I’m sure many of you have heard of a vaporizer, but you may not know exactly how a vaporizer works. When marijuana is smoked in a joint or a pipe the plant is burned at between 500 and 700 degrees Celsius. This temperature not only releases the THC but also burns the marijuana plant material which releases tar and other not so cool compounds.

However, THC is released from the marijuana plant at temperatures much less than 500 Celsius…in fact, temperatures of only about 200 Celsius are needed. A vaporizer heats the weed so you get the THC, but virtually no tar or other carcinogenic compounds. This makes vaporizers the healthiest way to blaze…and since your health is something you don’t want to mess with, you may want to consider a vaporizer! Although I own two vaporizers, I admit that I still find myself smoking joints fairly regularly…old habits are heard to break. But, that’s what New Years Resolutions are for, right? Vaporizers are still fairly pricey…the most popular model, the Volcano, retails for about $540 US, although there are much cheaper models between $200 and $300 that are almost as good. Vaporizers are fairly simple to construct, and I’ve actually built one myself in my lab, but that’s a topic for another day.

So, if you’re considering buying a vaporizer, my advice would be…go for it! Not only are you taking care of your health, but you typically need less weed to get high with a vaporizer than you do in a joint or pipe.

Happy smoking everyone!

Professor Blaze