Cold storage

[Bijan]

This seems to be a topic that comes up from time to time.

My coolers in my cold storage room have steadily gone down in temperature since this summer. From 18-19C to 8C. Humidity in the room has gone up from somewhere in the 40s to about 58%. Coolers with bovedas in them have held steady at around 63% humidity the whole time. Cigars still smoke fine. No mold so far. No issues with wrappers exploding or anything. If anything cigars are more moist now (which is what one would expect according to @PigFish) and have not dried out. Making me think I should have swapped my 65% bovedas for 62% for the winter. Temperature has not swung daily since this summer. In summer AC would kick on later in the day as I like the house cooler at night. Thermostat was 23C at night, 26C during the day. Now the thermostat is set to a steady 23C. Since AC has gone off and heating on temperature in coolers or cold storage room has never swung by 1C in a day. Maybe 0.5C a day drop at most. I now monitor the humidity and temperature constantly through remote sensors. I am smoking about 2 cigars directly from the coolers a day.

Anyways that is my experiment and results to date. I'm always sceptical of weird experiments with cigars. But am now conducting one of my own. I generally smoke outdoors and temperature has gone down from 25C during the summer to -8C tonight. Humidity generally between 55% and 100%. Maybe 70-80% typical. I'm planning on watching things and continuing down this path until next summer unless something changes (cigars freeze or humidity does something weird).

Edit: Basement (not cold storage room) is at 40% RH, 21C right now.

[TobaccoRoad]

I'm always interested to see how the cold temps and temperature changes affect the aging process. Maybe you could compare some identical  cigars from the same box that have been stored in the cold for the winter vs. stored in the 23C range. 

My storage is very similar to your 23C to 26C conditions but being hot-natured we keep the house a little cooler year round- 69F to 73 F (21C to 23C). Not ideal but with Tuppedores and 65 Bovedas it's where I am at right now. Looking at some Coolidor options as that is much better than a bunch of separate containers with a couple of boxes.

[dominattorney]

I hate to be this guy, but is such an experiment even likely to yield verifiable results, given the number of variables that appear to go into smoking enjoyment, even between different samples from the same box?

[Bijan]

11 minutes ago, dominattorney said:

I hate to be this guy, but is such an experiment even likely to yield verifiable results, given the number of variables that appear to go into smoking enjoyment, even between different samples from the same box?

My experiment or the experiment @TobaccoRoad suggested? If the latter I agree it would be more difficult. But if I stored some cigars from the same box in the cold and in the warm and waited until summer when both will be at a similar temperature and humidity I think I could compare them in let's say August or September.

[dominattorney]

5 minutes ago, Bijan said:

My experiment or the experiment @TobaccoRoad suggested? If the latter I agree it would be more difficult. But if I stored some cigars from the same box in the cold and in the warm and waited until summer when both will be at a similar temperature and humidity I think I could compare them in let's say August or September.

I'd think that might be interesting. You'd probably have to smoke at least 5 samples from each humidor to get a full comparison. 

[Bijan]

I think for best results I'd start next summer. Use an incoming box, put half in cold storage and half outside. At that point temperature should only be a few degrees off. Then wait an entire year, as the cooler cigar goes through one whole cycle, then smoke some to see.

[BrightonCorgi]

Here's my cellar reading and I can smoke right from boxes stored open in the cellar.   I normally vacuum seal them just in case.

 

[Bijan]

A small update. Cigars are still doing ok. Smoking about one a day straight from the coolidors and outside at around freezing, just over or under.

3 coolers now:

Cold Storage room is: 5.69C at 61% RH

Cooler 1: 6.71C at 65%

Cooler 2: 6.21C at 68%

Cooler 3: 5.98C at 60% (this sensor is new and it takes a while for humidity reading to reach steady state, it started at low 50s a few days ago and is slowly reaching steady state).

I have hygrometers in each humidor and they read between 62% and 64% (which makes sense given 65% bovedas). The wireless sensors are only accurate to within 4% RH, so I just use them to monitor for issues.

Edit: Temperature difference between coolers is probably due to how close they are to the door of the cold storage room.

