Help diagnose my problems

Another newbie here with a couple of problems for you experts to diagnose.

Quickly, i got into smoking cigars last year during the summer by my sisters boyfriend. I'm from the northeastern part of PA, and it's very cold here now! I figured i'd start working on my collection for the upcoming summer or just for a nice day here and there. He hooked me up with a few Rockys, punches, CAO's, Indian tabac, Ghurkas and others of the same quality and i really enjoyed it. This year i bought my own 150 cigar humidor and some 65 beads. I have a digital hydrometer also. I put it in for a salt test and it read 75 like it should.

My humidor has been going for probably two weeks and when it became stable at 65, i put in some monticristos that i ordered. They are the Africos or something of that sort. I put a 5er of them in there and let them sit for about 5 days at 65 RH.

Today i tried one and when i cut it, it split the wrapper where i cut it and it started to unroll a little. I manged to get it going but when i lit it, the tobacco inside started to swell and crack the wrapper open at the end where i lit it. It basically runied the whole cigar and it was really a terrible smoke until it got about half way where it sort of leveled out in taste. Ok so a few questions

1. Why did the wrapper split so easily? Were the cigars not in the humidor long enough at the 65 RH or did it have to do with me taking it outside to smoke where it's cold, or for some other reason?

2. Why did the tobacco inside start to swell up and split the wrapper when i started to smoke it?

3. Why did the cigar taste like total junk until about half way through it? Was this a result of possibly the RH being off inside the cigar for not being inthe humidor long enough or some other reason?


All in all it was a pretty bad experience. I couldn't even get a good solid draw off of it because the wrapper split at the top.

Do you guys usually leave your cigars in the humidor for a certain length of time after you recieve them in the mail before you smoke them? And should i take them out of the plastic wrappers that they came in?

I appreciate all your help as i have found some great info on this site concerning setting up my humidor and my cigar purchases i have made. Currently i have about 15 cigars in the humidor with a 15 sampler on the way. Thanks.

Dan

Hey, welcome to the board. One thing you can do is post a introduction in the Cigar section of the board, telling a bit about yourself. The people are much more likely to help you with your problems.... But I'll give it a shot anyways.


1-Bad Luck or over humidified and no

2-Bad Luck or over humidified

3-Bad Luck or it was a junk cigar


Hope that helps a little bit:smiley1:

Over humidified ---- Afriques taste pretty unique you might have just hated it. I only liek the small gauges of it. Check your hygrometer, I doubt its accurate.

In my experience, cigars that do this are unevenly humidified. Many B&M cigar stores use an unregulated mist vaporizor to humidify their walk in's, making for very wet cigars. One guy's was at 85%! You buy the gar's and put them in your properly humidified humidor. Slowly, the cigars lose the extra moisture from the outside in. If you light up before it's stabilized, the moist interior expands excessively and splits the less humidified wrapper. Not to mention ruining the burn and flavor. Wet cigars tend to have a slightly sour flavor, a tight draw, and thin smoke. The cigar will also feel abnormally hot.


You also could simply have gotten a bad cigar. It happens.