I feel as if I've been sufficiently taught by my new T1 to use it successfully in most any circumstance. So I thought I'd share some thoughts. As usual, they're just my thoughts; they're not rules. I'll probably change my mind about some of them after more use. I'll probably ramble.
In my previous message, I mentioned that as OF keeps pointing out, the T1 is a true convection vaporizer, and there are two parts to convection vaporizing. (1) Getting the heat source up to temp and keeping it there, and (2) getting the hot air to go through the load, heating it up and then leaching out the good stuff on its way into your lungs.
Generally Speaking, and also worth repeating here:
The count to ten preheat takes care of getting the T1's heat chamber up to temp. But that's only half the equation. You gotta suck hot air through the T1 for a while to heat up the load and the bowl before the hot air will carry off the good stuff. Once the chamber and bowl and load are warm/hot, it doesn't take much skill to get huge sweet clouds. After two or three consecutive hits, almost no pre-heat is necessary, and great vapor exists as soon as you start inhaling. From a cold start however, it's a different story. It can take another 15 or 30 seconds of sucking air before you start getting any good stuff, even after preheating by holding down the switch for ten seconds. Remember, just holding the switch won't do it, even if you count to a hundred (don't do this); with a true convection vaporizer you have to also move hot air through the load.
Some breathing definitions:
Two ways to get stuff into your lungs. Direct Inhale, by which I mean that you breathe in to your lungs directly. Vapor goes from your vaporizer past your lips, through your mouth, down your throat, and into your lungs, all at once. A nice, long steady pull, for maybe 15 to 30 seconds. One action. And Puffing, by which I mean drawing into your mouth first, not directly into your lungs. Then you can draw what's in your mouth into your lungs, if you want, or just exhale it from your mouth without it ever going near your lungs. In either case, two actions.
Direct inhaling, once the T1 and load are up to temp, seems to be the best way to get consistently great hits. A nice steady 15 to 30 second continuous strong inhale. Then maybe ten seconds to let the T1 recover (while you're holding your breath), and you can immediately take another steady 15 to 30 second hit. This method will reward you with great hit after great hit. But 15 to 30 second steady continuous inhales don't appear to be the best way to get a cold T1 going.
Puffing is what you see Sherlock Holmes doing when he gets his (tobacco) pipe going. You know, long wooden match, huge flame, puff, puff, puff, monstrous combustion, huge clouds of rank smelling smoke filling the room... Don't worry if you have no idea who Sherlock Holmes is. Anyway, in this case (T1, not Meerschaum) a puff needs to be a full one second strong draw to a full mouth. Not a tiny puff. Not a short sharp puff. A steady strong one second puff until your mouth is full. Remember you're trying to heat up the load by drawing hot air through it. The pause between puffs lets the heat chamber recover and lets the temperature keep going up. Puffing is a good way to bring the load up to vaporizing temperature, particularly when your T1 is cold, and you've just loaded a fresh, moist bowlful.
Some specifics:
I don't grind my load, I crumble it between my fingers. I found that a light crumble worked just as well or better than a medium or fine grind. Plus the top holes (in the cap) don't clog as quickly. And less stuff gets into your mouth. And less stuff falls into the chamber via the holes in the bottom of the bowl. I guess certain hugely sticky, unbelievably fresh stuff might need cutting, rather than crumbling, but the strains I've tried do best with a light finger crumble. ymmv. You don't want a superfine, dusty grind. I fill my bowl about 2/3 full. The ratio of "tasty" hits versus "tastes-like-popcorn" hits goes up if you use smaller loads. I haven't experimented much with very small loads (less than half full bowl) yet, but it's on my list.
I use the bristle brush that came with my Volcano, and q-tips dipped in iso to keep the bowl and cap clean. Piece of cake to keep the T1 clean. Another tip is to remove the cap every two hits or so and blow into the mouthpiece. This will clear the tiny air holes in the top, and keep your draw working. Don't forget to remove the mouthpiece and clean inside the top of the cap now and then. I haven't felt any need whatsoever to boil anything yet. Simple cleaning seems to do the trick.
