good feel for the flashing LED. Just having used the machine once makes it so much easier to understand and remember these tips.

Thanks, both of you.

 

[sweetherb]

Also make sure your material is dry. I mean really dry, so when you put it in the grinder it basically turns to dust. This will give you better flavor and more clouds.

 

[VapourHaze]

I dont own this vapouriser but if i was going from from smoking to vaping then put a good amount in the chamber (0.4) ... that chamber looks big. Turn it up to max and enjoy. If that doesnt work then im not sure.

 

[Aimless Ryan]

Also make sure your material is dry. I mean really dry, so when you put it in the grinder it basically turns to dust. This will give you better flavor and more clouds.

Can you suggest a good way to do that? I'm guessing I should just take a nug or two out of my stash and leave it/them on a plate for a day or so. I've seen where people mentioned keeping their stuff in a warm place, like on top of a TV or something. (Older TV, I assume.)

Sorry if I seem stupid sometimes. Even though I am a reasonably experienced smoker, I've always smoked alone, partly because I would always get paranoid if I smoked around people. Which makes it almost impossible to acquire new ideas/knowledge from buddies. Oh yeah, and having my brain attacked by my immune system probably doesn't help, either.

I should probably go back and watch every video I can find about this tool.

 

[VapourHaze]

Can you suggest a good way to do that? I'm guessing I should just take a nug or two out of my stash and leave it/them on a plate for a day or so. I've seen where people mentioned keeping their stuff in a warm place, like on top of a TV or something. (Older TV, I assume.)

Sorry if I seem stupid sometimes. Even though I am a reasonably experienced smoker, I've always smoked alone, partly because I would always get paranoid if I smoked around people. Which makes it almost impossible to acquire new ideas/knowledge from buddies. Oh yeah, and having my brain attacked by my immune system probably doesn't help, either.

I should probably go back and watch every video I can find about this tool.

No need to make sure material is particularly dry. In fact you can actually vape weed that is too damp to smoke. If u let weed get too dry it looses its terpene profile.

Don't get too caught up ... do your own experiments. My recommendation is just to crank the heat up and go from there.

 

[lemmeadem]

@Aimless Ryan If it's the medical components you want and pain/spasticity you want relief from, I'd say go as high a temperature as you can handle.

The majority of actives dealing with pain and sedation boil at a lot higher temperatures than THC and CBD (which is one of the main medicinally-sought-after actives). Higher temperatures mean you get closer to the high combustion will give you.

The difference between combustion and vaporization, linearly speaking, is combustion comes up a lot quicker whereas a vape high can take fifteen minutes to reach peak and often times people who come from combustion aren't aware they're medicated until well after a session.

With regard to dosage - try using the same amount you use whilst smoking and if the effects aren't prominent then, something's wrong. Generally people say vaporization cuts their usage/dosages to 1/2 or 1/3 of what they use combusting.

EDIT: Also, worry not, man. I've been a long-time lurker, short-time poster on FC and everyone's great here - helpful and forgiving of noobs in the best possible way. You'd do good to search Multiple Sclerosis in the search and see what others are doing to best manage symptoms - you might even find a strain that's particularly helpful that you can get if you're in a legal state!

EDIT EDIT!!!: @ataxian mentioned a strain called Blackwater in another thread - said it's great for pain relief and MS - also said it's best as a late-night strain, causing some cloudiness and loss of productivity.

 

[Aimless Ryan]

I've been sucking on this thing off and on over the last several hours. Started with 0.1 g, then put in another 0.1 g, which is probably just about spent. I might be kind of baked.

Thanks for the tips, guys. A lot of things are starting to make more sense. Maybe.

Also, if anyone has wondered what the hell I was talking about in my previous post, I actually meant to post that in the grinder thread.

EDIT: Dang it, I just realized I linked to the wrong video yesterday. Looks like vaping IS making me as stupid as I hoped. (Wait a minute. I had never vaped when I posted that video.)

 

[VapourHaze]

I think 0.1 is maybe a little too small of a load. Try putting 0.4 in to start and see .. that should knock you sideways.

 

[luchiano]

@Aimless Ryan I think I know what the issue is, but to be sure, I think you should start your session at 420f, then after two puffs, raise the temp until you get to 435f.

Make sure the herb is grounded well, inhale with the light blinking, and inhale for at least 10 seconds. You only need .10 grams. The more you put into the chamber, the longer your inhale needs to be, or you will be puffing all day.

Let me know how it goes. I want to see if my theory is right.

 

[Aimless Ryan]

Thanks. I will give that a try.

