Plain Old Me

I have seen a few of them before, including online (dunno a bout the color changing, but I have seen lots of all glass hookahs). I have also seen them in a few local shops. They are a bit expensive IMO and are usually meant for NHT. I would post links but the online stores have NHT stuff so I am not supposed to post em.

QUOTE (teq @ Apr 8 2008, 08:35 PM) QUOTE (VDDZ @ Apr 8 2008, 08:06 PM) I put a larger clay pot over the heating element to help trap the heat and I used a common light switch to regulate the heat; still, it didn't work. A light switch won't vary the temperature. Use a pentiometer. If you're getting too much heat, reduce the amount of resistance(uncoil your wire some). If you aren't getting enough heat, do the opposite. What is a pentiometer? A potentiometer is no use if you are plugging into a wall socket, but for apparatuses with less than say 50 watts you can get a regular pot. You can also find rheostats for $20 on eBay, which would probabally work better if you are working with 120V/15A wall sockets.

Potion Double Apple Setup: Friend's double Super Hookah, standard hoses, charcoal and foil that was included, modern bowl, water in base Cut: Nothing to add, very nice cut. Smell: Anise smelling, with other spice smells present. Smoke Volume: Good volume- not the best but fairly good. Buzz: I had not been smoking much in the last few weeks due to being sick but even so I did not feel much of a buzz. My friend had a headache though after like 10 hits. Duration: Dunno, went for 1.5 hours on and off and could have gone for longer if I put more coals on. Taste: From someone who generally does not like apple tobbaco, this was a pretty good flavor. In fact, this has to be my favorite apple yet. Anise taste is there, but its not overpowering and it tastes like some sort of cooked apple. Overall: 8.5/10. Good stuff, definately want to try out some more flavors.

Anyone know how to make a ceramic housing for an element? Seems like that would be ideal, but rather hard to implement... I am going to do some calculations and work out a triac circuit soon to control the temp of the heating elements. Will let you know what I come up with.

1800 watts would be the total peak that my device could get to. I would expect to have the lower coil almost of if not off completely, and the top 2 adjusted to be about 400-500 watts a piece, though to be honest cost reduction is not my main goal, as I would like to actually improve my smoking a bit. Not having to deal with coals would be nice, plus they give off some carbon monoxide which is not so great for ya... Also, a direct contact heater that would go on top of the foil or w/e (dunno if foil is a good conductor) would need much less power, and again to reiterate I am trying to use a convection heater rather than a direct radiation or contact heater.

I have already done all the calculations and such and have tested using different gauges of nichrome wire and ribbon- I use less than 600 watts per coil (x3 coils). It should not be getting hot enough to melt, as nichrome has a melting point of 1400 degrees and I should not be getting over 1200 degrees with the highest gauge stuff. As for efficiency, I am thinking that if I use a thin enough layer of clay or whatever it should be plenty hot. I wouldn't use plates sandwiched because that would not allow for much airflow, but perhaps a perforated plate may work. I did another test with a straight wire of nichrome and it did not melt off until I really jerked around the crimps, and I think that a structure to support the nichrome would probably be the safest and best solution. As for the sandwiching material, I was thinking clay. I dunno if steel would be suitable, is its resistance more than nichrome?

QUOTE (teq @ Mar 27 2008, 12:21 AM) The wire melted before even reaching the shisha. It did not exactly melt in the sense that it was liquid metal, but it got sufficiently hot that the force of gravity was plenty to make the wire kinda fall off the crimps. I think this could easily be delt with if I surrounded the wire with something like clay though, but even so I am worried about the temperature. Because I would rather have 3 separate coils controlled by separate dials, I may go with pots+triacs to regulate voltage rather than pay for expensive rheostats (which run about $20 for one that can handle all 120V at 15A).

QUOTE (Cerritus @ Mar 26 2008, 03:10 PM) What about the heater element from a toaster? They stay around 350-400F and you can reshape the thin walls they're wound on already. I've been debating making one. I'm buying a spare toaster to mutilate this weekend The problem is not really with the heating element, or even how you mount it. The real issues I have been having are with making the system adjustible in temperature. With a low voltage system, a simple pot can easily adjust the temperature, but working with 120 V its impossible to use a common pot to adjust the temperature, and the light dimmers I have tried to use don't do much but turn the element on and off. I have been wondering about using a universal potentiometer (which can be found fairly cheaply on ebay) but I have no clue if they could handle the 1600 watts I would be putting through em. Short of that, I have been thinking about possibly getting some sort of rheostat (which is really just a high-rated pot).

Just got something in the mail today. Goin to open it up tomorrow and see what I got.

Bass, computer programming, building random things (usually electrical things), skiing, swimming, audio engineering, growing things (herbs, spices, anything that will grow in my small apartment).

Stargate Fingers Ease of Lighting: Easy to light, at least for a natural coal. However, the sticks are very soft and crumbly (at least in comparison to the Diamentes that I usually use) and you can easily waste charcoals when you are breaking the stick up. Smell: Smelled nasty in the bag and while lighting, but after it got going it was not too bad. Taste: Had a noticable effect on taste. Not overpowering or anything, but not good. It left a bit of an aftertaste. Ash: Wierd ashing pattern. Kinda had big pieces of ash, not fine at all. The coals did not easily break after they got going though (my usual Diamentes usually get a tad weaker as they heat up and sometimes split). Longetivity: This was the most impressive characteristic. Coals kept going up to 2 hours. Heat: Heat was OK, although the heat produced throughout the session was very inconsistant, with tons of heat in the middle (I only had one piece on during the middle of the session) and a lot less heat at the beginning and end (I had 3 pieces). Overall: 6/10. I got these because I needed more coals and they were all that was in stock and were cheap ($6 for a bag). However, I am going to stick with Diamentes for my main smoke because these have an aftertaste that I find annoying and the heat managment is a bit annoying. I was expecting more based on the reviews of this stuff; maybe I got a bad batch or something...

So this last weekend I finally got to retest my heating elements. When I got the rig plugged in and such, I turned up the dimmer, but to my dismay I could only really get it 100% on or 100% off, even when I turned the dial very slowly. Also, when I got the heating element going it refused itself into a different shape after about 5 seconds. What I mean is that the wire kinda melted and then fused with other sections of the wire, creating a semi straight wire out of the coil I had going. I think I may need to use potentiometers instead of light dimmers...

I would advise anyone to be extra careful when doing anything here. I just tried out my nichrome stuff again (see my alternative to coal thread) and it again melted, and using light dimmers the only control I was able to achieve really was just about totally off and melting temp. I think pots may be the better way to go in order to control the temp, but be sure that you get some damn high rated pots if you are using a 120v/15w plug. The direct radiation and contact method this guy seems to be using would definitely need less heat than the convection method I am attempting, and with my experiences of melting nichrome I could easily see running a coil off of batteries, though perhaps a 9v battery might be more able to keep the heat goin.

I have had really good experiences mixing Starbuzz cherry and Tonic cosmo.

Al Amir Nakhla Starbuzz Hookah Hookah Tonic Kamal Al Fakher Sultan Fumari Pharoah Romann