Lighting Your Herb With A Soldering Iron- An Introduction, Tutorial, and Review

Hello, GC.

I'm going to be covering a topic which to many probably seems quite new and possibly even very silly. I'll be talking about smoking your bowls using a soldering iron as a lighting element. I'm going to start with an introduction and review of my soldering iron unit, then I will do a tutorial on the use of a soldering iron in lighting a bowl, and finally a review of the use of a soldering iron versus using a butane lighter. There will be both pictures and video.

First off, I'm going to introduce you all to my soldering iron unit. The brand name is, "XYTronic" and the model is AUTO-TEMP 379. This unit is different than the stock XYTronic unit, however. I bought this from a Glass Art Gallery in Denver called Heady Glass. He bought 10 of these unit and had them customized to include a few extras:

1. The metal plate on the temperature control unit can be used as a small break-up tray, or to hold some hash oil.
2. The unit that holds the soldering iron was modified to hold a piece of brillo pad. This is to wipe off any ash from the ceramic tip without having to wait for it to cool down.
3. A sleeve of metal around the base of the ceramic heating element to reinforce the tip ad keep it from bending.

Here are the pictures of the soldering unit I use.
















Now, I will move on to the Tutorial part of this post.

I'm going to go through the use of a soldering iron from beginning to end.

1. When you buy your soldering iron, there is one key thing to make sure of. Make sure that your soldering iron is a soldering iron that has a ceramic heating element. If it is anything but ceramic, you're wasting you time. It will take far too long to heat up, and it will not taste the same. Feel free to give it a try anyways, but take it from me, it's not worth it.

As far as readily available soldering iron units, I reccomend the Hakko Dash 60watt soldering iron. Google it to find out prices and availability. There are a couple screws you must take off the Hakko unit to expose the ceramic heating element, but from what I understand this is easy to do, and intuitive. The Hakko is widely regarded as the best ceramic-heated soldering iron for the money and is the soldering iron used by most cannabis conneseurs.

2. Now that you have your soldering iron, turn it on. On my unit, this involves a switch, on a Hakko, I believe you just plug it in. My unit takes less than 10 seconds to reach maximum temperature (red hot), which I set using the knob on the base unit. I do not know if Hakkos are temperature adjustable.

3. Pick up your soldering iron and touch it flat to the top of the bowl of herb where the tip is red hot. Start to inhale through your chosen smoking device as you do this.

4. Continue inhaling roll the tip of the soldering iron unit back and forth across the bowl, allowing oxygen to aid in combustion of the herb.

5. When the bowl is lit or you have as much smoke as you'd like, remove the soldering iron from the bowl, and set it down somewhere safe. My unit, for safety, has a holder for the hot (or unused) soldering iron unit so it cannot roll to the ground or aything. This makes it VERY convienient and one of the reasons I bought this particular soldering unit.

6. Clear whatever the smoking piece you're using is.

Here are the pictures for the tutorial, and a video I included of me actually using the soldering unit to take a hit.











I will move on now to MY review of the use of a soldering iron to light a bowl.

Pros:
1. It's just as easy to use as a lighter, as it heats in less than 10 seconds.
2. There is no butane to alter the taste of the herb you are smoking. So the smoke tastes much better.
3. The lack of butane also means inhaling fewer carcenogens (cancer causing agents) while smoking.
4. The lack of open flame causes the smoke to be at a lower temperature when it reaches your throat and lungs. This makes the hit MUCH smoother and I can take MUCH bigger rips off of my bongs.
5. You lose less THC than with an open flame, as an open flame burns higher than the temperature necessary to vaporize the THC. Thus, you get higher.
6. Since it burns at a lower temperature, it burns the buds slower, thus allowing more hits off of one bowl.

Cons:
1. Is is slightly more inconvienient to use than a lighter. There is a cord attached, so it is slightly more complicated. This is really not an issue if you pay attention to what you're doing.
2. Use wit ha room full of people can be difficult. Again, the cord can be limiting, but since I don't smoke with more than a person or two at a time, it's not a big deal.
3. A hot soldering iron is ALWAYS a possible fire or burn hazard. Please use caution when smoking with a soldering iron unit. YOU ARE USING AND EXTREMELY HOT TOOL WHILE INTOXICATED, PAY ATTENTION.

So, in summation, I give the use of a soldering iron a 9.5/10.0. It has completely revolutionized my somking at home. I have not smoked a single bowl without it at my house since I bought it. Even my roommates love it, regardless of the slight inconvience. I reccomend everyone go out a purchase a soldering iron with a ceramic heating element today and start saving your lungs, reduce the amount of weed you smoke, and optimise the THC intake from the weed you do smoke.

 

Good call.

Absolutely.

Glad it helped.

Yup. Anytime.

Yeah, it's a lower temp than an open flame, so yes, it's perfectly safe. And I should know, I LOVE glass.

Get one, for sure. You'll never regret it.

Thanks dude. Glad it helped.