I get the feeling that if I taste anything after a draw, even if there is not any visible vapor when I exhale, it means I'm still getting something out of my material. Can anyone confirm that? Or am I just wrong?

 

[Aimless Ryan]

Some random thoughts about my experience with the AroMed so far.

Negatives

• The glass casing around the lightbulb keeps unthreading. Not just a little bit, but all the way if I forget to check it regularly. And it's pretty difficult to check it regularly, because it's often too hot to touch when I think about checking it. Consequently, during the several minutes it may take for the glass to cool, I often forget that I intended to check/tighten it. Then I often don't remember again until after I've had the machine back on for a few minutes, which again makes the glass too hot to touch. This is already beginning to piss me off. I just wonder how it may affect the machine's performance.

• When I remove the herb holder from the water filter, the fact that the whip is still attached to the water filter makes it very easy to accidentally knock over the filter. It has already happened more than a couple times, and I wouldn't be surprised if it eventually ends up causing me to break the water filter.

Positives and Neutrals

• I find it much easier to use the AroMed with the glass pieces beside machine, rather than secured to the back of it. At first I was hesitant to do it this way because my cat sometimes likes to walk around on the table where I keep the machine. However, I found that as long as I keep the light securely in position inside the herb holder when I'm not around, it would be very difficult for a cat to knock over any of it. When I keep the filter on the back of the machine, as the instructions advise, not only is it physically difficult for me to use, but it also keeps me from being able to easily see both the blinking light and the herb holder at the same time, due to the short length of the tubing. When I keep the glass to the side of the machine, I can relax back onto my chair and easily see everything I need to see.

• I find that if I use the AroMed exactly as instructed--that is, by pulling (lightly) when the light is blinking, then continuing to pull lightly--the blinking light quickly becomes solid unless I either pull extremely lightly or stop pulling. Since I already pull very lightly, what I've begun doing is starting off by pulling lightly for about a second, or until the light is at full intensity. I then stop pulling for maybe half a second, but after that I can pull either as lightly or as hard as I want, without making the light stop blinking.

• I get the feeling that when I start tasting popcorn, it means the material in the herb holder is pretty much used up. Can anyone confirm this?

• So far today I have put a fresh 0.03 g in the herb holder and took several pulls at 190 C. I don't detect any kind of high feeling, but I do seem to feel a bit more relaxed.

• Since I was experiencing some spasticity in my legs last night at about midnight, and also because I didn't feel like my body wanted to go to sleep, I combusted a couple hits. It seems to have done what I wanted it to, but it made my lungs hurt so bad. And it hurt for a long time, too, after only about 48 hours of not combusting. I don't smoke cigarettes anymore, but I smoked for like 21 years. No cigarette has ever made me hurt like that.

• Occasionally during a session I'll suck as hard as I can for a second or two, just to stir up the herbs inside the herb holder. That's so much easier for me than disengaging the machine from the glass, then stirring the material and re-engaging the machine and glass. It may not be as much of a chore for other people to remove the equipment, stir, and then replace equipment, but I am a klutz. My hands don't always (or don't usually) do what my brain tells them to do, so it's very important for me to limit the number of chances I have to accidentally fuck shit up, including my body. That's why I spend most of my waking life lying on a couch.

@luchiano, I did pretty much what you suggested yesterday, unless I misinterpreted your instructions. I was feeling pretty nice for about 10 hours, and even kind of pleasantly stupid at times, having gone through about half a gram throughout the day. I am inclined to think smoking the same amount would not have kept me feeling all right for anywhere near that long.

One thing that's kind of messing with me so far is the fact that I really want to test this thing out from the time I wake up to the time I go to sleep, but I also don't want to deplete all my stuff just by satisfying my short-term curiosity.

Also, expect a lot of posts here from me in the near future. I am an analytical freak, and I enjoy sharing things that I've learned from experience; even if it's just impressions or ideas, like what I said about pausing for half a second before continuing a pull. I can't remember having read where anyone else said that, and it seems to me like it might be a useful tip.

I feel like this thread needs a lot more information, perhaps for people like myself who are starting at zero. And I also think it might be extremely helpful if a moderator adds a note to the very first post in this thread, advising people that it might be a good idea to just skip the first 10 pages or so.

EDIT: OK, I'm starting to get the impression that: 1) It might be best to draw as lightly and slowly as possible, and probably for as long as possible; and 2) Sometimes it seems to take nearly 10 draws before I really get the herb loose and ready to give up the goods.

EDIT 2: I think I just realized that the herbs I have used up the last few days are actually nowhere near exhausted. Also, taking long, ridiculously slow draws definitely seems to work best for me at this point.

