"QuickStiQ" - an Affordable, Simpler Way to Dab Hash Oil / BHO & Other Cannabis Extracts - Product Review

The QuickStiQ Hash Oil Pipe

The QuickStiQ is a nifty glass pipe design that simplifies the 'dabbing' process. Any number of cannabis extracts can be vaporized using the QuickStiQ - BHO, shatter, wax and even traditional hash.

As a connoisseur of cannabis in its many guises, I am a fan of well prepared extracts and the increasingly intricate devices used to enjoy them. But doing 'dabs' of hash oil - with the requisite glassware, blowtorch, 'nail' and dab-stick, is so complicated it can detract from the relaxation of the hash experience.

'Dabs' are tiny amounts of highly concentrated cannabis extract which are vaporized (not burned). The active ingredients are turned into a vapor which is inhaled and enjoyed - all without burning anything. Nothing is burned - so nothing is smoked - which is why 'dabbing' can occur indoors, at dispensaries and such, while outright smoking is generally prohibited.

QuickStiQ - Available from Peoplez Champz, NW Cannabis Market

How It Works:
The QuickStiQ is heated with a butane cigar lighter (or small blow torch) for about 5 seconds until hot. The glowing hot end of the QuickStiQ is then dabbed into the heat-proof Oil Slick container holding the cannabis extract. This is done quickly and gently - and the resulting vapor/smoke is inhaled through the mouth-end of the QuickStiQ.

The double bubble s-trap design protects against melted extract migrating into the mouth of the unsuspecting consumer.

The Oil Slick container is made with medical grade silicone that will not stick to the ooey-gooey gunky texture of even the stickiest hash oil extracts.

Oil Slick Container

Our Experience:
Learning the correct timing and technique of heating the end of the QuickStiQ took a little practice - and getting the temperature correct is vital for a consistent experience with extracts. The end result of this was that the same extract could taste floral and inhale smoothly at one temperature and be generally disagreeable at other temperatures (see note below).

A few dabs of the BHO extracts we sampled with the QuickStiQ were sufficiently potent for even the most medicated members of our tasting group. Smoking high quality marijuana is like drinking beer or wine - but doing dabs is more like doing shots. With up to 3x the concentration of active ingredients, these hash oil extracts pack a punch.

The glassware and especially the required blowtorch style lighter was off-putting to some members of our tasting group who likened the whole experience to smoking crack cocaine. Others disagreed, and pointed to the decorative colored designs on the side of the QuickStiQ.

Heating the QuickStiQ with Mini Blow Torch

A Note on Dabbing & Vaporizing Temperature:
Regardless of whether you are using a vape pen, a traditional dab set-up with nail, a vaporizer like the Volcano (R) or a QuickStiQ - the temperature of whatever is vaporizing the cannabis extract is of vital importance. Temperature will impact not only flavor and smoking quality (ie - harshness) but will impact the subjective quality of the 'high' by changing the chemistry of some of the numerous cannabinoid compounds in the cannabis extract.

THC vaporization temperature: ~ 365 degrees F (185 C).
Tip: a plausible range to aim for with the QuickStiQ is ~350-390 F
THC combustion temperature: ~445 degrees F [Anything higher and you are just smoking a pipe]

Overview:
Overall, the QuickStiQ is an innovative way to enjoy the increasingly broad array of cannabis extracts with minimal investment, good portability and functionality. Hash Oil Rigs can cost hundreds and even thousands of dollars. This well designed product delivers an experience similar to far more complex (and expensive) systems.

The downside of the QuickStiQ is, well, the blowtorch. But as dabbing has gained popularity, an array of specialty style blow-torch lighters are widely available.

The QuickStiQ is available in a variety of colors from the Peoplez Champz booth at the Galaxy NW Cannabis Market. Note that NWCM is a medical marijuana access point that requires all visitors to be current Washington State Authorized Medical Marijuana patients.

(C) 2014 Stoner Living Blog
 

Vaping & Hash Oil Pens - Are Weed Smokers the Tobacco Chewers of the Future?

What will the North American cannabis market look like in 2050? Joints packed up like cigarettes? Here at Stoner Living, we doubt it. We love the completely natural aspect of marijuana, and the virtually non-existent processing. Some cannabis devotees will surely stick with tradition and demand minimally processed flowers for smoking, but that probably won't dominate the market.

XL Vape Cartridges - visible (left) and 'stealth' (right)

A standardization-friendly, non-smoked version of weed seems most likely to reign supreme by the time cannabis is sold like cigarettes. To control dosage and minimize the number of producers (the US has 3 major tobacco companies right now - and two are talking about merging), a highly standardized, expensive to start up system is what the mature marijuana industry will look like.


