Tools of TRADITIONAL Hash Consumption: HOT WAND TECH WITH Chameleon Glass

Hash of a dying breed

While we share a deep love for fine solventless concentrates, Nick and I don’t have to agree on everything. After all, variety is the spice of life, though we both agree not to smoke Spice. He likes the Eagles (go Birds!), I’m more of a Tom Petty guy, but the valley of opinion is widest between our respective stances on traditional, non-dabbing grade hash.

Charas, temple balls, and classic bubble hash hold a place close to my heart, and that place is my lungs. Far be it from me to try to change anyone’s mind, this is a subject we have barely discussed, knowing his justifiable disdain for the dirtier, messier, less refined equivalent to the pure-as-the-driven-snow full melt of the modern era. Yet, today’s fruits spring from yesterday’s roots, so this series will highlight the glass artists still dedicated to crafting tools for the enjoyment of old-school hashish.

Gandalf Natural PErc Hash Bubbler

by Chameleon Glass

A glorious pipe with some glorified kief

Since the nineties, Chameleon Glass has been family-owned and operated in Trinidad, CA. Now offering a wide variety of US-made bowls, water pipes, and accessories, the company grew organically (just like the best resin) from concert parking lot meetups to a nationwide collective. With ice water trichome separation catching on in cultivation circles in the mid-aughts, Chameleon introduced their first line of hash pipes in 2006. These featured three vent holes around the rim of the bowl as opposed to the single hole at the bottom seen in flower pipes. By adjusting the design in this way, users could vaporize their hash using a heated glass wand, conserving more flavor and potency than burning it with a direct flame. The solid bottom of the bowl also enables a pure hash session, as opposed to requiring a combined experience with flower to efficiently heat the material.

Certified authentic Chameleon

Though Chameleon is not the only studio to create a hash pipe, the company’s combined experience and proximity to the Mecca of cannabis culture has fostered a philosophy that taps into what the average consumer might seek in their glass: attractiveness, American manufacturing, and accessible prices. The Gandalf Hash Bubbler is no exception, sporting an elongated neck, beautiful fume tech, and a spherical section just past the bend, opposite the bowl. This not only adds aesthetic intrigue, resembling a snake swallowing large prey, but also enhances the function of the pipe by adding natural percolation. Thanks to the clever bit of engineering, the perfectly good dry pipe can accommodate a small amount of water, trapping it in the rounded chamber rather than sending it up the neck and through the mouthpiece for a surprise drink. A practical lesson in fluid dynamics, the natural perc provides choppy resistance on the draw for a denser hit of vapor.

Included with the Gandalf pipe was an insulated soft case, a pair of glass wands and a lighter, setting me up with everything I needed for a sesh, minus the hash. Luckily, a bid in trim jail from a recent harvest yielded enough dry sift to press and roll into a small ball for ease of pinching off a serving. Chameleon includes the following directions on their site: “Place a chunk in the bowl, heat the ball end of the hot stick with a common Bic lighter for 30+ seconds or a torch for less time and push the now slightly red ball of the hot stick into the chunk. As the chunk melts, it also vaporizes.”

Do the dutty wand

I went to the lake and followed the manufacturer’s recommendation, though I found my hits losing heat quickly outdoors. To combat the wind, I substituted the lighter for a mini torch and swapped the included glass wand for a quartz one I had on hand. With about 20 seconds of torching and 5 of waiting, the quartz wand warmed the crumbly hash on contact just enough to express and vaporize bubbling oil without scorching the remaining plant matter. At the end of a session, the narrow end of the glass wand was perfect for scraping the bowl clean.

Smoke on the water

The tastiest hits produced fairly thin clouds; to thicken them would be to cross a distinct line between heating and burning. Still, as the bowl filled up with several wand hits’ worth of caking residue, there was no degradation of smoothness on the inhale. Needless to say, there is a learning curve involved with mastering this technique, which varies with different grades and consistencies of hash. Between rips, the wind sung a gentle tone as the breeze rolled over the mouthpiece (video below - listen closely!). As I perfected the alchemy of it all, balancing the elements of earth, water, fire and air in their proper proportions, I never felt more like a hash wizard than using the Gandalf pipe.

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