Cigarettes the cheaper way

reply to post by glen200376


There is a reason why you do not have the "smokers cough" usually associated with cigarette smoking.Loose tobacco sold for rolling your own does not have the same poisons and carcinogens added to it to get you hooked.Though the tobacco may come from the same people who make cigarettes,it is not prepared the same way.Cigarette manufactureres do not want you to roll your own.They want you to buy their overpriced poison nad get hooked on it.
No,I have no real proof of any of this.I base my assumptions on 35 years as a pack a day smoker.I am proud to say,however that I have been tobacco free for 41 months,as of last week.
While rolling your own from loose leaf tobacco is not as deadly as manufactured cigs.,it is by no means healthy.I will not preach to you about the dangers of tobacco use(ok,maybe a little,lol) because its a free country.You can smoke if you want to.Personally,I feel that cigarette smokers have been unjustly crucified in this country,but that discussion belongs in a whole other forum.Have a nice day.

you are better off rolling your own by hand, those stupid machines are just a waste of money. That bugler and top tobacco is crap also. Just go to your local tobacco shop and ask them what they got as far as roll your own goes.

My parents have been rolling their own for about three years now in that time they've had I think like 5 crank style machines

the first two were this kind: they worked ok but are kind of noisy and more expensive than the others below

the second two were this kind: not as hard to crank as the first kind but broke quite easily

and right now we've got this kind although it's red. This is in my opinion much better than the others feels more ergonomic when using and has a much smoother cranking motion output with this machine is much faster and consistent


So far we haven't considered buying the electric models as they seem much to expensive for a relatively small increase in output.

For a while the local tobacco shops had electric machines available for rolling cigarettes on premises. A few stores had even began leasing large vending machine sized rolling machines that could roll an entire carton in like 5 or 6 minutes. The gov't said that was a no go and any packs made in this manner would be required to be taxed at the same rate as prepackaged cigarettes.

Here in Norway (Scandinavia) 1.7 Oz of tobacco cost 28 US$, a pack of cigarettes - 18 US$, and a bottle of Jack Daniels - 70 US$. One litre of gasoline cost 2.73 US$....

And don't get me started on food-prices....

The one thing I noticed about the tobacco I bought was it was very dry and almost no taste. I'm thinking I'll try some pipe tobacco and try that...

Its nice to see so many people going the DIY route

I've rolled my own (by hand) since I started smoking... erm 30ish years now - Wow, how time flies when you're enjoying yourself!

Never once had a cough and I can still rock climb better than people half my age purely cos there's not so much s**t in them. I roll what we used to call 'prison rollies' basically they're very thin, I guess about 20% of a normal smoke with no filter. Sure, you spit a bit of errant tobacco now and again, but its all good.

Recently I had to but a pack of Marlboro as I couldn't get any baccy and boy did I feel it the next day - I could hardly talk and my house smelt really bad, if anything it was a good reminder for me to stay away from these factory produced, low quality, expensive pieces of crap.

Last year i bought a huge bag of natural tobacco from a local village, the guy suggested that i may want to add a bit of flavour to it so I added some nice Scotch Whisky... Result: I'm looking forward to re-stocking soon

Originally posted by HomerinNC
The one thing I noticed about the tobacco I bought was it was very dry and almost no taste. I'm thinking I'll try some pipe tobacco and try that...

Sometimes tobacco dries out really quickly. I usually put a bit of orange peel in the bag and after a day it'll be nice and moist.

Yea I started rolling my own after crisis management (congress)
Passed the Fire Safe Cigarette bill.

I wondered for about 3 months why all my new packs of american spirits tasted stale, with the flavor
Of burnt asses. Then, the whopping coughs came, the stuttering of my eye, then massive tooth aches so painful
I could not even walk. Soon after my wife (smokes same brand) claimed not to feel half of her face after smoking.

My father then told me that FSCs were "killing people faster". I didnt think much about it, but yep.

The minute I switched over to RYO all the problems STARTED TO SUBSIDE. My tooth pain was caused by enlarged sinus cavity; this I confirmed on FSC Boards after checking with a doctor. Only took about 5 days to go away.

Another good thing is that if you buy Organic tobacco you miss out on all the 6000 chemicals that come from pre-packaged cigs in the store. Sure, smoking is bad....but not as bad as sucking down nicotine plus thousands of additives in the process.

Originally posted by JibbyJedi

Originally posted by freedom12
reply to post by HomerinNC

 

Here's what I use.

$1 per pack here in NH. The 16oz bag ($14.99) makes 2 1/2 cartons, the 2 - 1 carton tubes ($2.49 each)... That equals less than $1 per pack.

After about 3-6 months, Carpal Tunnel syndrome kicks in your wrist.