Future cannabis connoisseurs who are non-cigarette smokers will be likely to enjoy 'vaping' their cannabis, and will be a lot less likely to fall into the "nothing works like smoking my bong/pipe/blunt" group. I understand the sentiment of this group, as I fall into it myself. But product development is driven by the wants and needs of the young - few market research agents include participants over the age of 36 in their research unless they have a demographic specific reason to do so. It's one of Marketing's dirty little secrets.

XLVape w/ Visible Cartridge

As I discussed in an earlier article, vape pens "fix" a lot of the problems consumer's have with cannabis- - no smoke, no smell, no lingering odor. The trade off is that the vape pen experience is not exactly the same - and for many, it is not as satisfying.

It's no big secret: smoking is bad for you, is increasingly taboo and it is a dying part of our culture. But it is a legal part of our culture, and despite cigarette volume declines, cigarettes will never completely go away.

Joint 10 Pack from Urban Roots Collective

Smoking is the norm for marijuana these days. And many pot smokers also smoke cigarettes. But that doesn't mean it will always be that way. Think about tobacco: first it was smoked in pipes, then rolled in tobacco leaves and smoked, and it is chewed in a variety of cultures.

Tennessee Twist

Trends wax and wane but few (if any) habits truly go away. Nasal snuff is nasty stuff, but it is still manufactured and sold. And there is a stronghold of Tennessee twist tobacco users, mostly old holdouts from the tobacco growing regions down where Tennesee meets the North Carolina.Today's joint smoking pot farmers from Cascadia may be doomed to be tomorrow's Tennessee twist holdouts.

Here in the United States, smoking was originally promoted by public health campaigns due to the risk of typhoid and other spit borne diseases that were so deadly in the early 1900s. When cigarette filters were introduced in the 50s, one of the first was the Kent Micronite filter, made from Asbestos.

So let's proceed with caution as we march into the future of legal marijuana. It would be wise to learn some lessons from the tobacco industry. Better yet, the nascent world of legal marijuana  could develop a marketing model that would put consumer 'wellbeing' paramount to profit. 

(c) 2014 Stoner Living Blog

Hashish for the New Generation: Dabs, Hash Oil and Vaping

Hash oil (also called honey oil, BHO and dabs) has exploded on the North American scene. The past few years have seen a proliferation of marijuana products going far beyond traditional hashish. Long before kids were blowing up suburban garages with compressed butane and before ingesting cannabis had anything to do with a blow torch, excellent quality hash existed in a handful of special places. Let's explore some of this heritage and consider what it means for marijuana connoisseurs in 2014.

High quality American Kief

First of all - what is hash anyway, and what about hash oil?

Background
As a more compressed/concentrated form of marijuana, hash (hashish) became popular during global prohibition of cannabis because of its relative ease of transport. This is similar to the gain in popularity of distilled spirits over wine and beer during American alcohol prohibition.  In the USA, hash shows up sporadically and becomes the stuff of urban legend.

But hash has never been popular or widely available in the United States. Why has the European tradition of hash smoking failed to catch on in the US? Locals in Amsterdam smoke hash rolled with tobacco.

Maybe smoking 'bud' is an American thing. Perhaps it traces back to the influx of cheap Mexican weed in the 70s, followed by the flood of BC Bud, outdoor weed from the emerald triangle in California and finally recreational legalization in Colorado and Washington State. Maybe it had to do with the proximity to Jamacia and hypnotic Rastafarian grooves.  Or maybe it is because Americans can drive a car load of stinky marijuana from California to NY without interaction if they obey traffic laws, while drivers in Europe had lots of borders to cross.

Hash
Hash is purified marijuana, produced by isolating the psychoactive active-ingredient-rich trichomes (resin glands) from the plant material. Examining a marijuana flower closely will show small, glassy, clear to amber colored trichomes that look like little pins, with heads on stalks. These trichomes can be removed mechanically (as with charas or ice hash) or by using solvents like butane or CO2. The resulting isolated trichomes are pressed together to make hash.

Hand rubbed charas are a well known classic form of hash from Nepal and India, made from the resin collected from hands during the hand-processing of marijuana. Gardaa is an excent hashish produced in the northern parts of Afghanistan and Pakistan. Its format varies slightly by region, with some formats being powdery and others being a dark, pliable solid.

Hash Production
Domestically, screens in various formats can be used to separate the trichomes from plant material well enough to produce very pure hash. Fine powder (kief) is created by screening the cannabis over screens that are 127 - 135 lines/inch. The resin glands that fall off of marijuana flowers can be obtained at home from stash-boxes with screened bottoms. Quality product is made slowly with light pressure, taking care not to screen undesirable plant material into the kief. Instructions for preparing hash are available online.

'Ice hash' uses the same principle, with bags made out of silk-screen material, ice and water. Cold water extraction makes the trichomes fragile and more likely to fall off the plant material, filter through the various layers of silk screen bag until they are isolated and collected. One benefit of this method is that no harmful solvents are used. Supplies can be obtained for under $200 USD from Fresh Headies in BC.

