Whether you smoke or vape, any dedicated dry herb enthusiast will tell you cool herb grinders are an essential tool for smoking and vaping dry herbs and tobacco. While you can break down and crush your dry herbs with your hands or scissors, it is a messy process and has the potential of lowering the potency of your herbs. Cool herb grinders are not only a cleaner method, but they are also more efficient at creating the fresh, well-ground herb pile you require for your vaping or smoking session.
How to Choose a Cool Herb Grinder?
While personal preferences are part of choosing the best cool herb grinder for your specific needs, there are a few considerations you will need to chew over before making your selection. The most important factors you need to decide on are the number of compartments (or chambers) and the grinder material.
Grinder Types
Like many other smoking, vaping, and dabbing supplies, cool herb grinders can be manufactured from a variety of materials. While there are plenty of good and bad points to each material, it often comes down to personal preference, design, and style. The most common materials used for making cool herb grinders include (but are not limited to) electric, metal, plastic, and wood.
Electric Herb Grinders
Electric herb grinders are compact and battery-powered. Although the exact amount it can grind can vary depending upon the density and power of the device, typically electric grinders can grind up to three grams of herb at one time.
Metal Herb Grinders
Metal grinders are made from either aluminum, titanium, stainless steel, or a combination of the metals (ex. aluminum with titanium coating). The benefit of metal grinders is they offer higher melting points. For example, the melting point of aluminum is 660 degrees Celsius. Therefore, you will never have to worry about your grinder melting. Aluminum grinders are also the most widely manufactured option of all cool herb grinders. Not only do they provide excellent durability, but hey are also relatively inexpensive compared to other materials.
Plastic Herb Grinders
Plastic (or acrylic) grinders are the cheapest grinder option out of all the materials. While they are less expensive, this savings comes at a price. These inexpensive options do not last long and have very low durability. However, they are a great option for those looking for a quick and simple short-term solution.
Wood
Wood grinders are generally handmade, making them harder to mass-produce. In most cases, wooden grinders consist of a single chamber. These grinders are harder to make than other materials but are a great choice for those who prefer organic materials. The biggest downfall to wooden herb grinders is the potential for the varnish to mix with your herbs.
Herb Grinder Compartments
Manual herb grinders typically come in two, three, four, and five-piece selections. Also known as one compartment grinders, two-piece grinders have one compartment to grind and collect your herbs. However, there are two major downsides to this style of herb grinder. First off, two-piece grinders lack size consistency in your ground up herb pile, so you may need to grind larger pieces more than once. The other issue with two-piece grinders is the retrieval process. Since everything is completed in one chamber (or compartment), you may have to dig the dry herbs out of the teeth to collect, use, or store the ground up product.
Three-piece grinders have two compartments. The first chamber (where you will place the dry herbs you wish to break up) consists of the teeth and has holes leading to the next compartment. When you twist the top of the compartment, it will grind up the dry herbs which will fall into the second chamber once it reaches the desired size to fit through the holes.
Four-piece grinders offer three compartments. The first two chambers are similar to those found in a three-piece grinder, with the bottom of the second chamber usually having some sort of screen rather than the traditional bottom found in three-piece devices. The screen allows for the pollen (or trichomes) to pass through the screen to the third compartment where the kief will be stored until collected.
Although five-piece grinders are not as popular as four-piece grinders, they are the most versatile and advanced of all the herb grinders on the market. While they function exactly the same as a four-piece grinder, five-piece grinders have an additional mesh screen. The second screen is a different size and allows the user to collect an even finer and purer pollen collection within the bottom compartment.
What Is a Cool Herb Grinder?
Cool herb grinders are a convenient and useful accessory for breaking up and pulverizing dry herbs or tobacco. These easy to use devices take your dry herbs and break them down into a more manageable size, so the user can consume the herbs in whatever manner they prefer.
Herb grinders are very simple devices, with most utilizing a twist-top grinding mechanism within the first chamber to grind the dry herbs. Nevertheless, there are most complex options which can include crank-powered grinders, fine screens for pollen collection, options with magnetic closures, and more.
Why Buy a Cool Herb Grinders?
Anyone who has ever smoked or vaped dry herbs in their life, knows dry herbs do not come broken down. Thankfully, this does not have to be as tedious as it once was. To simplify this process, all you need is a cool herb grinder. These convenient and essential tools offer an assortment of benefits to the user such as preserving the integrity of the herbs, saving time and effort, and creating more uniform pieces.
Preserves the Integrity of the Herb
The biggest perk of herb grinders is they keep your dry herbs potent and improves the overall efficiency of your smoking or vaping session. Using your hands can not only remove trichomes from the herbs but also transmit your natural skin oils onto the herb (which can decrease the potency of the dry herbs).
Saves You Both Time and Effort
One of the biggest perks to purchasing a cool herb grinder is the amount of time it saves you. Using your hands takes more effort to break up the dry herbs than using a herb grinder, especially if you decide on an electric model. To use a manual grinder, simply place the herb into the grinder, close and twist the top (lid) of the grinder. The twisting motion will cause the teeth inside of the grinder to pulverize and grind the dry herbs into small pieces.
Creates More Uniform Pieces
One of the biggest issues with breaking up dry herbs by hand is the inability to create uniform-sized pieces. Having inconsistently sized pieces can be a problem depending upon the method you prefer to consume them. For example, having larger pieces can drastically affect the outcome when rolling a joint, or cause uneven burning within vaporizers and pipes.