[Shrimpchips]

Would have to think the accuracy of wireless thermometer/hygrometers to cover the spread of <1 C.  Even within the coolers I’m sure if one sensor is a little higher than another they might read slightly different.  
 

Probably academic, but I wonder if the fluctuation in temperature regardless of the range will result in a noticeably different aging process versus storage at constant temperature and RH.  

[Bijan]

11 minutes ago, Shrimpchips said:

Would have to think the accuracy of wireless thermometer/hygrometers to cover the spread of <1 C.  Even within the coolers I’m sure if one sensor is a little higher than another they might read slightly different.  

That makes sense, and is what I see with the temperature readings on my little LCD display hygrometers spread around the coolers and the room (1 degree C variation even within the same cooler, or right next to each other).

However I just checked and the wireless sensors are +- 0.25C so these difference might be meaningful. Also turns out they are +- 3% RH (from 0-80%RH).

17 minutes ago, Shrimpchips said:

Probably academic, but I wonder if the fluctuation in temperature regardless of the range will result in a noticeably different aging process versus storage at constant temperature and RH.  

Good question. The fluctuations are rather small in the short term. Probably no more than 0.5C a day. Maybe just over 1C a week. But a very large range between summer and winter (18-19C summer at the warmest, and 5-6C winter at the coldest). I have to assume that at very low temperature aging is possibly slower, maybe much slower.

The logic behind my thinking for letting this go this far is that cigars are frozen to prevent beetle outbreaks and it's assumed it won't have much effect on the cigars, to freeze them and then thaw them. In fact it's assumed Cuba does this, then people often do this again when they receive the cigars, and if they have a beetle scare, they do it another time after that. I'm basically doing that once a year but just short of actually freezing the cigars (going from about 65F in summer to 40F in winter and back).

I'm definitely planning on keeping some of these cigars many several years, so I'll be able to say if this process ruins them.

As to the comparison to normal storage, I'll see if I have the interest and motivation to split a box and store half the cigars outside the cold storage room as a control.

[Shrimpchips]

12 hours ago, Bijan said:

That makes sense, and is what I see with the temperature readings on my little LCD display hygrometers spread around the coolers and the room (1 degree C variation even within the same cooler, or right next to each other).

However I just checked and the wireless sensors are +- 0.25C so these difference might be meaningful. Also turns out they are +- 3% RH (from 0-80%RH).

Good question. The fluctuations are rather small in the short term. Probably no more than 0.5C a day. Maybe just over 1C a week. But a very large range between summer and winter (18-19C summer at the warmest, and 5-6C winter at the coldest). I have to assume that at very low temperature aging is possibly slower, maybe much slower.

The logic behind my thinking for letting this go this far is that cigars are frozen to prevent beetle outbreaks and it's assumed it won't have much effect on the cigars, to freeze them and then thaw them. In fact it's assumed Cuba does this, then people often do this again when they receive the cigars, and if they have a beetle scare, they do it another time after that. I'm basically doing that once a year but just short of actually freezing the cigars (going from about 65F in summer to 40F in winter and back).

I'm definitely planning on keeping some of these cigars many several years, so I'll be able to say if this process ruins them.

As to the comparison to normal storage, I'll see if I have the interest and motivation to split a box and store half the cigars outside the cold storage room as a control.

I’d have to think that unless you’re on the precipice of some critical environmental condition that affects tobacco leaf degradation (or aging, if you will), +/-1C isn’t going to be a meaningful difference.  

I was more thinking the magnitude of the seasonal changes will result in a faster/different aging profile. Even if you’re sitting for a third of the year at fairly low temps, the cigars are still subjected to periods where they’re warming and cooling and expanding and contracting fairly significantly several times a year.  Not a materials expert by any means but you’d have to think the periodic changes likely result in a different aging profile than constant conditions. 

[Bijan]

3 hours ago, Shrimpchips said:

Even if you’re sitting for a third of the year at fairly low temps, the cigars are still subjected to periods where they’re warming and cooling and expanding and contracting fairly significantly several times a year.

