Big Vs. Small Bowls

[peaceman27]

I recently purchased a really small bowl that I planned on using when I only wanted a half session. It was made for a slightly smaller hookah, so I had to carve the inside out a bit. To my surprise it worked really well. My comparison:

Small Bowl
Standard Egyptian
Holds 10g
Needs one coal to start, and one more half way through
Lasts about 1h 15m on average

Big Bowl
Shallow Egyptian
Holds 30g
Needs two coals to start, and one more half way through
Lasts about 1h 30m on average


They both produced the same nice think clouds when I was smoking both Al Fakher, Nakhla, and a friends Starrbuzz. Therefore, I have to wonder why I would ever again plan on using a bigger bowl, It's not worth triple the tobacco for 15 extra minutes.

[Hassouni]

I use bigger bowls when I'm smoking with other people - the flavor runs out of a small bowl too quickly if its constantly being pulled at

[kmccoy90]

My MYA bowls holds about 15 grams, and I can get two sets of coals (two ch or ccn halves) at about 45 minutes per set.

The Egyptian that came with my Temsaah holds about 30 grams, and I can get three sets of coals (three halves) out of it, and the sessions last a little longer with the third half on there.

It's not really more wasteful for me. The Egyptian bowl looks better on the Temsaah, the MYA looks better on the MYA. And the Egyptian smokes brands like Nakhla better because it's shallow.

All bowls are different and its all about figuring out the nuances of each one.

[rj_skillz]

[quote name='Hassouni' timestamp='1298216524' post='498543']
I use bigger bowls when I'm smoking with other people - the flavor runs out of a small bowl too quickly if its constantly being pulled at
[/quote]

I agree with Has here. I usually tend to use bigger bowls when there's a group of us smoking one bowl.

I usually use smaller bowls while smoking at home by myself.

[TheyCallMeDave]

I use my phunnel a large majority of the time. This semester has been very kind to me. I either have few classes and far in between giving me hours of smoking time for a full phunnel, or if I have a class, I'll just being my hookah (in a bag lol) to lecutre, and start smoking a saved bowl from earlier right after.

[kcK]

I used to enjoy larger bowls, but I've found the Crown Micro is a fucking beast. I could pack 10g in it, and it'll burn for 2 hours. After the first coal goes out, stir up the bottom, and light another coal. I had 4 people smoking out of the Mya QT, with the Crown Micro with Romman's Sweet Start... And it lasted for at least 2 hours. Shit was impressive. Never once did a lack of flavor occur either, it stayed consistant the whole time. On the other hand, the larger bowls I find tend to lose some ... Uumpfh after 2 hours. Maybe it's the shisha, maybe it's the diffuser.. But, that shit works wonders.

Small bowls, ftw. SHISHA SAVING == THE BUSINESS.

[kvtaco17]

Use my small phunnel probably half of the time now... With my crown jewel bowl and a large egyptian splitting the rest of the duty...

[peaceman27]

Yeah, I've been using my big bowl for larger groups. Still, extended flavor doesn't seem to be worth 3x the tobacco usage. I could load another bowl when the flavor is dying out of the small bowl and still only use 20g over 30g.

[magick777]

I wonder whether we have a fair comparison here. It surprises me that the OP gets only 1h 30m smoke time from an Egyptian bowl holding 30g and I can see why he would regard this as wasteful; my 7cm Egyptian holds ~15-20g and smokes for a good two hours or more. Small bowls certainly do have their place, I've just written a rave review of a tobacco-saving bowl that smokes well on just one teaspoonful of shisha. It's a great tool to have and I'll break it out for short duration smokes, rare shisha and anything that seems to suit it. Plus the saving is extreme enough (5g vs. 15-20g) to count.

But, the right bowls for me will hold something like 3-4 teaspoons of shisha, and will last 3-4 times as long as a bowl holding just 5g, while producing a somewhat better flavour and smoke quality as well. For example, last week I tested a Saphire Power Bowl (similar to a Super Chief) with 4 teaspoons (~20g) of Nak DA and a 2-3mm air gap below foil and got 2h 55min of very decent smoke time. Best session of Nak I've had in a while. Admittedly, that could have been 4 fills of the Hot Shot bowl @ 45 minutes apiece, with 4 sets of coals. It wasn't. I don't regret it. 'Nuff said.

In summary, a bigger bowl is a bigger risk - and before I start sounding more expert than I actually am, the week before last I loaded up a stupidly large party bowl with ~100g of AF, scorched it beyond repair in 15 minutes, repack was disgusting. I turned the air blue, threw the lot, and had a 3-hour session on 15g of Tangiers in a funnel instead; I'm still debating whether the offending bowl deserves a lousy review for allowing me to fuck up! So there is such a thing as too large, or too large for hasty people, at least. (no criticism implied, but it certainly applies to me...)

In other words, while I can't be sure that the problem rests with you as the user, neither am I convinced that the right answer is to blame the bowl. You should be able to get two hours plus from a medium Egyptian bowl (~7cm) holding 15-20g of Nak under optimal conditions, more with a flavour-retaining bowl. Of course, that is still not an argument for a bigger bowl if you don't want to smoke for a couple of hours, but I respectfully submit that your results may have more to do with heat management than with the size or capacity of your bowls.

[peaceman27]

this is a very good point magic.... i'll try to take pics of both the bowls and my coal placement tomorrow to help clarify.

