Resources on AceFour's Notebook

Resealing open circular tins

Tue, 10 Mar 2026 00:00:00 +0000

Sometimes I don’t want to jar up every tin I open. This works with circular tins and sometime square tins but probably not for the new tins used by SG and GH.

How to reseal an opened tin? Get a vacuum jar that is big enough to hold the tin. This jar I can do five tins at a time and found it on eBay. Simply put the tins in the jar

How thin can you go?

Thu, 29 May 2025 00:00:00 +0000

So I wanted to see if I took the time to calibrate the cutter, how thin you could you go cutting up a plug. Started with an all Virginia plug that I believe is all red and brights.

The cutter is a cheap Amazon meat slicer that does better than an antique cutter. The reason is there is a measuring guard that you push the plug up against. Slowly make the cut and perfect. The trick was setting the space between the guard on the back of the blade. There are two screws that determine the thickness of the cut. I used the guard itself as the size of the thickness. I took the guard off and put it between the screw and the blade and bring the nut snug. Do that with both screws and then add the guard and knob screws.

Wrapping Old Boy in Leather

Mon, 25 Nov 2024 00:00:00 +0000

If you are going to buy and IM Corona Old Boy, don’t buy a painted one. I got a nice blue Old Boy and then one day tossed it in my pocket with the keys. The paint chips and it started to look ragged.

My buddy Jamie at Stem & Briar recommended me to Sick Saddles. I finally jumped on this recommendation and wow, does Sick Saddles do nice work! He gave a wide selection of choices for the leather. Highly recommend

The best, cheapest plug cutter

Tue, 21 Nov 2023 00:00:00 +0000

Now I have an antique plug cutter made of cast iron and a new blade made by Bingham Knifeworks. It cuts like butter.

It is fairly expensive and it takes time to cut the plugs and you tend to have inconsistent thicknesses of the flakes as a result.

Enter the cheapest meat slicer on Amazon!

What is nice is you get two blades. You can adjust the thickness of the cut. What you need to do is extend the holding tray right up the the blade. I used two box tops from cigar boxes.

Tobacco Pressing Resources

Wed, 06 Sep 2023 00:00:00 +0000

Blending/Processing Whole Leaf

Press:

Noodle Press (Cheap and simple, good for 50g pucks)
PVC and Hockey Pucks (Cheap and little effort, good for 100g pucks)
Shop Press (Saves time pressing 1 minute vs 10 days with a C-Clamp)
2’ Stainless Steel Tube T43311 (Expensive but you can do 4 - 5 200g whole leaf plugs at a time)
3/4" Richlite high temperature cutting board (custom order and cut to size for stainless steel tube)

Whole Leaf Vendors and Casing supplies

Ways to pressing pipe tobacco

Tue, 26 Jul 2022 00:00:00 +0000

There are several ways to pressing pipe tobacco and as elaborate as your budget will allow. Why press? It melds the flavors better of the tobacco no matter if you are doing raw leaf or using an existing blend. Many folks like make tobacco cakes and plugs.

Blend pressed without prior drying

Moisture content will affect how the plug compacts. One experiment was pressed right our of the bag and another press where the tobacco was microwaved for 20 seconds and tossed it like a salad to get the excess moisture out. The straight out of the bag pressed for 3 weeks quickly expanded like a crumble cake after 3 weeks. Not a lot of color change. The microwaved tobacco came out as a black plug as dense as Salty Dogs. The dense plug was cut into flakes and was a sweet mellow smoke that went for an hour and 45 minutes with no relighting.

Pipe Tobacco Blending Resources

Fri, 22 Jul 2022 00:00:00 +0000

Casing/Recipes

Press

Noodle Press
PVC and Hockey Pucks
Shop Press
2′ Stainless Steel Tube T43311
3/4″ Richlite high temperature cutting board

Whole Leaf Vendors and Casing Supplies

Whole Leaf Tobacco
Leaf Only
Flavor Extracts and Cacao Nibs (use “like a spoonful per 16oz of casing”)

Cutting

How thin can you go? (Inexpensive method for producing uniform thin flakes)
Bingham Knifeworks (custom blade design for vintage plug cutters)