There are two types of smokers. You either worry about how the smell of cannabis affects the people around you… or you don’t.
I belong firmly to the former—if I think my smoking is going to bother the neighbors or my roommates, I won’t enjoy my next hit.
Call it anxiety. Call it courtesy. Call it paranoia. I just want to smoke in quiet peace, and I can’t do that if I’m worried people might be upset about the smell.
To be clear, I’m not running around smoking in public or near children. I do like to sit on the back porch with a bit of fresh bud, though, especially as the sun starts to fade. The lower temperature, the beautiful colors and scenery, the sound of nature taking hold as traffic and construction slows down… it’s my favorite time to smoke. Which is precisely why I don’t want it interrupted with anxious thoughts about how my neighbors may dislike the smell of cannabis.
Thankfully, there’s an easy way to reduce the smell of marijuana while you smoke.
Building a Better Doob Tube
One of the simplest—and most effective—ways to reduce the smell of cannabis as you smoke is to use a doob tube. Not to be confused with the small cylindrical containers for storing joints, the doob tube we’ll be building here is designed specifically to filter exhaled smoke.
Sometimes referred to as a sploof, deodorizer, or smoke filter, the easy-to-build tool works surprisingly well. It won’t stop 100% of the cannabis smoke, but it will cut a majority of the odor. And, the remaining smoke smell will be largely overpowered by the pleasant scent of dryer sheets.
Even better, chances are you already have everything you need sitting in your home.
Materials:
- Empty paper towel roll
- Paper towels
- Dryer sheets
Step 1: Grab an empty paper towel roll
The next time you finish a roll of paper towels, make sure you hold onto the empty cardboard tube. You can use a toilet paper roll, but that will limit the doob tube’s effectiveness by reducing the filter size.
Step 2: Fill the tube with paper towels and dryer sheets
Try to start and end with a paper towel. This guarantees you won’t be exhaling directly into a dryer sheet, which could affect the quality of the hit. From there, alternate paper towels and dryer sheets until the tube is full.
Step 3: Make sure the tube is packed firmly
Too loose, and more smoke will make it through the tube unfiltered. Too tight, though, and the smoke could struggle to move through the DIY filter. When you get this just right, you should barely see any smoke escape the cardboard roll.
Step 4: Test the tube!
Now that construction of the doob tube is done, it’s time for the fun bit: testing.
- Press the end of the smoke filter firmly against your mouth to create a seal. Any smoke that doesn’t go through the sploof won’t be filtered.
- Exhale slowly. This gives the smoke a chance to move through the paper towels and dryer sheets, dissipating before it reaches the end.
- Cover the bowl or pipe after each hit. By using your lighter to cover the mouth of the bowl after each hit, you can reduce how much sidestream smoke escapes.
No-Build Ways to Cut Back on the Smell
Using a sploof, or doob tube, is a great way to reduce marijuana odor. But, there are a few reasons this may not work for you.
If you prefer smoking joints, the filter will only be so successful. That’s because the sidestream smoke coming from the lit joint is escaping unfiltered. And holding a lit joint against a tube full of paper towels and dryer sheets is a bad idea.
Instead, smoke from a bowl or pipe. You can always use your lighter to cover the top of the bowl, reducing how much smoke escapes after each hit. This will also reduce airflow and conserve weed.
Alternately, you could switch to vaping or edibles for a smoke-free, largely odorless experience.
Discreet, Smoke-Free Smoking
How your doob tube turn out? Share your experience in the comments below. And remember, consuming cannabis in public is against Colorado law.
And if you need a gram of flower to test your new smoke filter, stop by Karing Kind in North Boulder to stock up on top-shelf, clean-grown bud and CO2 extracted cannabis oil.
Karing Kind is located just off of US-36, one mile north of Broadway, open MON-SUN from 9am to 10pm.
While we carry a variety of strains, concentrates, edibles, salves and tinctures, inventory and stock levels fluctuate from week to week. Check our menu and follow us on Twitter for an up-to-date list of edibles, concentrates and buds available.