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We have a personal request from rainmax in Slovenia, who has asked us to play for his sweetheart,
Use the Mold to Roll Some Cigars.
Seriously, the toro-size cigar mold shown below was hand crafted by rainmax. The design is excellent. For a torcedor who does not work in a factory, a two-cigar mold seems a perfect size.
The threaded wood posts and nuts spin down easily, then firmly tighten with a quarter twist. The heft of the threaded parts appears sturdy, and feels solid in use.
I find the slots at the head (which accommodate a twisted end from the bunch) to be the trickiest aspect of inserting a bunch. Since the slots are outside of the "compressed" cigar volume, they could be chamfered without affecting the mold's function. [I use that twisted leaf at the head to assist in removing the pressed bunch from the mold.]
The construction of the mold has remained perfectly flat and true, despite radical swings in ambient humidity.
Keep in mind that, of the gazillion cigars that I've rolled (average ~5 per day), only a tiny fraction have been made using a mold, glue, and any capping of the head. I usually roll and smoke immediately, which requires no glue, and no industrial cap. I occasionally use a reinforcing cap at the head, when the wrapper leaf is imperfect there.
So, the cigars shown were made using rainmax's mold, ooey gooey cigar glue (from WLT), and for two of them, a tripple cap. As you can see, I'm not very good at that. The bound bunches were placed in the mold, but the finished, wrapped cigar were not.
The wrappers are both from WLT (Thanks, Don): Corojo and Ecuador CT Shade. All utilize a double binder of Sumatra (also from WLT). I should note that a double binder stiffens the length of the cigar, making its removal from a mold much easier.
So, a special thanks to rainmax for the wonderful mold, and for providing me with a motivation to roll some cigars for my brother in St. Louis.
Bob
