When Are You Done Vaporizing?

A question we get asked all the time is how to tell when you are done vaporizing. The vapourization process extracts the most oils from your botanicals of any method, but of course, like all good things it has to come to an end. We’re going to talk about how to tell when you’re done, read on to learn more!

Reusing Botanical – Two Sessions For the Price of One

The most important thing to know is that if you don’t finish vaporizing your botanical, you can leave it in the vapourizer and come back to it. The best part about vapourization is that unlike smoking, it doesn’t continue to vapourize the oils when the vapourizer is sitting there, turned off. Even when the unit is on high temperatures, the oils only get fully extracted when there is airflow – especially with convection devices. With conduction it’s like leaving something on the pan – it’s still going to cook a little bit, but not a ton.

Lower Temperature = More flavour = Smoother Vapour

Most vapourizers have a number of different temperature settings so you can enjoy your vapour at the temperature you prefer. The recommended settings for vaporizing is anywhere between 190 – 235 degrees Celsius.

If you like vapourizing at a lower temperature, you will get very smooth and aromatic vapour but a lower percentage of extracted oils.

If you continue to vapourize at a lower temperature the vapour will fade out slowly, at which point you can bump the temperature up and continue vapourizing.

If you continue vapourizing at a low temperature the vapour will fade out slowly. At this point you can increase temperature to make sure you extract more vapour.

Higher Temperature = More Extraction of Oils

When you increase that temperature, the vapour will be thicker, stronger, and that taste will fade. We recommend not going over 235 degrees Celsius or 455 Fahrenheit.

At that temperature you will have extracted up to 85% of the essential oils.

So to me, the easiest way to tell if you’re done vapourizing is if you hit the max temperature on your vapourizer (or 235C) and you’re not getting any more visible vapour. If you can’t see or feel any vapour, there isn’t any left to come out.

Visual Signals and ABV

Once you know you’re done, you have what is called ABV (already been vaped) or AVB (already vaped bud) and there’s a ton of cool stuff you can do with it, like cook, smoke….I guess that’s really it, but those are some awesome options!

You can see the differences at different temperatures as well, when we look at the ABV at 190, 200, and 210C. We’ll use the Utillian 722 here.

But there is a difference between ABV from conduction and convection vapourizers. I’m going to use the Zeus Arc and the Storz & Bickel Mighty to demonstrate the differences.

With any conduction device, the ABV will be darker in colour as it comes in direct contact with the heating element.

The convection based Mighty will give you lighter ABV as it heats by hot air passing over your botanical.

The even-ness of ABV is an indicator of a proper cook and efficient vapourizer. With a lot of conduction vapourizers, you will have to stir your bowl to truly ensure that you’re heating the bowl evenly and making sure you get every last essential oil out of your botanical. Without a stir, the Pax 3 does not evenly cook your botanical. The Arc is better, but still requires a stir from time to time to keep everything even.

With a convection device, the cooking is generally more even because that hot air can get in between the botanical and cook the whole thing more evenly.

When do you need to refill a Vapourizer ?

So once you’ve pumped up the temperature to the maximum (or 235) your botanicals will be a dark golden brown colour. Over time you will develop an instinctive feel for when you’re done based on the flavour and quality of the vapour.

Make sure there is no green in your bowl and you’ll know you’re done. Of course, some people will prefer to not go all the way to the max darkness – ie flavour chasers.

If there is, give your bowl a quick stir and turn that sucker on again!

If you like to read more about the three different ways of vapourizing and temperature settings for vapourizing visit the link: best temperature settings for vaping.

Vapour Shocking, Vapour Stepping and Vapour Tasting are the top three methods to vapourize and over time you find an appreciation for each of them.

Thank you for reading today’s blog and feel free to leave your comments or questions below!