[kcK]

I look forward to seeing those pictures. I remember Magick being pissed about the 100g bowl, and then him taking that bowl of tangiers for 3 hours. Very impressive, and I've seen his set-up a few times. Magick knows a thing or two, and despite the long-winded post... He makes very good points, of which I probably would have raised myself.. If I hadn't been smoking hookah for less than a month. :-p

[peaceman27]

this is how i set up my coals on both my largest and smallest bowls. in addition i add one extra coal on each when the first set starts to die out. i did notice that i tend to pack the little bowl a little tighter too, which is another variable... but still, that just means that i'd waste even more tobacco on the big bowl if i packed it as tight. anyways, here are some pics of my biggest and smallest bowl that i mentioned....

[URL=http://img254.imageshack.us/i/img3898x.jpg/][IMG]http://img254.imageshack.us/img254/5341/img3898x.th.jpg[/IMG][/URL]


[URL=http://img824.imageshack.us/i/img3897r.jpg/][IMG]http://img824.imageshack.us/img824/5682/img3897r.th.jpg[/IMG][/URL]

[magick777]

There's nothing wrong with that coal placement (on the large bowl), but, you're heating a good 50% of the tobacco from the outset, and all of your heat is going direct into the tobacco. Meaning you'll soon move those coals to avoid scorching, and will likely cook the top of your bowl within the hour. Try breaking those coals into halves and putting four pieces around the *very* edge of your bowl, i.e. put as much coal into heating the bowl as the foil. Or leave them whole and just move them even further out. Consider adapting hole pattern if needed, I favour more holes round outside and fewer in the middle. Expect your session to be slower to start, and slower to smoke well, but also slower to dry out and slower to scorch.

I will add, with the caveat that the majority advice on this forum is pack right up to the foil, that I am (reliably and reproducibly) obtaining subjectively better results by leaving a [b]slight[/b] (2-3mm) air gap below the foil. Again, this means you take a bit longer to get going (and may even use more coal), but the trade-off seems to be better flavour and longevity. The truth may be that I'm not as proactive about heat management as some, but, the general principle seems to be "what goes up slowly comes down slowly". That big Egyptian bowl of yours [b]should[/b] take a good five minutes to heat through properly, it's a nice big lump of clay and the thermal stability will be excellent. If you're getting full-on clouds in very much less time than that, you're likely heating the shisha too much for a long session, unless you can reliably moderate the heat at the right time. Edited February 21, 2011 by magick777

[peaceman27]

And I usually push my coals further out after the first couple of minutes on my big bowl. The question still remains though: is it economical to use a smaller bowl? I weighed the amount of shisha i put in each bowl today with a scale. 8g in the small one, 31g in the big one. Even if I could double the length of my big bowl, it's still using double the tobacco for the amount of smoking time (and with a slow start up).

[magick777]

The answer to the question "is it [b]economical[/b] to use a smaller bowl?" is yes, by definition. How important that economy is and whether it is an important factor in your session is a different question and one that we cannot answer for you. If you prefer the small bowl, then it's a no-brainer which bowl you prefer. :-) My reason for liking large bowls is not economy, or not of the financial kind anyway. Economy of my time and effort when I know I want a 3 hour session, maybe. Economy of effort in heat management, perhaps. Flexibility to relight a bowl for 3 short sessions over the course of an evening - yes please, if it's a flavour I like. If it isn't, how much do I care about wasting half a quid's worth when I decide it's not worth more coals?


I speak from the United Kingdom, where £10 / $16 per 250g is considered a good price for Nakhla; so loading up a 3-hour, 25g bowl costs me about a pound. Is it worth breaking that into 5 bowls at 20p a shot? Not unless I have availability problems - but that 5g bowl will be out in force when I start experimenting with Tangiers, my supplies of which are limited and occasional in nature. That, for me, is the primary use case for a tobacco saving bowl. But to give a real world example, the flavour of the month with me at the moment is Nak Mandarin, which I bought cause my local retailer didn't have any of my go-to flavours. Very nice but quite subtle, and good for long sessions. Currently local and cheap. The correct response: to eke out 40-50 tobacco saving bowls, or to enjoy a couple of good sessions and then go buy another pack while it's in stock?

No promises this works for you, but, if that 31g is a full load, try loading your large bowl with just 25g, pack it well and leave a small air gap if that's what results. Minimal air holes, I'd typically stab it 8 times evenly spaced with a 4-pronged fork, and at any given time, 4 of those 8 sets of holes will have a small bit of coal on them. This should get you an improved smoke duration (though I doubt very much that you'll triple what you might achieve on the small bowl). You may like the effect on smoke quality and flavour or you may not, but you don't lose much by trying.

[GoldenFingerBl4ster99]

whats a good bowl to start with a a 30" khalil mamoon.

[Cp44]

The regular big bowls i use will last me easily 4 hours whereas some local lounges use the smaller ones will last me 1.5-2 hours.

[Yasseah]

[quote name='kcK' timestamp='1298231945' post='498573']
I used to enjoy larger bowls, but I've found the Crown Micro is a fucking beast. I could pack 10g in it, and it'll burn for 2 hours. After the first coal goes out, stir up the bottom, and light another coal. I had 4 people smoking out of the Mya QT, with the Crown Micro with Romman's Sweet Start... And it lasted for at least 2 hours. Shit was impressive. Never once did a lack of flavor occur either, it stayed consistant the whole time. On the other hand, the larger bowls I find tend to lose some ... Uumpfh after 2 hours. Maybe it's the shisha, maybe it's the diffuser.. But, that shit works wonders.

Small bowls, ftw. SHISHA SAVING == THE BUSINESS.
[/quote]

I'm having the same experience with my micro. I'm smoking for the same amount of time I was with the tang phunnel, getting just as good quality sessions(with multiple people), and simply using a fraction of the shisha.

Nice to see another diffuser user here too. Huge improvement.

[kmccoy90]

The diffuser shouldn't affect the flavor at all.