Cold T1, fresh, moist, crumbled load, fresh batteries:
I preheat the T1 for 10 seconds (15 seconds if the batteries are half used or more). Then I start taking puffs at one second intervals, holding down the power switch the whole time, during the puff and during the pause. One second strong steady puff, check for taste, no taste, exhale from mouth, watching for vapor. No vapor, pause one second, then take another one second steady strong puff. When I start to get a little taste, or my previous exhale-from-mouth shows a little vapor, I know that the load has gotten hot enough to start giving off the good stuff. Sometimes this takes two puffs, sometimes it takes ten puffs. I just keep taking a puff and a pause until I see (or taste) some vapor. At that point I switch over to my usual 20 second direct inhale. Works every time. Only thing that changes is how many puffs it takes to get the T1 ready.
If it doesn't work, either your batteries are dead, your holes are clogged, or your load is played. (I suppose I should include or your switch is broken/misaligned, or your heating core has burned out). Do you have to take more preheating puffs without getting vapor than you would expect? Maybe you need to stir your load. Maybe the holes in the cap are mostly clogged. Maybe the batteries are actually discharged. You can easily check each of these things. Unscrew the cap and look at its holes. If they're clogged, blow them out (by blowing into the mouthpiece with the cap off). While you have the cap off, look at your load. Is it brown in the center and green on the outside? If so, then stir it. You won't get any significant vapor if all you're doing is channeling hot air through a narrow scorched tunnel in the center of your load; you will needlessly and frustratingly waste the charge on a pair of batteries though. Those two things look OK?, then dump the load from the bowl into the cap, and press the switch, and look to see if the coils start glowing orange. If they don't, you need to put in fresh batteries. It's not rocket science unless you want it to be.
Anyway, once the T1 is "warmed up," I change my method.
Warm T1, warm load, reasonably charged batteries:
After the second hit, I dump the load in my hand, stir it around, and scoop it back up into the bowl. The bowl isn't too hot to handle after two hits, but after that the bowl gets hotter than I want for scooping up stuff from my hand. So I just loosen the cap, invert the T1, and shake the load every subsequent two or three hits; the load is always dry by then, and shaking seems to mix it up just fine.
By the third and subsequent repeated hits the T1 is hot, and my preheating is down to one second, or not at all. If it's been a little while since the last hit, but the T1 is still pretty warm, I may preheat for five seconds. In either case, with a hot T1, it generally takes only a single puff to get a little vapor. Sometimes (rarely) I have to take a second puff. Then I take my 20 second direct inhale, letting go of the power switch about five seconds before I'm done with the inhale. Once the T1 is hot, I leave the power switch off until just before I take my next hit. It really depends on how hot the T1 is, and how long its been since there was power to the heating chamber.
So the short form of all this is: Preheat when necessary, hold down the switch and puff until you get vapor. Then take full inhales until you fall over, only keeping the switch down when you're inhaling, and don't forget to stir between every two or three hits.
Oh, and if you just hate wasting anything, remember that when you're preheating the load by puffing, you don't have to immediately exhale it from your mouth; you can inhale it into your lungs. I usually don't, but read on...
Breaking the rules:
There's only one "gotcha" with this method; I really like the stuff you get from the first two hits of a fresh load. The stuff that volatilizes at the lower temps. The stuff with most of the taste and smell. The stuff that rounds out the thc/cbn parts and gives each strain its unique taste and effect. So I don't want to waste that stuff puffing. What I do is just rely on the direct inhale method for the first two hits in every load. I don't get vapor clouds in the first two hits using this method, but halfway through the first hit I get the most wonderful taste, and even though there's no significant visible vapor until the end of the second hit, I get the full effect of the strain. It also preheats the fresh load, removing any remaining moisture, and prepares everything for the next four hits, which are always killer (if not as sweet). Once I've done the first two hits, I revert to the "puff to get it going first, only as necessary" method.
started with a P maybe? hehe too baked to remember.
This looks like exactly the kind of thing I'd want in the TV, and actually pretty much all vapes...
