After alot more use, I find I don't like the stem actually. I can't tell if it's too open or restricted. Either way, too much draw force is required for my tastes. However, many may not agree.
The CL head and cap on a j-hook or bubbler is AAA though. Airflow, taste being exceptional.
I'm finding it does suit multiple heat cycle extraction. I have too many devices more suited for OHE, so I don't mind adding a temp stepper to my rotation.
In my personal experience and when asking friends not accustomed to vaping (vapor is drier than smoke) often on short vapor path devices the diameter of the opening of the mouthpiece has a strong correlation between perceived harshness of vapor (and where the vapor hits your tongue, this effects your olfactory system's perceived taste of terpenes also.
An excellent example of this in practice is the vapman, its a very short vapor path yet friends who are very inexperienced with this plant find it fairly smooth and definitely tasty. If I'm remembering correctly you have a vapman already. So I would recommend trying this before buying a new stem.
Take out the vapman mouthpiece. Take it and the XL stem to a large plumbing or hardware store and find a high quality grommet you can stuff the vapman mouthpiece into and that with some effort/elbow grease you can then jam into the XL stem. You working this grommet in and out for a while will reshape it to better suit the stem and mouthpiece. I coated the interior section of the grommet with stem reclaim for a snug fit and to ensure it doesn't impart any flavor. I would post pictures but I'm not sure how to do so anonymously, my apologies.
The narrow airpath created by the vapman mouthpiece makes the vapor significantly less irritating. Moreover the air path's size means that your pulls are a touch slower to cool your heating element so you can take a couple of quick tokes in succession while remaining in the goldilocks heatzone. This narrow path takes any technique out of inhaling (good and a bad thing, good for when friends who've only smoked joints before come in blind and can get a nice hit easily though). I do this when I'm out and about and want a more joint like experience. A little push from the side pops the mouthpiece assembly out and I'm good for dry/wet rig use.
A question for users.. Camouflet recommends popping the cooling unit out for running through glass.. I've tried this but I find it easier to one hit extract a large bowl with the CU in the stem (I'm probably overpowering the heater too quickly with it out vs in I guess?).
Has this been the experience of others who use a large flame with the XL? Many thanks in advance :-)
For those posters having issues with the ceramic cooling unit sliding out, painting reclaim on the outer of the orings fixed this issue for me.
