Workin' hard to catch the cancer

[IdolEyes787]

Hey guys, I'm putting this all together with the intentions to share it elsewhere (excuse the blasphemy). I've been smoking "roll your own" for awhile. I used to buy cans of Bali Shag until the huge tax hike (5.3 oz. went from $18 to $45 at the store, shortly after it was illegal to ship roll your own across state lines via internet/phone ordering, i.e. interstate commerce). After that I tried a few things and eventually settled with Daughters & Ryan 3 Sails Pipe Tobacco, which smoked just like Roll Your Own and tasted alright.

Then the bug hit me a couple months ago. I wanted to start buying leaves and making my own blends. I loved the experimentation with different leaves, but the biggest and most frustrating obstacle was processing the tobacco, e.g. chopping/shaving/shredding. I've gone through about 6 different techniques, and think I finally landed on a working solution. I wasted a lot of money on this fucking hobby... my story below:

1. The first was the Leaf Only branded Tobacco Leaf Shredder from the site that I was buying my leaves. I was only able to mount it at my computer desk since the vice/clamp/grip was too thin to mount anywhere else. It was working out OK for a little while until the thing kept jamming up and bending the combs (my tobacco was barely moist). It was also a pain in the ass to get a second or third shred with no hopper. Eventually I destroyed the thing after processing a few times. Cost $50 (unrecovered).
2. I tried rolling the leaves into cigar shape and cutting with scissors based on this guide. It was difficult to cut, and the tobacco came out too thick no matter what I tried. The problem with a thick cut is that it tastes like you're inhaling pipe tobacco, too much characteristic flavor and is awful going down. I bought a pair of scissors just for this purpose. Cost $17 (hey but now I have a nice new pair of scissors).
3. I bought a food processor, same problem as in #2. Cost $20 (unrecovered).
4. I bought a pasta machine and an angel hair attachment. I even bought dremel tool to grind grooves into the rollers so that they grabbed the tobacco. The gears that allowed both rollers to roll in harmony broke not 10 minutes into the venture. The gears were fixed on the rod via a secant cut. That got warped and eventually only one roller was turning. I beat the machine mercilessly with a hammer and threw it in a box. Whatever I did cut actually smoked pretty decently. Cost $115 ($50 recovered)
5. I bought a 3 foot plank of 3" x 3" oak wood, a hacksaw, a portable vice clamp, and an expensive meat cleaver. I pressed the leaves into brick form with ~ 1000 lbs of pressure (guessing), and tried to shave thin slices using both a straight razor and a meat cleaver. I bought a sharpening stone, and grinded away so that the cleaver was sharp enough to go through paper like soft butter. This whole project took a lot of physical effort from construction to tobacco processing. In the end, I only ended up with the same cut of tobacco as #2.
   Attachment 113558
   Cost $115 (unrecovered)

   ---

   INTERLUDE:
   This next one was the last attempt, pass or fail. It's not even about the cost of tobacco anymore, it's that tobacco is more of a hobby than a habit. However, I can only fail so many times and waste so much money before I start to really lose my cool.
   

   ---

6. I bought a Staples Mailmate M5 paper shredder. I had to rip out the protective plastic that limits the thickness of the items being fed through, as depicted here:
   Attachment 113559
   Then, using my metal working magic, crafted an aluminum hopper:
   Attachment 113560
   I then deribbed all my leaves, blending 5 different types of tobacco (American VFC, Canadian VFC, Oriental, Light Fire Cured, Aged Burley). I shredded it three times. This is the first shred:
   Attachment 113561
   The second shred:
   Attachment 113562
   The third and final shred:
   Attachment 113563
   And here's a view up close:
   Attachment 113564
   Cost $70.
   

   ---

The verdict: It tastes great and burns well (evenly, ashes solid). The only caveat so far is that I have to keep relighting my cigarettes; however, since it doesn't give me that pipe taste of a low temp burn I'm not going to get too worked up over that.

In case anyone was wondering, my plan was to link to this post from the "How to Grow Tobacco" forum. I have no yard or any place to grow and cure my own leaves, so I'll just stick to buying them for now.

Countries have spent less money and effort on going to the Moon.

[Squeamous]

I love a resourceful solution to a problem Mary! Also your attempts at self sufficiency. I got some instructions off the net on how to make a whisky still which I haven't got around to implementing yet, but I make as many of my own consumables and home furnishings as I can. I've never thought of trying to grow tobacco before. The only drawback I can see is you can't put a roll-up in a cigarette holder, and I wanted to start using them on nights out for that 20s flapper feel

Never had natural tabacco myself but I've heard it doesn't do the job.It doesn't give you that kick.Is this true?I figure all the junk they put in at the factory is what makes it do that.
I only smoke a pack a month so what the fuck do I know?

I don't think that's true. Roll-ups give me a head rush that I don't get with cigarettes. But then I don't smoke particularly high nicotine cigarettes, so I guess it depends on what you're used to, and also which filters you use.

[IdolEyes787]

I've never thought of trying to grow tobacco before.

Maybe try patio tomatoes first and work your way up to senseless , life shortening stuff from there.

[Squeamous]

I've never thought of trying to grow tobacco before.

Maybe try patio tomatoes first and work your way up to senseless , life shortening stuff from there.