EDIT 3: Yes, that makes all kinds of sense! It's very similar to how a pizza stone or pizza oven (deck oven) works, but on a much smaller and quicker scale. Thermal mass.

EDIT 4: To keep the two glass pieces from sticking, I rubbed a little bit of Grinder Grease on the stem of the herb holder, inserted the herb holder into the filter, and rotated the stem quite a few times inside the water filter. Seems to be working well so far.

EDIT 5: Yes. If you put cold food on a cold stone, then put it all in a hot oven, that stone is doing nothing for you. In fact, it's doing less than nothing for you. That cold stone is blocking all the heat from your oven, keeping the heat from getting to your food.

If you bake a pizza on a 2 mm thick pan or screen, on a 600° stone, you're not actually baking at anywhere near 600; probably not even 500. Just a millimeter or two away from the hot stone, the temperature is nowhere near the temperature of the stone. And as soon as you put a cold object with the size and mass of a pizza on top of the stone, the stone loses a whole bunch of heat.

Similarly, I feel like if you don't have a very hot glass surface (the thermal mass of the herb holder), as well as a consistent source of heat (that is, the light/heat from a very long, slow pull), you can lose a lot of heat over the space of only a millimeter or two.

If you don't have the thermal mass from the hot glass and continuous heat from the lightbulb (and possibly even thermal mass in your herbs from recent use of the machine), your herbs probably never actually get anywhere near the temperature on your temperature display.

Similarly, a pizza in a 600° oven
never reaches a temperature of anywhere near 600° (unless you leave that pizza in the oven for an hour or two). Honestly, I can't even tell you how hot a pizza gets. I'm guessing somewhere closer to 200°.

EDIT 6: I just took about 10 consecutive draws at 235°C while pointing an infrared laser thermometer at the glass just above the herbs. The temperature of the outside of the glass started out at a little over 100°F. After taking all those consecutive draws, the temperature of the same area was at least 180°F. Thermal mass. (Sorry for reporting this in two different forms of temperature measurement.)

EDIT 7: When I point the laser at the very top of the glass (herb holder) with the light on, with the machine set at 235°C, my thermometer says anything from 237 to 244, and it hovers in the 200°C range after the AroMed has sat idle for a while (but still on, at 235).

 

[Aimless Ryan]

In the previous post, EDIT 7 is incorrect. When I talk about the machine, the temperature should be expressed in Celsius. Conversely, when I talk about the thermometer, the temperature should be expressed in Fahrenheit. I tried to edit the previous post, but apparently I was a couple minutes too late.

 

[luchiano]

@Aimless Ryan OK, the reason I asked you to do that, was because I think your body is used to smoking, and inhaling heavy smoke. I see you sit on the couch a lot, and this probably means your blood circulation, and metabolism, isn't the best, so thin vapor won't really hit you like that. Smoke, and thick vapor, gets your sympathetic nervous system going, and that helps speed up things, that's probably why smoking, and high temp vapor effects you more then light vapor. The thing is you will reach a plateau if you keep taking in thick vapor, at least I do. When the vapor is thin, you can get extremely high, when everything in the body is moving, meaning your metabolism, and circulation.

If you are willing, a good thing to do before your first session of the day, is to go for a nice Powerwalk for around 40 min.-1 hr. If you puff right after that, you will definitely feel the vapor if you start around 385f, and gradually go up to 430f. It will most likely hit you real strong. Power walking or regular walking with intervals of walking on an incline, really gets blood going to your brain without sacrificing muscle glycogen. If you eat a nice carbohydrate rich food, right after the walk, and then puff, you will be ULTRA relaxed.

As far as connecting the bulb, have you tried this technique that was posted earlier in this thread?
http://fuckcombustion.com/threads/aromed-4-0.408/page-17

Frank Fuchs of AroMed said: I have attached a foto to show how you can provide a good setting of the heater grip. Hold the grip tight to the herbholder and bend back the gooseneck.

Look at the gooseneck as the legs of the heater, and pushes it into the herbholder.

If you still choose to keep the water holder to the side, get you some scotch fastener tape, so it will be stable.
http://mounting.scotchbrand.com/wps...g/?N=7584065+7583086+7584073+3294529207&rt=r3

On the blinking light, I don't get why it still blinks even though you are inhaling hard. Email them and see what's up with that.

After every session keep the joints lubed up, so they want lock, and you risk breaking the glass. A little vegetable oil rubbed on both sides helps if you run out of the other stuff.

