Cigar humidor?

[AJB Temple]

Has anyone made one? Tips?

I am thinking of making a humidor. It seems to me to be just a nicely made box with a means of controlling humidity.

Anyone made one? I have plenty of box making wood such as cedar (1st grade for bee hives), wenge, maple and english walnut.

(PS, I am asthmatic and never smoked except for 4 cigars in the last year , but there is a reason for this).

A

 

[Richard]

Here are a couple I made in the late 1990s. You can get hygrometers and humidifiers from Amazon, but there are specialist suppliers too. As you surmise basically a box, in this case of walnut and cherry dovetailed together. The lining and trays were made out of cedar of lebanon, left unfinished, giving a nice smell from what I recall were meant to be desirable oils. One way of limiting air changes is to incorporate a double lid comprising an inner panel of cedar of lebanon, in this example, that you can see in the photo in its own groove, not shown in the sketch, and a double tongued outer show lid with the upper tongue incorporating an ovolo moulding - see sketch. The outer show panel starts out at about 12 - 14 mm thick so it is scooped out on the inside face to weaken it making it less likely to distort the lid which would cause a gappy fit between the lid and box body. Slainte.

PS. The sketch is a bit out of proportion, i.e., the upper tongue in the lid side is a bit skinny, but after I'd doodled it I simply couldn't be bothered improving it via a new sketch.

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[AJB Temple]

Thanks Richard. I notice the inner top tray has holes in it, presumably to keep humidity constant throughout. What is the circular indent for in the back centre of the top tray?

 

[Richard]

Thanks Richard. I notice the inner top tray has holes in it, presumably to keep humidity constant throughout.

Yes, constant, perhaps better described as trying to equalise humidity throughout the interior as much as possible. The holes should allow air within the humidor to circulate reasonably.

What is the circular indent for in the back centre of the top tray?

There's a shallow hole bored front and back so that a finger from each hand can lift that tray out. Subsequently, with the gap created, the other two trays are easy to lift out. Without the shallow recesses in at least one tray it's hard to lift the first of any one of the three snug fitting trays. I guess I could have carved a finger recess a bit like a recess for a pocket screw, but I chose, lazily I suppose, to use a sawtooth forstner bit to do the job. Slainte.