Again generally change is 1 degree Celsius a week at most. That's enough to get temperature from 18-19 down to 5-6. From August/September to January/February and back. It's mainly a one direction at a time process. Pretty straight down from end of summer to winter and back again. Even if outside temperature swings 10-15 degrees Celsius the cold storage room doesn't do that. I think I've seen it go maybe 2-3 degrees against the trend at most .

[traveller]

Started to see any differences @Bijan? I keep my cigars in the basement, not as wide of temp swing as your cold room but about 15 degree Fahrenheit swing from Winter to Summer

[Bijan]

On 2/1/2023 at 1:42 PM, traveller said:

Started to see any differences @Bijan? I keep my cigars in the basement, not as wide of temp swing as your cold room but about 15 degree Fahrenheit swing from Winter to Summer

Missed your message the first time around, since I don't often check the humidor subforum these days.

Haven't noticed much yet, but the oldest cigars I have in cold storage are from July 2020. I'll fire one up today and see how it goes.

[BossHogg]

@Bijan, just curious, do you dry box your cigars before smoking from them from the environmental settings that you have stated above?

[Bijan]

23 minutes ago, BossHogg said:

@Bijan, just curious, do you dry box your cigars before smoking from them from the environmental settings that you have stated above?

No, I generally get the best results going from storage to smoking directly.

But I do think that when there is a delay between when I take them out of storage and when I smoke them, I could get better results by letting the cigars sit in a dry box or another temporary humidor for a few days to acclimatize.

[BossHogg]

@Bijan Thanks for your response. I only ask because my buddy and I smoked a cigar today straight from my humi (which ranges from 59F-60F and 63RH-65) and both cigars bulged and split. The only thing I could think of was that it went from cold to the hot flame immediately and resulted in this. Maybe it was a fluke thing though 😄 

Glad to hear that you are having good results with yours 👍 

[Bijan]

@BossHogg I don't get too many bulges/splits, but when I do it tends to be with heavier/tighter cigars when the weather is hot and humid. Out of curiosity, what was the temp/humidity where you were smoking?

[BossHogg]

@Bijan These cigars were noticeable rolled tighter. The temp outside was 46F and humidity 74.

Here is a pic

[Bijan]

@BossHogg the starting temperature of the cigar doesn't make as much of a difference as the tightness/heaviness of the cigar and the ambient humidity.

The lit end of the cigar (not just the cherry) will heat up to a few hundred degrees.

I'm guessing that will dry out the middle of the cigar but the moisture can't teleport out, so you get some parts drying out, the outer parts getting more humid, etc. 

Like a log crackling on a fire more a factor of the humidity, wetness of the log and characteristics of the wood than the temperature.

Poor construction can cause a cigar to tunnel, and get soggy, or in this case bulge and split due to no room for things to expand. (Again my intuitive guess at the physics).

[Bijan]

On 2/1/2023 at 1:42 PM, traveller said:

Started to see any differences @Bijan? I keep my cigars in the basement, not as wide of temp swing as your cold room but about 15 degree Fahrenheit swing from Winter to Summer

Smoking a March 2017 RASCC stored since August 2020. Still potent and flavourful.

A bit heavy at 8+ grams. But used a punch cut and didn't use the perfecdraw. Smoking well, with even burn, no relights or touch ups yet (I'm now about halfway at 35 minutes in).

This humidor was 5.88C and 69%.

My other 3 humidors are:

6.03C, 67%

6.13C, 67%

4.84C, 68%

Ambient temperature -5C and somewhere between 75 and 90% RH.

[BossHogg]

@Bijan Thanks for your replies 👍

Also, looking at these two post, one from 2021 and the other most recent one, do you think cigars stored in colder environments benefit from higher humidity vs lower humidity, or the other way around? Have you found one to be wetter than the other?

On 1/22/2021 at 3:58 PM, Bijan said:

A small update. Cigars are still doing ok. Smoking about one a day straight from the coolidors and outside at around freezing, just over or under.

3 coolers now:

Cold Storage room is: 5.69C at 61% RH

Cooler 1: 6.71C at 65%

Cooler 2: 6.21C at 68%

Cooler 3: 5.98C at 60%

 

31 minutes ago, Bijan said:

My other 3 humidors are:

6.03C, 67%

6.13C, 67%

4.84C, 68%