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The Coolerador

Long-Term Storage - The Coolerador

So, you have a number of nearly full, nice wood humidors. They make the requisite "whoosh" in the lid drop test. They pass the "dollar bill" and flashlight tests. Yes, your wood humidors are quality boxes, yet you continue to purchase cigars. Maybe you would like to set some boxes of your favorites away and discover how a few years of age will improve them. Maybe you discovered the CigarBid website. In any case, just as the old computer adage, "disk usage will grow to fill all available disk space", so will your aquisition of cigars. It is a universal truth of cigar smokers - you will outgrow your storage. You could keep buying quality, wooden, desktop humidors and scatter them about the horizontal surfaces of your home. You could spring for a few grand and order an Arlin Liss masterpiece humidor. Or you could spring for less than a hundred bucks and set up a coolerador. Or two. Or three. Or ...

What is a coolerador? It is literally a humidor made from a cooler. The kind of cooler in which you keep beer and soft drinks cold. In my case it was a 54 quart Coleman purchased for about $25 from a CostCo. With a few more accoutrements I put together a functional and reliable humidor in which to store more than a dozen boxes of cigars.


The Virgin Cooler

When choosing your cooler, do not use a used cooler. Fish, salami, spilled beer, and spoiled potato salad are all quite odoriforous. Spring for a virgin cooler. Don't go smaller than about 35 quarts and don't go much over 80 quarts. Less than 35 quarts and you are missing the entire point of the coolerador. I have seen coolers well over 100 quarts - a megador! However, remember, you will move your coolerador around. You are not assembling a herniador. A rectangular cooler works best for the simple fact that cigar boxes are also rectangular.

You may notice a plastic smell from a new cooler. You have a choice of trying to deal with it or ignoring it. There is much to be said for ignoring it like the "new car scent". However, there are many schemes devised and purported to remove the smell of new plastic, such as expose the inside to a few days of sunlight, or rub it down with baking soda or lemon juice. I did neither, settling for just leaving it open for a few days in a warm place. I ignored the residual scent.

In order to turn your new, virgin cooler into a coolerador you will need a way to reliably monitor the relative humidity and you will need a way to keep the relative humidity within an acceptable range.

The Coleman cooler above is 54 quarts. The internal dimensions are 12"x12"x26", with a slight slope. The coolerador is currently and comfortably holding a dozen boxes of cigars and two cabinets.


Digital Hygrometers

A digital hygrometer will allow you to monitor the percent relative humidity (%RH). Forget analog units. Any analog units within the price range of mere mortals will be pieces of junk. Digital units are cheap and relatively accurate. Such hygrometers are readily available. I purchased mine from Tampa Humidor, for about $15. RadioShack also has a number of different digital units. Buy a few of them and put them in all your humidors. There are wireless units available that allows up to three remote sensors to report back to a base unit. You could wirelessly monitor the %RH in three humidors. The thought warms this geek's heart. The HygroSet is my current favorite. After receiving the hygrometer you will need to "calibrate" it. This is not strictly a calibration as the units are not adjustable, but it is a check of its accuracy from which you will determine how far off the unit reads.

The top unit is from Tampa Humidor and the lower unit is from Radio Shack. Note with the correction factors (NA = No Adjustment) they agree within 1% as to the %RH. The temperature differs, but they were fresh out of the humidors and had not yet equilibriated to the conditions. Both units will also display in degrees C. The Radio Shack unit is 1.5" x 3.25".


Hygrometer Calibration

Salt Slurry

Fill a small plastic bottle cap half full with table salt. Just do it. Don't ask why. Then dampen the salt with a few drops of water until the salt becomes a thick slurry. Use room temperature salt and room temperature water. Then add more salt until you can clearly see some of the salt is damp, while some remains dry. Place a business card upright in a small zip lock sandwich bag to form a little tent. Just do it. Don't ask why. Then place the bottle cap with salt slurry and the hygrometer in the sandwich bag and seal. Leave undisturbed at room temperature for 6-8 hours after which make note of the reading on the hygrometer.


Calibration Baggie

The salt slurry in the sandwich bag will regulate the internal relative humidity to 75%. The difference between 75% and the noted hygrometer reading is your correction factor and it should be written on the hygrometer. I cut a small piece of the sticky part of a post-it and write something like, "Add 3" or "Sub 2", to indicate how to correct the displayed reading. Check your hygrometers yearly at the same time you change the batteries in your smoke detectors. Also, the next time you are on the Valley Isle of Maui check out Lahaina Galleries.


Humidifier

Florists Foam Humidifier

Next your coolerador will require a method by which to regulate the internal relative humidity to an acceptable range. Humidifiers can be easily constructed from disposable plasticware and green florist's foam and a 50/50 solution of propylene glycol. A small quantity of propylene glycol can be ordered from your friendly neighborhood pharmacy. Pick up a few packs of SudaFed while you are there and use the name and address of your local state representative on the pseudoephedrine tracking form. I have made a number of foam humidifiers and they work well to regulate internal relative humidity to around 70%. However, in recent years I have completely converted to using humidification beads.