Commercial tumblers using screens in drum formats are ideal for larger operations, with excellent examples of both tumblers and ice systems. Screens can be purchased at printing stores for under thirty dollars. The resulting powder can be further pressed into solid shapes using heat and pressure.

The resulting powdery screened product will vary in quality vastly, depending on raw material quality and processing factors like time and pressure. It is variously called pollen (polm), kief (kif),  skuff, scuff, (scuff is technically the material used to make the hash and the verb of obtaining it), The resulting product is available as-is at dispensaries and hash markets where marijuana is legal.

Cinex BHO (Butane Hash Oil)

Hash Oil
The concept behind hash oil is to separate the desired psychoactive compounds (ideally along with aroma and flavor compounds) while leaving the other material behind. The process is creating a marijuana 'essential oil' (not to be confused with the hemp oil which is extracted from seeds). The main psychoactive compounds in marijuana are not water soluble - but they are soluble in fats, alcohols and other solvents like butane and CO2 .   

'Dabs' refers to concentrate products (hash or honey oil) and the process of smoking such products in specialized vaporizers. Think of dabs as the next generation of hashish, a cannabis extract popular for centuries. This hash oil is a waxy version of hash made by refining a marijuana extract so only crystallized resins (and no structural plant materials) are left behind. Hash oil can be made from a wide range of solvents. High quality hash oil is sometimes called honey oil. Other textures of hash oil are know as shatter, wax, ear wax and diffent local terms.

Probably the most popular hash oil available today is BHO - Butane Hash Oil - made using solvents of varying purity (usually sold as lighter fluid, widely available at gas stations, etc). Some claim up to 1% of the butane used can remain in the hash oil (this seems unlikely to the author). This residual butane has health risks of its own.

Despite efforts to 'purge' the hash oil, the product may remain contaminated by non-volatile contaminants other than butane. Brands like Ronson state on their MSDS sheets that they contain 99% butane.  This means they contain 1% something else, which may be a simple mix of hydrocarbons that will blow off, or it could be something else that will remain and contaminate the hash oil. (Have you ever had a 'plasticy' taste?). Smoking systems that involve heating a metal or ceramic nail introduce the very real possibility of introducing metal toxins. Blow torches are inherently dangerous when used by the intoxicated.

One undesirable consequence of over-processing marijuana is the potential to strip out desirable aroma & flavor compounds. After all, a 100% THC extract wouldn't have the fruity and complex aromatic bouquet of a well cured cannabis flower.

O Pen Vape- An E-Cigarette for Weed!

Often, hash oil extracts are smoked in elaborate devices, some requiring the use of a blowtorch and a 'nail'.  The blowtorch isused to super-heat the metal or ceramic element on the 'nail', and then the hash oil extract is smeared on the heated 'nail' and the resulting vapor is inhaled through a mouth piece. Water cooling/filtration may or may not be involved.

CO2 extraction has great promise. This technique uses sophisticated extractors (not yet available for practical home usage) which use pressurized CO2 to extract the essential oil from the cannabis flowers. Work with processing regimens will continue to improve the product.

Highly pure honey oil has very little odor and can easily be enjoyed in devices that look like e-cigarettes and spare the lungs the harsh hit of burning smoke.  The O-Pen Vape unit looks like a conventional e-cigarette, and costs less that $40 including the charger. Refill cartridges are available for $30. Similar discreet and effective systems are likely to become a commercial format of choice, due to the relative ease of calibrating dosage and standardizing potency of the product.

Quality Tips for Savvy Smokers
If a smoker is going to be using the product as a 'topper' for marijuana smoked in a pipe or bong, ground hash or kief is recommended. Loose kief or pollen is best enjoyed mixed with another smoking base - ground cannabis flower or tobacco works well. This can be smoked through a pipe, water pipe or can be rolled in paper. Lighter gold/beige colors indicate higher quality than greenish powder (green indicates it has been screened long enough to include undesirable leaf material in addition to trichomes). Consumers looking for a natural product should consider domestic kief or hash made by cold water extraction if looking for an ideal cannabis topper.

Hash oil in one of its many guises is ideal for those who vaporize their cannabis. Its suitability for use in e-cigarette type devices has great commercial potential. Home vaporizing systems will be discussed in a later article. Hash oil varies in quality and potency, and few offer the results of analytical testing due to the expense of testing. Remember, blow torches are inherently dangerous when operated by the intoxicated.

Concerns about purity and lingering solvents make CO2 extracted products preferred over Butane extracted products (BHO), until purity can be guaranteed otherwise. 

Reported by H. Hjorth for Stoner Living

-------- (c) 2013 Stoner Living