 

[luchiano]

@Aimless Ryan I forgot to let you know that you should heat the aromed up with the herb holder, and water piece, separate for 2 minutes empty. This will help the glass with the bulb will connect easy. Once the bulb is heated then connect the pieces, and let the bowl heat up. After around one minute, the bowl should be hot enough to add herbs. Your session will be quicker because the whole bowl Would be heated up, and that means more vapor during the first few puffs, then if you just heat the bowl up with the cooled herb. Have fun!

Video showing another way to connect the aromed's bulb, to the herb holder.

If you get a chance also try to get a more fine screen. It helps keep the herb holder cleaner, and add a little more heat at the bottom of the herb, that is touching the screen.

 

[Aimless Ryan]

Thanks luchiano. That last post is very helpful. I'm sure the one before it is, too, but I think I was pretty baked when I read it, so I don't remember much of what you said. Consequently, I'll have to read it again. You are obviously very passionate about this machine, and your posts show a very high level of knowledge and understanding. I appreciate that.

I doubt that I would've thought about heating up the herb holder before adding herbs, but that does make sense to me. In keeping with my pizzamaking analogy, I'd say your tip is akin to preheating an oven before you bake a pizza in it. If you don't preheat the oven, the pizza will not bake properly; especially if you only bake that pizza for the same length of time as you would bake the same pizza in a fully preheated oven. (Does this mean that if I don't preheat my herb holder as you instructed, I will not bake properly? My somewhat-educated guess is yes.)

In my analogy, which I think is actually a pretty good analogy, one baked pizza is the equivalent of one hit. If you want to make more than one pizza, you have to keep the oven and the stone hot. That is, you don't turn off the oven and let all the heat escape right after your first pizza finishes baking, then turn the oven right back on because you want to bake another pizza immediately. That would be horribly inefficient and stupid.

What you're saying seems to be very similar to my discovery yesterday that I may prefer to take several draws in very quick succession, specifically because it creates a more even, consistent temperature inside the herb holder. Or at the very least, it enables me to have a series of draws in which the herbs themselves are consistently closer to the AroMed's displayed temperature setting than when I just take a draw every couple minutes or so. (I may be totally full of it here. Not sure yet.)

So far today I have loaded the herb holder with about 0.16 g of very finely ground Purple Urkle and taken at least five draws at 157°C/315°F. I'm definitely not high, but that session may have helped calm down my nerves a little. I tend to be very tense these days.

Sorry if my pizza analogy doesn't make sense to anyone else, but I think it makes a whole bunch of sense to me. (If I didn't say it here already, I'm a total pizza geek. Not a foodie or chef or baker. Pizza geek.)

*****​

ADDED LATER: In my pizza analogy,

Herb holder = Oven baking chamber
Lightbulb = Broiler
Air from draw = Convection
Herbs = Stone/pizza
Vapor = Bite of dinner
Temp display = Temp display

I might have to rethink a couple of those a little bit.

0.05 g of herbs = Small thin pizza. (A small thin pizza will reach its desired internal temperature relatively quickly, especially when compared to a large thick pizza. So will 0.05 g of herbs, compared to 0.25 g of herbs.)

0.1 g of herbs = Medium pizza, a little bit thicker than the small pizza. (More thermal mass requires more time to heat to desired internal temperature.)

0.15 g of herbs = Large medium-thick pizza. (Even more thermal mass = even more time to heat to desired internal temperature.)

0.25 g of herbs = Massive pizza, like Giordano's. (Requires even more time to reach internal temperature.)

It generally takes 5-10 minutes for a small thin pizza to reach its desired internal temperature. It takes 45 minutes for a large Giordano's pizza to do the same thing.

If it takes longer for a large pizza to reach an internal temperature of, say, 190°C than it takes for a small pizza to reach 190°C inside the same oven, then it also must take longer for 0.25 g of herbs to reach 190°C internally inside an herb chamber than it takes for 0.05 g of herbs to reach 190°C inside an herb holder under identical conditions.

Also, for any of those pizzas to be able to reach an internal temperature of 190°C (at least within a relatively short period of time), the oven's thermostat must keep the oven temperature considerably higher than 190°C. Like 260°C to 290°C. Which probably means that for herbs to reach an internal temperature of 190°C, they must be kept in a space with an air temperature of considerably higher than 190°C.

Air is not a good thermal conductor. Which is why you can reach into a 600°F oven to fetch your food without getting your exposed arms burned by the hot oven air. Similarly, the temperature of the herbs in an AroMed herb chamber cannot possibly be anywhere near the temperature of the lightbulb. Even with convection. I think.

