I hope this explains what I’m aiming for. While I might be experienced with my Vapcaps, there's always more variables to change and methods to discover.
I find that it’s hard to get a light packing in the Vapcap to be consistent. Sometimes it works like you say, other times it’s too compact. The age, strain, and grind can effect how it packs considerably.
This new method throws a light packing out the window. It’s actually quite compressed in the tip so that the herb stays in the tube shape. It reminds me a lot of a hybrid rocket design where the fuel is on the walls of the tube.
I’m hoping I can get more into the tip this way while cooking it all nice and even. I’m not interested in the fastest extraction for this loading style, at least the initial testing has swayed me to develop this for flavour and cloud chasing. If I can keep the flavour going I’ll gladly take more heats over faster extraction.
Flavour has always taken such a dive after the first hit that I gave up trying to preserve it. Now though? I think I can get Four nice cycles out of the load instead of the first one being good, the next okay and the third spent.
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I did another load this morning, 3/4 full hard packed with the same diameter air hole through the centre. I did this to allow myself a bit more room in the bowl for stirring and I also underestimated how much more I can fit in there when it's hard packed.
I proceeded to do three medium heats before dumping in to my palm for inspection and noted the ABV was very consistent. The colour was solid gold or just past green, and the flavour was right there just like last night. Very consistent vapour production from bowl to bowl with a 45-60 second pause in between. I checked after each heat to make sure the air hole hadn't plugged up, it needed slight reforming on the second load but was otherwise pretty stable.
I loaded it up for one last medium heat which was the last, the material had shrunk to only 1/2 a bowl full at this point. The flavour was weak but didn't have a roasted aroma. The ABV was pretty much spent and poured freely into my hand with a small tap of the tip. It was a medium golden brown and I likely could have gotten another load out of it but I decided that it was done. I typically try not to produce dark ABV as I like to use it for infusing into fats for baking.
I'm a big fan of this way of loading the tip, it's far more pleasant than what I was doing before.