Solution - switch hands every 6 months.

edit on 5-2-2013 by JibbyJedi because: (no reason given)

I've been doing MYO for 4-years now with a Top-O-Matic. I was beginning to have some issues with my wrists.....but 1.5 years ago the heavy duty spring on the Top-O-Matic wore out. It was a blessing in disguise.

Note: I'd belonged to a number of RYO/MYO forums starting out, and the "experts" back then had advised about removing the spring (the one on the right, underside of the unit) for smoother, easier injecting. It is truly NOT necessary, and only makes it more difficult to inject! Also, I would never use any type of oil. Just a good quality synthetic brush and regular cleaning keeps my machine in top working order.

As an aside, a good B-complex vitamin works wonders for carpal tunnel syndrome....coming from someone who used to do data entry 8 - 12 hours a day!

I thought it was against the terms of service to discuss drugs for medicinal/addictive/self-medicated use.

Not sure how much you're paying in the US, but I smoke the cheaper brand of cigarettes in the UK and they are £6.45 per pack of 20. Which at the current rates means if you were paying UK prices, a pack of 20 cigarettes would cost you just over 10 dollars. What do you think of that?

I've rolled my own for will over a year now. I don't smoke that much and I was always more of a cigar smoker. So rolling my own was an easy move. Since I'm a cigar smoker I never had a need for filters, and having the right tools to keep the tobacco fresh, well I already had them.

I don't use the tube I just use rolling paper and some pipe tobacco. Which has worked out very well for me, as long as I keep it's humidity at the right level. When I have to roll on I like using my pocket roller it's easy to use once you get used to it and know how to pack the tobacco.

On of the other thing I like about rolling my own, is that if I pack one right I can make it last for well over 15 minutes of some heavy puffing. I've had a buddy burn five cig's while I'll still just puffing along on my one. We both wanted to see the difference in the burn times. But we both didn't expect that big a difference.

Go for the pipe tobacco. I've been doing this for a few years now. I got it down to less than 2 cents a cig. I roll my own by hand though and don't use the tubes. I stick with the natural blend over the aromatics. They tend to be harsh after a while.

I can buy a pound of pipe tobacco for $18 and 10 packs of 100 leaf papers for around $1.10 a pack.
This will last two people (my wife and I who are both semi heavy smokers) a month, so for one person that would be almost 2 months for under $30. An apple core or orange peel will keep your tobacco moist and give it a tiny little bit extra flavor.

If you can handle the switch, this is definitely the way to go.

Another funny thing I've found from rolling my own and using pipe tobacco, is that I get far few dirty looks when smoking in public then someone smoking a regular cig.

reply to post by Abstruse


Tobacco isn't illegal just yet.

I've been doing it like OP for about 4 years. A pack of smokes costs about 5 euros here. I smoke about 12 packs a month, that's 60 euros. But doing it the cheap way costs me about 25 euros a month. Big difference, especially since tobacco is becoming more and more expensive.

Not to belabor the obvious, but why not drop the cig thing altogether and buy you a few nice briars?

I never smoked cigs, Dad and most of my uncles smoked pipes or cigars or dipped/chewed, so when my next older bro Dan started smoking a pipe (in high school - we were a bit offbeat) I did too.

It doesn't rot your lungs out, although I suppose it's rough on your kidneys and mouth. Since you don't inhale, your lungs aren't dripping with tar and crap, so your wind isn't affected. Yet, especially with the right baccy, you'll get all the nicotine the law allows, and it doesn't stink nearly as bad as cig tobacco.

You use less tobacco too, and if you just want a few hits, you can just stick it in your pocketses and it goes out automatically.

reply to post by glen200376


That cigarette roller he has is the absolute worst. I know because it was the first one i bought. Half the time it crushes the smoke when you try to retrieve it. Spend $40 get a good one and you can make about 10 cigarettes a minute.

reply to post by HomerinNC


Smoke shops in my town have machines that do the work for you. It's free, you just have to load the machine with filters and tobacco and wait for the machine to do all the work.

reply to post by HomerinNC


My parents use pipe tobacco and they seem to like it and my dad' has always been pretty picky with cigarettes and they were Marlboro Red smokers before they started rolling their own. It is also generally cheaper than loose tobacco specifically for cigarettes as it is taxed differently. You want to make sure its still a long cut variety, the short square cut kind (I don't know but something like Burley and Black) would be too moist and can get stuck in the roller.

I used to smoke Kretek (Djarum Black) and sometimes when I get a toothache I'll roll a couple with their machine (beats orajel by a mile) I just grind up some cloves in a spice grinder and mix it up with the same tobacco they use and as far as tobacco quality I can't tell a difference. In fact the only thing I notice is the different filter as Djarum has a flavored filter. But at 8 bucks for a pack of 15 the homemade does the trick. Although they aren't that great black color.