The Great RH Experiment

[Mr. Guy]

As some of us might have seen, CI had a sale on Boveda packs recently. I went ahead and grabbed some 62, 65, 69, and 72 percent packs. I've used the 65-72 before in various applications, but most of the time the overall RH in those storage situations was 65-68 percent, and contained different cigars. My plan, strictly for my own "research", is to take a few sticks I am familiar with and store one of them in Tupperdors with each of the different levels of humidity. So I will end up with 4 different Tupperdors, each filled with the same 6 or so brands and different levels of humidity. After a few months I'll start smoking one brand at a time, starting with the lowest humidity and going to the highest humidity, then move onto the next brand to repeat the process. This will indeed be a long and boring process, but if there's interest I will share my experience with the group, starting when the Boveda arrive, sorting the sticks in to the Tupperdors, reviewing and comparing each brand at the various levels of RH, and ultimately ending when the last cigar is enjoyed. I hope to see solid evidence on what humidity does to each stick in terms of flavor and burn quality, at least in my opinion.
So what do you say? Any interest in following this possibly very uninteresting and time consuming experiment?

EDIT: Please read post #44;
"Gentlemen, I'm going off topic for a moment to say how amazed I am to have received a few offers to send me sticks to experiment with! Thank you so much to everyone who has presented this option! I am officially declaring my stance to only use smokes I have, or will be purchasing, as free cigars was not my intention with this thread, and I apologize if anyone was left with that impression. All offers have been presented in kind and with the brotherhood at heart, but I hope no one read my plan and left with the idea that I am fishing for sticks. I also hope no brothers have been offended by my (hopefully polite) decline of said offers.
I guess I somewhat underestimated the generosity of our little forum and failed to explain this from the start."

 

[SeaGarr]

Subscribed.

Great project. I'll be interesting to hear your insights. I know when I went from 70 to 65 there was a massive difference for me!

See you here in a couple of months then .

 

[Cigarth Vader]

I'm in. Looking forward to the experiment.

 

[irie]

this is an excellent idea I look forward to reading your results

 

[Mr. Guy]

Well, I guess that seals it. I'll stop at the Walmart while I'm out and about to grab some fresh Tupperdor, or would that be that GreatValudor, supplies. The Bovedas are scheduled to arrive Thursday, and I'll be using sticks from my stash. Expect gratuitous preparation pics to be included soon because, let's face it, this will be a pretty dull thread for a while!

 

[jonboy]

I'm in.

 

[Mossome]

Subscribed. Kinda wish you had gone ahead and done this and waited to post until they were already humidified. Now I'm just going to have to wait.

 

[gunther7912]

I'm curious to see the results.

 

[Bruce T.]

Great idea, I wish I had the patience to do it.

 

[DrBob]

curious as well, i use 69% bovedas in my wineador after a fair amount of trial and error, but have yet to go to 65% or lower. Maybe name off the cigars you plan to test with?

 

[THEMISCHMAN]

Sounds like a perfect experiment. Subscribed.

 

[ssaka]

Hmmm... I could either pay attention to this or work... I'm in.

 

[Sirspanksalot]

Go for it!

 

[a2t2p]

i'm in. and curious as to what will be your test subjects.

i think that it may also vary person to person. some like 65 and some like 70. i'm personally in the 65-67 range

 

[StogieNinja]

Subscribed, interested to see what you find out!

Also, you should try and do cigars that vary, like heavy dark maduros (Liga Privada No 9 or Tat reservas), some CCs, something like a Caldwell LLTK... stuff that will allow you to see how the rH affects different types of blends and wrappers.

 

[Zigarro]

Well, I guess that seals it.

WHAT? Seals it? without my input? I think its a helluva idea, do her and we'll all benefit! (Now its sealed!)

 

[Whtwtrman79]

I think it's s great idea too and look forward to the results

 

[mguti]

I'm currently using 70% boveda's in my humidor. But something is telling me to go to 65%. So I will be interesting to see the results

 

[Mr. Guy]

Dang, I never expected this kind of interest! Thanks for all the support, and a special thanks to @Zigarro for the blessing!
I will definitely be picking a variety of wrappers and manufacturers. Now I'm thinking the meager choices I had in mind previously might not live up to the expectations No problems though, it might be more interesting for me to throw in some "top shelf" smokes anyway. Hmmm, this might be a good excuse to place a couple of the orders I've been eyeballing lately.

 

[Senor Perfecto]

As some of us might have seen, CI had a sale on Boveda packs recently. I went ahead and grabbed some 62, 65, 69, and 72 percent packs. I've used the 65-72 before in various applications, but most of the time the overall RH in those storage situations was 65-68 percent, and contained different cigars. My plan, strictly for my own "research", is to take a few sticks I am familiar with and store one of them in Tupperdors with each of the different levels of humidity. So I will end up with 4 different Tupperdors, each filled with the same 6 or so brands and different levels of humidity. After a few months I'll start smoking one brand at a time, starting with the lowest humidity and going to the highest humidity, then move onto the next brand to repeat the process. This will indeed be a long and boring process, but if there's interest I will share my experience with the group, starting when the Boveda arrive, sorting the sticks in to the Tupperdors, reviewing and comparing each brand at the various levels of RH, and ultimately ending when the last cigar is enjoyed. I hope to see solid evidence on what humidity does to each stick in terms of flavor and burn quality, at least in my opinion.
So what do you say? Any interest in following this possibly very uninteresting and time consuming experiment?

I fully support your scientific approach.