Effects of RH

[shilala]

Ya know what, Steve? Everyone is gonna come in here and tell you something different, and end up telling you their own particular preference.
Like me, for instance. I've tried pretty much everything at pretty much every rh.
Ultimately I found I like my cc's around 55-60%. At first, I like my nc's a little higher, around 65%. Now, I like them down around 59%.
My suggestion would be to find a starting point (65% is a darned good suggestion) and slowly work from there.
I think one thing everyone will agree on is that wet cigars don't perform well, and they don't taste so good. I agree with that, too, but I don't think you'll get even 3 guys to agree on what "wet" is. That's because as you guessed, different cigars do better than others at given RH's.
Being as it's too much work to keep different humidors for all my particular likes, I've just settled. I like them at 55-60%, so that's what everything is gonna be, even if maduros taste better (to me) at around 63%, and maduros are my favorite.
I think I'm starting to hit that phase where I don't want to struggle with my smokes anymore, I just want to enjoy them. The easier it is keeping them, the more fun it is.

[BlindedByScience]

Originally Posted by shilala

I think I'm starting to hit that phase where I don't want to struggle with my smokes anymore, I just want to enjoy them. The easier it is keeping them, the more fun it is.

QFT....thanks for writing my post for me..... I quoted the last sentence as it's the one that I agree with the most.

Anything over 70% and the risk of mold is great. Below that....round up a hundred experienced cigar enthusiasts and ask them what RH they smoke at. You'll get answers from 55% to 70%, I promise you. When I was new at the game, I'd freak out over a point or two in the coolers. You know what? A point or two almost doesn't matter, IMHO.

I have a tall, vertical Staebell humidor. The RH controller is in the upper 2/3 of the cabinet. With a set point of 65%, the RH runs about 63% in the top, about 67% in the bottom. So, I age in the bottom of the cabinet, and smoke out of the top. Works fantastically.

Like most have said - start at 65% and see what you think.

[Brutus2600]

Originally Posted by NotFromHere

Anything over 70% and the risk of mold is great. Below that....round up a hundred experienced cigar enthusiasts and ask them what RH they smoke at. You'll get answers from 55% to 70%, I promise you. When I was new at the game, I'd freak out over a point or two in the coolers. You know what? A point or two almost doesn't matter, IMHO.

Hah! So true. I think my little desktop humidor lived in half a dozen different places in my house when I first started smoking, just trying to find the place that was closest to 70 degrees. And using the little Xikar gel containers to keep it at 70% RH was all I could do not to freak out over why it wasn't staying within a point or two of 70%.

Years later I found out that the digital hygro I was using sucked, and was probably off possibly as much as 10 points, so there was a good chance I was keeping them at way higher than I should've been.