New To Hookah

[Bowley88]

I went for a trip to visit my cousin a couple weeks ago and her roomates introduced me to shisha and I really enjoyed it, so when I got home I ordered a hookah and some shisha for myself but I can't seem to get it right. Im smoking some Romman and Al Fakher brand tobacco but I'm getting more burning taste rather then the fruit flavor. Ive been watching some setup videos and reading some guides but I'm not making much progress.

I've been playing around with Foil, Double Foil, and the screen that came with my hookah and Im finding that when I check on the shisha after smoking a bit, the top layer is usually burned at stuck to the foil/screen. I'm thinking that perhaps im packing too much in(the people on the setup videos look like they are packing more then I am) or the coals suck. I've been using quicklight coals that came with it and Ive been letting them burn off the black layer first before attempting to smoke and still I seem to taste some flavor, but alot of burning, It doesnt seem as pleasant as I remember from my cousins.

I also bought a pack of Romman natural coals with my order but I havn't played around too much with them yet. Do you guys think that maybe the brand of coal is the source of this problem? Any suggestions would be very helpful, I really want to get this going properly

[jfaltous]

Chances are the setup videos that you're watching are for Tangiers, hence the overpacking. With AF and Romman you'll want to fluff it up and underpack it so its sitting a few millimeters away from the foil, however once you're good with setting up bowls this won't make a difference. Your problem comes most likely from a combination of lousy quicklight coals and bad heat management. What you need to pay attention to is the number of holes that you're putting into the foil (and their size), and more importantly how much coal you put on.

For starters, try splitting one of those quicklights in half and putting one 1/2 piece on either side of the bowl (at the edges). Rotate them around into the gaps every 15 minutes or so.

If all else fails, road trip up to Calgary and I'll help you out here

Oh, and if you can... post step-by-step pictures of your bowl packing. That will make it easier for forum users to help.