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You can burn a candle and ‘wax away the night’. You can ‘wax philosophical’ if you’re feeling particularly poetic. The moon wax-and-wanes with every month that goes by. Want to know what else is waxed? Cannabis. Wax, shatter, hash oil… you’ve probably run into one or many of these kinds of cannabis concentrates.
Wax packs a potent punch that is definitely not for beginners. If you’re an experienced stoner then you’ve likely smoked or vaped some wax of your own. Heck, you probably asked Santa for your dab rig last year, so you’re covered on the equipment side of things too.
What about if you’re not well versed in this world of weed wax? A good starting point to understanding the finer points of dabbing concentrates is to make your own. Homemade wax rigs aren’t too difficult to set up, but learning how to do dabs properly – i.e. without hitting your brain so hard that you’re jettisoned into deep space – takes a lot of practice.
What is the best way to smoke wax? How do you smoke sugar wax? Is it possible to learn how to dab without a rig? Let’s melt our brains and put a wax seal on the latest & greatest techniques for dabbing wax without rigs.
DAB WITHOUT A RIG: The Bowl Method
The first and one of the best ways to smoke wax dabs without a rig is to use your bong, bubbler or pipe. Any smoking implement with a decent sized bowl will do, in fact, so this method is one of the most convenient because you can incorporate the smoking accessories you already own. Using any non-stick metal utensil, collect some wax and smooth it over the juiciest nug in the baggie. Alternatively, you can grind up your cannabis flower first and then spread the wax over top instead.
The important step in this process is to put your wax dab in the middle of the flower (i.e. covered if possible). If you’re smoking a whole bud without grinding then try to wrap the wax around the middle of the nug. This ensures even heat distribution and that the wax combusts consistently and over a decent time period (not at all once, not just at the end).
This is hands-down the easiest way to dab without a rig and one of the most popular homemade wax rigs employed by many stoners.
HOW TO DO DABS: A Joint Is All You Need
What’s next to user-friendliness to a bong, pipe or bubbler? Roll a joint, yo! Smoking blunts is the timeless staple for smoking weed that will never go out of style, and learning how to smoke sugar wax inside a joint is no exception. Many stoners roll their rollies in oils, kief, honey or other sticky substances so why not a bit of high-potency sugar wax for your next blunt-blast-off?
To roll your own expert wax-blunts you don’t need to change anything from your usual joint-rolling system. Lay out your papers, sprinkle your choice of buds in an even line. The only difference is before you roll it up, pour/scrape a line of wax into the middle of the cannabis flowers along the entire length of the joint. Just like with the bowl method, try to cover the wax with buds so that there’s no direct flame-wax contact in order to maintain its integrity.
HOMEMADE WAX RIGS: Vape It Up
If you’re not quite ready to learn how to do dabs, maybe a vape or two is enough of a step-up from your average joints/bongs for you? Some vape cartridges can be opened and re-filled. These atomizer-access types of vaporizer cartridges are key to making your own homemade wax vape rig. Never break open or jimmy-rig a cartridge that is meant to be single-use only! The heating coils can lose integrity and potentially cause harm to you or your vaporizer device.
If your vaporizer allows refills simply use a non-stick metal utensil to place some wax onto the heating coil. Reseal the cartridge and heat up your vape, allowing it to heat up a bit longer than you would for vaping raw cannabis buds. A slow drag on your mouthpiece usually helps to slowly raise the temperature and get the most out of your sugar wax.
THE BEST WAY TO SMOKE WAX: Glass/Stone
Ever heard of a healthstone or volcanic glass rig? This is a very traditional way to do dabs before dabbing was even a twinkle in a stoner’s eye. In the old days, the best way to smoke wax was to place it on a glass or stone bowl with a funnel or mouthpiece hovering over it. Then, keeping the catchment funnel or mouthpiece close to the bowl, a long match or heat source would be used to heat up the wax. As the wax melts/burns, the smoke travels up into the mouthpiece and you can inhale the goodness.
An important step in this traditional process is to keep moving the heat source around the wax, back-and-forth. This prevents the flame burning off too much wax in one spot and evenly combusts the resin so that you’re inhaling a consistent amount of those good cannabinoids. This method isn’t the most efficient as the smoke can run rampant in a drafty room, or between inhales-and-coughs you might be wasting a lot of the good stuff. Nevertheless, as far as homemade dab rigs go, this might be one of the most ancient.
HOMEMADE DAB RIG: Bong, James Bong
A not-so-secret agent in the homemade wax rig world is also our teams’ personal favorites: the bong method. Who needs a dab rig when you’ve already got some colorful, curvy, trippy, artful glass sculptures we like to smoke out of? Not to mention, bongs utilize water vapor for a clean, straight-to-the-head inhale.
That being said, some bongs are a little too much “art” and not enough “function”. Any bong over a couple feet might be too long of a delivery tube for the potent wax smoke to fully reach your mouthpiece. This is one of the reasons why homemade dab rigs utilize very short chambers/tubes – to minimize the distance the smoke has to travel to get to your lungs.
Once you’ve situated yourself with a good-sized bong, pack your bowl like with the bowl method. Instead of a typical lighter or match heat source, any kind of heat-press like a dab nail is ideal to be able to target your combustion. Make sure the nail you choose can fit in your bong’s bowl. If this is too much sophistication for your tastes, you can stick to lighters just know you might be losing some of that potent wax smoke without a targeted heat source.
HOW TO SMOKE SUGAR WAX: Knives! Get Your Hot Knives!
This homemade wax rig isn’t the best way to smoke wax, we’ll admit it. Heating up knives on an element or with a blow dryer? That’s sketchy. Nevertheless, a lot of stoners on extreme budgets have adopted this practice without many incidents, you just have to have some really good oven mitts and some dependable silverware.
When all you’ve got on hand is an oven, some utensils and a tin full of some world-class wax, then the hot knife method is the way to go. Quite simply, heat up a knife with the sharp end making direct contact with the heat source until it begins to glow. Then – weaning oven mitts! – grab the knife handle, put a dollop of wax on the end and hold it under your nose/mouth, inhaling the curls of smoke.
Obviously this is not the ideal way how to do dabs, but if you’re traveling or at someone else’s house and you don’t have access to your personal repertoire of cannabis accessories, a hot knife can still do the trick.
DABBING WITHOUT A DAB RIG: Dabedibles?!
Dabibles? That sounded too religious, so we came up with “dabedibles” for a new term to describe these wax-infused edible creations. You can bake/cook your own edibles with wax in them, or simply add some sugar wax like a candy-cane or cookie-crumble garnish.
This doesn’t technically fit into the category of “how do you smoke sugar wax?”, because you’re not smoking anything. Still, it’s another way to dab without a rig – the only ‘rig’ in this case would be your stomach as it digests and melts the wax into your system. To get the most out of this method, stick to edibles recipes that call for concentrates to make sure the temperatures are high enough to unlock the terpenes & cannabinoids in your wax.
HOW DO YOU DAB?
We’re not going to touch the aluminum foil or lighter techniques for smoking wax because, frankly, they can dangerous to your health. Despite what some stoners that have smoked everything short of moon dust, it’s not a good idea to inhale the residuals, particulates and fumes from certain materials. Aluminum foil and chemicals from solvents can be very damaging to your respiratory system. For these reasons we’ll leave these two out of our homemade dab wax rig equation.
Did you learn something from this guide to dabbing without a rig? Are you puzzled at why we’d even suggest NOT dabbing? If so, tell us! We love hearing from our amazing community of customers here at Haute Health. Check out our social media channels or send us an email with your dab secrets or another unique way to smoke wax without a rig.