I already grow tomatoes. Maybe I'll use my knowledge of genetics and create tomacco

[IdolEyes787]

Too late to get the patent.

Tomacco

Tomacco was originally a fictional plant that was a hybrid between tomatoes and tobacco, from the 1999 episode "E-I-E-I-(Annoyed Grunt)". The method used to create the tomacco in the episode is fictional. In the episode, the tomacco was accidentally created by Homer Simpson when he planted and fertilized his tomato and tobacco fields with plutonium. The result is a tomato that apparently has a dried, brown tobacco center, and, although being described as tasting terrible by many characters, is also immediately and powerfully addictive. The creation is promptly labeled "tomacco" by Homer and sold in large quantities to unsuspecting passersby. A cigarette company, Laramie Tobacco Co., seeing the opportunity to legally sell their products to children, offers to buy the rights to market tomacco, but Homer demands one thousand times as much money as they wish to pay him, and the company withdraws. Eventually, all of the tomacco plants are eaten by farm animals — except for the one remaining plant, which later goes down in an explosive helicopter crash with the cigarette company's lawyers.
The process of making tomacco was first revealed in a 1959 Scientific American article, which stated that nicotine could be found in the tomato plant after grafting. Due to the academic and industrial importance of this breakthrough process, this article was reprinted in a 1968 Scientific American compilation.^[14]
A Simpsons fan, Rob Baur of Lake Oswego, Oregon, was inspired by the episode. Remembering the article in a textbook, Baur cultivated a tomacco in 2003 by grafting together tobacco and tomato plants. The plant produced fruit that looked like a normal tomato, but Baur suspected that it contained a lethal amount of nicotine and thus would be inedible. Testing later proved that the leaves of the plant contained some nicotine.^[15] Both plants are members of the same family, Solanaceae or nightshade.^[16] The tomacco plant bore tomaccoes until it died after 18 months, spending one winter indoors.^[16] Baur was featured on the "E-I-E-I-(Annoyed Grunt)" audio commentary in the Simpsons Season 11 DVD box set discussing the plant and resulting fame.^[17]

The 2004 convention of the American Dialect Society named tomacco as the new word "least likely to succeed."^[18] Tomacco was a wordspy.com "Word of the Day".^[19]
Tomacco juice is shown with Marge's other groceries in the new opening theme. Also, there is a Tomacco field in The Simpsons Hit and Run.

[Squeamous]

Mintacco then....for that menthol ciggie taste

[megabyteme]

Too late to get the patent.

Tomacco

Tomacco was originally a fictional plant that was a hybrid between tomatoes and tobacco, from the 1999 episode "E-I-E-I-(Annoyed Grunt)". The method used to create the tomacco in the episode is fictional. In the episode, the tomacco was accidentally created by Homer Simpson when he planted and fertilized his tomato and tobacco fields with plutonium. The result is a tomato that apparently has a dried, brown tobacco center, and, although being described as tasting terrible by many characters, is also immediately and powerfully addictive. The creation is promptly labeled "tomacco" by Homer and sold in large quantities to unsuspecting passersby. A cigarette company, Laramie Tobacco Co., seeing the opportunity to legally sell their products to children, offers to buy the rights to market tomacco, but Homer demands one thousand times as much money as they wish to pay him, and the company withdraws. Eventually, all of the tomacco plants are eaten by farm animals — except for the one remaining plant, which later goes down in an explosive helicopter crash with the cigarette company's lawyers.
The process of making tomacco was first revealed in a 1959 Scientific American article, which stated that nicotine could be found in the tomato plant after grafting. Due to the academic and industrial importance of this breakthrough process, this article was reprinted in a 1968 Scientific American compilation.^[14]
A Simpsons fan, Rob Baur of Lake Oswego, Oregon, was inspired by the episode. Remembering the article in a textbook, Baur cultivated a tomacco in 2003 by grafting together tobacco and tomato plants. The plant produced fruit that looked like a normal tomato, but Baur suspected that it contained a lethal amount of nicotine and thus would be inedible. Testing later proved that the leaves of the plant contained some nicotine.^[15] Both plants are members of the same family, Solanaceae or nightshade.^[16] The tomacco plant bore tomaccoes until it died after 18 months, spending one winter indoors.^[16] Baur was featured on the "E-I-E-I-(Annoyed Grunt)" audio commentary in the Simpsons Season 11 DVD box set discussing the plant and resulting fame.^[17]

The 2004 convention of the American Dialect Society named tomacco as the new word "least likely to succeed."^[18] Tomacco was a wordspy.com "Word of the Day".^[19]
Tomacco juice is shown with Marge's other groceries in the new opening theme. Also, there is a Tomacco field in The Simpsons Hit and Run.

And Mary was saying she had a hard time getting her tobacco leaves to stay lit. You'd have to douse the tomacco fruits in gasoline to get a good draw.

[Artemis]

Being a chemist, scary mary has access to a whole raft of accelerants/explosives that would cause far more a combustion/detonation than dousing his labors in gasoline. If he put his mind to it, he could probably level a whole city block without trying too hard, it's just the explaining why that would be hard.

[IdolEyes787]

What city does Mary live in because I might be up for funding that.

[mjmacky]

What city does Mary live in because I might be up for funding that.

I'll await your funds.