And I think I've read that combustion can occur at temperatures as low as 200°C. If so, then why isn't any of my stuff combusting inside the AroMed? And if 233°C is generally considered the specific temperature at which combustion must occur, then I shouldn't have any ABV. Especially considering I have taken many consecutive draws of the same herbs at 235°C. If the herbs were actually being heated to 235°C, my ABV would be ashes.

Basically, the Aromed is a tiny little convection oven. As are all vaporizers, I suppose.

 

[luchiano]

@Aimless Ryan the aromed's temperature is only the air being heated up when you inhale, it doesn't heat up the bowl to exact temperature. Combustion occurs around 451f, not 200c, this is why you still have unburnt abv. The herb heats up to the exact temperature of the display when you inhale, but the temp drop once you stop inhaling. You can only measure it with a good conductor like silver. This was discussed on page 21 of this thread. Go to post #516, and read on from there.

I agree with your pizza Analogy, except it's not thermal mass in this situation, its timing of inhales. The more herb you use, the longer the inhale needs to be. The top portion will always heat up first, and the air extracts as it travel along the herb. This is why I told you previously that using a lot of herb will cause you to do long inhales, or have a long session. The less you use, the faster your session. The secret is manipulating the temperature, you don't need to stay at one temp, just play with all of them except for areas near 451f, unless you are using something like a concentrate. Those won't burn if you that high because they don't have cellulose in them, bud does, and is why it burns when going that high.

 

[Aimless Ryan]

Disclaimer: I don't mean to be argumentative here, but I feel like my words may come off that way. If I seem at all argumentative, it's just poor communication. I'm just trying to learn, and I learn by questioning things. I'm sorry if I say anything that offends you or anyone else.

I didn't actually believe whatever I read about combustion and 200°C. I was just saying I read somewhere that combustion sometimes happens at 200°C. Regardless, 451°F is 233°C, which is less than 235°C.

I read all that discussion about temperature measurement earlier in the thread, before I made the decision to purchase an AroMed. I didn't get the impression anyone ever came to a concrete conclusion. Based on what I've read, I certainly didn't come to a concrete conclusion.

I know very little about this kind of stuff, but I can imagine that there could be an IR thermometer somewhere near the lightbulb, with its laser pointed at the screen. I think I remember people talking about some kind of temperature sensor near the lightbulb. Could this sensor actually be an IR thermometer pointed at the middle of the screen? I would think that might be the most accurate way of gauging the temperature of the herbs. Because regardless of how much you put in, the thermometer would always be reading the surface temperature of your pile of herbs, or the top surface of the actual herbs; not the air temperature, which is meaningless, considering the temperature of the air 1 mm away might be 100° less than the air being measured. Although I do have a handheld IR thermometer (for pizzamaking), I don't know how big the working part of the thermometer is. All I know is how big the plastic casing is.

EDIT: I think pretty much everything I proposed in the previous paragraph is wrong. That is, I don't think there is an IR thermometer involved in the operation of the AroMed. If there was, the light would remain at full intensity every time you remove the light from the herb holder while the machine is on, because the sensor (or IR thermometer) would be pointed at your relatively cold table instead of your hot herb holder. At least one other reason, too.

@Aimless Ryan the aromed's temperature is only the air being heated up when you inhale, it doesn't heat up the bowl to exact temperature.

But it does heat up the bowl to an exact temperature. Which is one temperature if you just finished your first hit, and a totally different temperature if you just finished taking 10 long hits in a row. That 100°C difference in temperature affects the temperature of the air considerably, which affects the temperature of your herbs considerably.

Just because you don't know the temperature of the glass doesn't mean the temperature of the glass is insignificant. If the temperature of the air inside the glass is 400°F, but the temperature of the inside surface of the glass is 600°F, at least some of your weed is going to burn. And that is not an unrealistic scenario, either.

If all the herb heated up to the exact temperature of the display, then it wouldn't matter if you have a fine grind vs. a coarse grind, because every little piece of material would be the exact same temperature as every other piece of material. Also, you most likely wouldn't need to take any more than one hit at any particular temperature. Because if everything inside the bowl is the same temperature, if you're getting anything from it, you're getting everything from it.

The more herb you use, the longer the inhale needs to be.

Yes, because of thermal mass. You need to inhale longer because the heated herbs are not all the same temperature. If you put a cold 1/2" thick stone in a hot oven, you're still going to have a relatively cold stone for 15 or 20 minutes. If you put a cold 1" thick stone in a hot oven, you're still going to have a relatively cold stone for maybe 30 or 40 minutes. Similarly, if you put cold herbs in a hot herb holder, most of the herb will not reach that temperature. Ever.

It's not the temperature of the air that matters. It's the temperature of the herb that matters.

Or am I nuts?