Humidification Beads

These beads are available from a number of sources and are available with "set points" of 60-75% relative humidity. I have gotten my beads from Heartfelt Industries, and I prefer the 65% variation. Your opinion may differ, so follow your heart. I find my cigars smoke better at 65% relative humidity rather than the oft quoted sweet-spot of 70%. The beads and website provide instructions on how to calculate the amount of beads you will require. To simplify matters you will need 4 grams of beads for every quart of cooler capacity. Therefore the 54 quart cooler will require about 200 grams of beads which is about 7 ounces.

In choosing the container for your beads, the more surface area the better, so go for small, shallow disposable plasticware. I have split my beads for my 54 quart coolerador into two 100 gram portions. The beads form a 1/2" thick layer on the bottom of the plastic ware. The center of the lid of the plastic ware can be cut out, a piece of nylon stocking cut to cover the plastic ware, and the cut out lid forced down over the stocking remnant. This will keep the beads in when you tip it over.

The beads ship dry and must be sprinkled or spritzed with a bit of water. The white beads become clear when moistened. Spritzing works particularly well. Use ONLY distilled water, and spritz and stir until about half the beads are clear. As a guide, 200 grams of dry beads only need 11 milliliters (2.2 teaspoons) of water. If your beads get too wet they can be dried in a warm oven. Warm the oven to 200F, tranfer the wet beads to a ceramic bowl. TURN OFF THE OVEN (don't ask), and put in the beads.

We now have all of our accoutrements in order, the cooler, the "calibrated" hygrometer, and the humidification device(s). Start stacking full cigar boxes in the cooler. Set one portion of the beads low in the cooler and one high in the cooler, then set the hygrometer somewhere in the middle. Some people will suggest placing sheets of spanish cedar in the coolerador to help moderate the relative humidity. My suggestion is to just put in more cigars.


Packed Coolerador

Open the coolerador daily for a while to see how things are going. Shortly you will be greeted by the heavenly aroma of perfectly humidified cigars. If your cigars were initially particularly wet or dry it will take some time to stabilize around your chosen percent relative humidity.

Remember, the point of any humidor is to protect your cigars from the ambient conditions outside the humidor. That includes keeping your pets out of your stash. Cats seem to be the biggest problem. Please see 100 Uses for a Dead Cat. In some climes the air outside the humidor will be wetter than that inside, and in some climes the air outside will be drier than that inside. You should know your conditions, so use your hygrometer to measure the humidity outside your coolerador. You may be able to use the ambient conditions to your benefit, by leaving the coolerador open for a few hours at a time to either raise or lower the humidity in the coolerador.

If the outside air is wetter than that inside the coolerador you may find you need to dry your beads occasionally. If the outside air is drier than that inside the coolerador you may need to keep your beads a bit wetter.

All coolers come with a drain to allow melted ice water and stale beer to drip out. This drain can be used to your advantage if you so desire. Opening the drain will allow a very little bit of air exchange between inside and outside. One may also drill a 1/4"-3/8" hole, high, through the opposite side of the cooler. It can be plugged with an earplug or tape when not in use. Having a low, open drain plug and a high, open hole in the opposite side will allow a bit of cross ventilation through the coolerador. You may find this useful depending on your conditions.

For long term aging, every few months you should rotate your boxes from the bottom of the coolerador to the top, and check the condition of the cigars. Humidors of any sort can develop wet spots which could lead to mold. Some people have installed computer fans in their cooleradors that run intermitently to stir up the air inside. I'm a geek, but I've also got a life.

Loose cigars can be stored in plasticware. Some folks have used kitchen stackables to create lift-out shelving in their cooleradors. Once you assemble your coolerador and start filling it up, you will have your own customizing ideas.

There are lots of tips/myths for long term storage I will not cover here. There still rages the "cellophane on or cellophane off" debate (off). There still rages the "prop open the boxes or not" debate (use tiny black bull clips). There still rages the "remove the spacer and one cigar from the box to let them round up" debate (yes). There still rages the "jewelery or flowers for the spouse" debate to soften the credit card charges for your cigars (alternatively both, or go spouseless).

Cigar aging itself is not a myth, and many cigars improve with age, particularly fuller body cigars and younger cigars. Rumor has it Consuegras require at least a year of age to attain their full potential. In my opinion no amount of aging will improve a Consuegra. I do know for a fact, a few months of age greatly improves a Genuine Pre-Embargo Counterfeit Cuban, and after a couple of years they are greatly improved and quite good.

Given for $75 you can assemble yourself a large, quality coolerador there is nothing holding you back from buying more cigars. So go forth, heat up those credit cards, and in 10 years you will be enjoying long-aged, quality smokes.