Canoeing... What causes it?

LiquidChaos66

Tonight I had one of my two Casa Fuente sticks. I was super excited for it and for what I got to smoke of it... I was impressed. BUT one side would not stay lit at all! Right from the get go it wouldn't toast, it wouldn't. Get a cherry and wouldn't burn! I fought with it to correct the burn for 30 minutes and finally had to give up. it was in my humi at 70%rh and was left out on my counter to acclimate for a hour before smoking. (This method usually renders me no issues while smoking). Input?

Bob Luken

Sorry the hear about that. If it was completely unsmokeable they may be willing to compensate you. Give them a call.

The3Stogies

Was that one of your B-day cigar's, that sucks. Did you take it apart and check it out? Someone on here does post-mortems on bad burning cigars and they said usually it was a stem causing the issue.

webmost

I am the poster child for bad burns and equally mystified. It usually happens to me when I am smoking out in the garage on a damp Dull-Aware evening. Which seems like most evenings. But even so, it's just hard to predict. Last night, for instance, I burnt Roland's drumstick followed by an Uppowoc Perfecto. I fully expected both to burn badly considering the light drizzle and hot air. Roland's required constant puffing because it was so loose I couldn't get a cherry. Other tha that, no issues. My U.P. burnt like a champ, with a constant predictable cherry. Why didn't either one of these amateur cheroots canoe or tunnel? There's the mystery. Some other day both of them will. Not last night. The night before I took a Montecristo churchill which ckrddsmke found in an old humidor, all dried and cracked, and mailed to me to re-wrap. Burnt perfectly end to end. Night before, I sparked a nice little La Riqueza. That sucker just had to burn up one side. Couldn't fix it. Even trimmed the trailing edge off with scissors and scorched that edge good with a butane torch lighter. Back up one side it went. There seems no good reason under God's creation why these knobbly amateur cheroots (in Roland's case, the first stogie he had ever rolled) ought to out-perform a store bought premium. If that fact's any clue, then a bad burn cannot strictly be about the roller's skill. However, next time, it will be the reverse, the amateur will refuse to burn, while the pro will burn like a poster child.

The one thing I can say for certain is your broadleafs appear to burn much better in the dampage. Either as a binder or as a wrapper, some broadleaf or sumatra.

Other'n that, I dunno.

bigharpoon

It happens sometimes. It could be a number of things. 70%RH is a little high, a lot of people keep their RH lower to get a better burn. The ambient RH is also a factor, cigars tend to burn worse when it is humid or raining outside. It can also be the roll, if there is an off-center bunch or a large stem along the edge in the filler. Ligero doesn't burn well so if it is all rolled off-center it can make the other side burn faster. I'd try lowering your RH for starters.

danielzreyes

A DE rep answered this same question about a batch of UC that kept canoeing/tunneling. He claims that they rushed the curing process and the filler leaves ended up being too dry. Therefore the filler burned faster causing cigars to canoe/tunnel

SleevePlz

danielzreyes:

A DE rep answered this same question about a batch of UC that kept canoeing/tunneling. He claims that they rushed the curing process and the filler leaves ended up being too dry. Therefore the filler burned faster causing cigars to canoe/tunnel

I love the fact that they apparently knew of the issue and still decided to release the product.

Cigary

danielzreyes:

A DE rep answered this same question about a batch of UC that kept canoeing/tunneling. He claims that they rushed the curing process and the filler leaves ended up being too dry. Therefore the filler burned faster causing cigars to canoe/tunnel

This is pretty much what causes tunneling. It's a good idea that when we receive our cigars at home that we put them away to let them acclimate to our humidors. Canoeing is usually a by product of storage at higher than normal RH and 70% is a bit high. Leaving your cigars in your humis for at least a few weeks will usually fix the problem if your cigars tend to suffer from this problem. One thing about trying to drybox a cigar in an hour or even a few hours is that it's not going to uniformly "dry out" the cigar enough to resolve this type of problem. Dryboxing seems to have given a lot of people the idea that it's a one stop fix for over humidified cigars...it isn't. Proper storage at a good RH is the answer. If that doesn't fix the problem then it can be attributed to how it was rolled.

jd50ae

I have had it happen more often to new cigars then rested and aged cigars. Maybe a total of 5 times so I guess I have been lucky.

webmost

bigharpoon:

It happens sometimes. It could be a number of things. 70%RH is a little high, a lot of people keep their RH lower to get a better burn. The ambient RH is also a factor, cigars tend to burn worse when it is humid or raining outside. It can also be the roll, if there is an off-center bunch or a large stem along the edge in the filler. Ligero doesn't burn well so if it is all rolled off-center it can make the other side burn faster. I'd try lowering your RH for starters.

I line the ligero off center idea. That makes sense.

webmost

Last night, I fired up a nice little La Perla del Mar. Bout a five buck cigar. Basically a Brick House with a Connecticut wrapper. Garage could not have been damper. Not only was it drizzling outside, but the floor was half covered in a puddle from the downpour which had flooded under the door the day before. Perfect burn.

Broadleafs, I tell you. Good burners.

slamb@cigar.com

The major cause for burn issues in a cigar is uneven or over humidification--at least in 80% off these cases. This can happen to any cigar during the aging process and can easily be remedied by dry-boxing the cigar for a few days prior to smoking. Basically during the aging process cigars can hold on to moisture like a sponge. This moisture can be unevenly distributed and one side of the cigar may end up being more humidified than the other; once the flames hit the cigars the burn temperatures can be altered and this will ultimately cause the burn issues to occur. I like to take a pre-emptive strike on these issues and keep my humidor at a cool 65% humidity--if at all possible--and this really seems to help a lot and helps to circumnavigate dry-boxing. The last thing that can possibly cause these issues is the general lighting of the cigar. If you aren't taking the time to properly and evenly char the foot of the cigar before lighting it, this will also have a big effect on the burn. Also simple things, such as how you draw on the cigar and how often and vigorously you are puffing on it will have an effect on the draw as well.

LiquidChaos66

I think im gonna have to re-evaluate my humidification system. I have the Dr. RH jars that are at 70% and hold it fairly well. But when it gets warm they tend to let off anywhere from 70%-74% and i am constantly opening my humi lid to let off excess humidity. I sold a few things this week and was gonna buy more vape juice... but looks like im gonna be dropping an order for some Heartfelt beads and a bead holdy thingy.

LiquidChaos66

Looking into the options.... it looks like im gonna go with 2 medium bead tubes by Heartfelt. Its about double the beads i need for my humi so it should be severely stable and not take up much space at all... just have to find a way to keep the tubes from rolling down from the top... maybe glue a stop on both end caps so they dont roll.