Humidor Help

Hey, I made the mistake of putting in a couple flavored Acid cigars into my Humidor. Needless to say it ruined the taste of the whole lot of em. I've got two big questions now...

1) Can my old Cigars be saved somehow? Air them out away from the Acid ciggies.

2) Should I dry out and re-season my humidor before putting some new Cigars in?

Thank you

[adamh_25_]

A. Maybe. Take out all flavours/acid and let them rest for a few weeks. Depending on how bad it is, one would think that they would eventually expell the flavour.
B. If you notice in a few days/week or so that the smell is still quite strong in there, id take everything out, put a small cup of baking soda in for a day or a few hours or something, then take it outside and leave it open to air out anything else that smells.
Jump in here BOTL's as I've never done this....just seems to me to make sense.
Adam

[RGD]

Originally Posted by adamh_25_

Jump in here BOTL's as I've never done this

Me either. The only "flavored" smokes I have ever done are the RP Java's - and I keep those away from the everything else also.

But - if it was me - I'd move everything to Tupperware or zip locks. Leave the humidor open until the smell dissipates. Unless oils were transferred then the odor should clear out soon, and even it oils did, it should eventually. Do not use any type of soap/cleaners – air circulation will have to do – but I would maybe just wipe with distilled water.

As for the smokes – again – just my opinion – they are going to be the same deal as the humidor. If oils transferred, then it may be, oh well. It seems to me though that the only thing that will help them will also ruin them – air circulation.

Maybe just have to smoke them as is and chalk it up to experience. Put a mark in the “don’t do that chit no more” column.

Good luck with it all –


Ron

[luckybandit]

Have a few flavored cigars and a few acids in the humidor for a while now and never had that problem. Is the humidity to high maybe?

[RGD]

Originally Posted by luckybandit

Have a few flavored cigars and a few acids in the humidor for a while now and never had that problem. Is the humidity to high maybe?

Hmmm - since it's widely reported that they will and do mix, I would think that your situation would be odd. Are your Flavored/Acids in tubes??? I held an Acid once - and the transfer of odor to my fingers lasted so long that I had to wash them to get rid of it.

I think you’re lucky at this point.

Ron

[NCRadioMan]

Originally Posted by RGD

Hmmm - since it's widely reported that they will and do mix, I would think that your situation would be odd. Are your Flavored/Acids in tubes??? I held an Acid once - and the transfer of odor to my fingers lasted so long that I had to wash them to get rid of it.
I think you’re lucky at this point.

Ron

Hessien, I would keep that humi for the flavored ones and pick up another for the others. And Acids perfume is so strong, I don't have hope for you non-flavored ones. But you never know?

NCRM

[Hammerhead]

I hate to be a 'wet blanket' here, but I think you're hosed. There have been frequent and dire warnings on this site, and others, about mixing flavored cigars with others for this exact reason.

Just smoke what you got, and chalk it up to experience. I tend to think that you're just better off keeping that one humidor and starting with a new, clean one. For one thing, however long it took for the other cigars to absorb the scent and flavor is likely at least as long as it'll take them to get rid of it - even if you can.

The principle I have in mind is that of dilution. If you take a glass filled with orange juice, pour half of it out, and dilute it with water, you'll still have 1/2 of that mixture as OJ. Do it again, and it's 1/4. Do it a third time and it's 1/8... and with the overpowering scent of Acids, I tend to think it'll never go away.

If you buy another humidor, I would NOT put the non-Acids that have absorbed that perfume into the new box. That will just transfer the odor to your new humi.

And, of course, don't ask me what I think of Acids in the first place.

OK, here's my experience: I had a fellow send me some pipe tobacco that had a strong odor. He also sent me a couple of cubans in the same package. The pipe tobacco was inside ziplock bags, which were in another ziplock bag, which was inside the bag with the cubans. Odor was still all over the cubans. I pulled the cubans out, tucked them into a couple of cedar coffin boxes I had, let them sit for 3 days. Still highly odorous. I then starting rotating the sticks into and out of tubos with cedar linings (I have several dozen of these). new tubos everyday for a week, left the used ones back open so the cedar would air out. After a couple of week, the odor was mostly gone, then I put the cubans into an older humi with some average N/Cs, and let them perculote together for a couple of weeks. The smell was eventually un-noticed, then the cubans went into my regular humi.

If these had been a couple of run-of-the mill non-cubans, I would have chunked them. If you have a bunch, you might try lots of cedar, rotated in and out of a humi. If the effected sticks are in cello, remove the cello before you start, so you won't be trying to de-scent them along with the cigars.

Good luck!

[Hammerhead]

I think Cliff just made my point. Look at what all he had to do to get his 'gars back to normal. 3 days in coffins plus at least two weeks in rotation into tubos with cedar which he just happened to have (not everyone has spares), then back into another 'backup' humidor for a few weeks. Sounds like at least a month's juggling back and forth. That's an awful lot of work.

And, if you consider that there wasn't even any direct contact between the 'gars and the tobacco in this case - both were in ziplock bags isolated from each other - it makes a very compelling point for not mixing your stuff.