Mechanical Vs. Hand Trimming.

[+Malamute]

If you are selling your buds trimmed with a machine for the same price as nicely hand trimmed,... you are ripping people off. Period.

 

Other than that, be honest and upfront and nobody cares.

[free420country]

the caregivers that I know of do not entertain customers. if that applies to you I understand your defensive tactics here, but detest your insistent trolling of near every post I make, even if it doesnt apply. You crap all over yourself resto, always have, everyone smells it whenever your in any room here. Please heal quickly my friend. we need every cannabiss helping hand we can muster.

 

we think this reminds us of you

That's funny muffin

[matt79]

I used to hand trim when only a couple plants.

Then I did the spin pro thing for awhile. That thing tears the buds apart, I end up with gallons of trim. Plus it still requires quite a bit of plant prep and it's fairly laborious.

Recently a couple other growers and I went in on a Twister T4. It was 6000$ and worth EVERY penny. I'm never looking back. The prep work is minimal, basically just strip the big leaves and take the buds of the stems.

I took down 18 4foot tall plants in about 14 hours. The finished product is comparable to hand trim.

If you have the $$$ I highly reccomend picking one up. Northern lights hydro shop rents them out a reasonable price if you wanna try one out

[+Malamute]

 

[+Malamute]

Head to head comparison of Twister T4 vs Centurion Mini Part 2

 

 

[+Malamute]

MSRP: $6400

 

 

Ouch.

[matt79]

It doesn't hurt as bad as spending hours day after day hunched over a table with a pair of scissors.

[trichcycler]

If I was a "cropper" I would have a trimmer, but I dont see the value in one now. Even when I assist five patients its still only a couple few plants harvested per week in my perpetual grow. Hardly an hour of trimming for me.  My 1k light penetrates well to about 20 inches, I see no reason to grow anything below that on the stalk. I suspect this is why I dont mind a trim here and there. I've seen those giant flowering plants and my hands hurt thinking about them.

 

cropper=harvesting whole gardens at one time

[imiubu]

The term "croppers" sounds kind of negative imho.

 

I know caregivers who do not run a perpetual garden and I don't consider them 'croppers'.

[trichcycler]

The term "croppers" sounds kind of negative imho.

 

I know caregivers who do not run a perpetual garden and I don't consider them 'croppers'.

so, thats why I defined it properly, I figured at least one poster would be offended and wanted to explain. I was a cropper too, when I was a first time grower. I cropped my whole garden at the same time. In time I learned to perpetually grow my supply, then patients plants fit in easily given enough space. Think of outdoor growers who grow their year supply outside, not a whole lot of choice there, except to crop the finished garden at the end of the year, dry it, and divide it among your patients, or hold on to some and supply as needed, either way, cropped all at once. I grew outdoors too, and was a cropper there for the same reasons.I'd like to see more people growing outdoors, and I am, every once in awhile a new awesome outdoor goes up in plain view around here. When both my neighbors have one, so shall I, and we'll all be outdoor croppers.

 

I hope that helps explain my definition. No negative connotations, no in between the lines, it is what it is. Some of us are crop farmers and some are perpetually harvesting farmers.  My first outdoor crop was four plants, all finished right and were good, but waay to stinky to do again(till the neighbors do) I could smell my girls in august september/october from 300 feet down my drive to the road, kinda scary to me at the time.  Its getting smellier around the nighborhood so it shouldnt be too long, me and mine'll be enjoying the mother nature powered medicines.

[Restorium2]

That machine can't trim a leaf stem way down inside the bud. You are going to have to re trim everything when you use it. And if a person pays by weight it's a rip off. But hey, to each their own. If you like the results it's all good. 

[matt79]

Take a look. It does a pretty good job

[trichcycler]

Take a look. It does a pretty good job

always hand trimmed here, with little springy fiskars, new pair every couple years. I consider my default  trim job to be fine. I accept patients that like my trim job, and the fact I toss in 2/5 grams in each delivery and more when I have it. If someone paid me 400 dollars an ounce to handle/keif their buds I'd do it, if they also bought the prerolls made from that trim, you know, for ten bucks a piece....lol

 

I dont trim by hand any better than those pics, good job!!! they look awesome to me.

[Highlander]

That machine can't trim a leaf stem way down inside the bud. You are going to have to re trim everything when you use it. And if a person pays by weight it's a rip off. But hey, to each their own. If you like the results it's all good. 

 

 If patients like the results and it saves the CG time and that time saved is reflected in the price to the patient, it's all good.  I've been pretty happy with my spin trimmer but haven't used it in close to a year.  I bought it when I got off-kilter on my perpetual grow and had many plants to harvest in a short time.  When I gave patients spin-trimmed meds, I was up-front about it.  I offered a discount and some consideration for the lost weight.  As an experiment, I hand trimmed 2 oz. of meds after going through the trimmer and after drying them.  I got less than 2 grams in new leaf trim from 2 oz. of meds.  Some patients don't have a whole lot to do...or more accurately a whole lot they can do due to disabilities.  So they actually like the idea of spending some time trimming meds to save a few bucks.  It's a win-win for CG and patient.  Recently, I've been offering un-trimmed meds to patients at a discount.  I snap-off the fan leaves and cut the buds from the big stems and leave the little leaves to the patient to trim or not, per their own preference.  Patients have responded well to this.

[Highlander]

Take a look. It does a pretty good job

 

I posted similar photos in my first post about the spin trimmer.  It does a pretty good job.  There is no substitute for hand-trimming, but if the patient is aware of what he/she is getting and understands that there is still leaf stalk left inside the bud that only a human can trim, and the CG is up-front about this, then there really isn't an issue.  It comes down to a deal between patient and CG. 

 

And yes, I understand that spin trimming might knock-off more trichomes than hand trimming.  But I've always given patients finger hash and, when using a mechanical trimmer, hash scraped from the bowl for free. 

 

I guess there might be a big difference between a CG using a mechanical trimmer and selling buds to a dispensary and then selling the hash.  I don't work that way. 

[+Malamute]

I agree with highlander.

 

Up front and honest, and proper comparative pricing.

 

Then it doesn't matter at all except personal preference.

[matt79]

Idk what all this talk of stems is. I snap all the leaves by hand. When they enter my trimmer it's basically just the sugar leaves.

I can tell you that I've submitted buds run through a spin pro style trimmer and the twister.

The spin pro ALWAYS says "many damaged trichomes"

The twister NEVER says that.

[Highlander]

Idk what all this talk of stems is. I snap all the leaves by hand. When they enter my trimmer it's basically just the sugar leaves.

I can tell you that I've submitted buds run through a spin pro style trimmer and the twister.

The spin pro ALWAYS says "many damaged trichomes"

The twister NEVER says that.

I don't understand. I never heard of a spin pro or twister saying anything.

[matt79]

Haha I mean to iron labs

[Restorium2]

Idk what all this talk of stems is. I snap all the leaves by hand. When they enter my trimmer it's basically just the sugar leaves.

I can tell you that I've submitted buds run through a spin pro style trimmer and the twister.

The spin pro ALWAYS says "many damaged trichomes"

The twister NEVER says that.

Right. The sugar leaves have stems too. I trim those leaves closer to the stem than a machine can. A machine just cuts an outline of the bud. Everything inside that outline is still there, including things I trim off. Sometimes I wonder how many folks trim the whole sugar leaf off. I think a lot of  folks trim like a spin pro anyway. If you like your buds trimmed like that it's all good. 

[imiubu]

I've had tightly hand manicured flowers, lightly hand manicured flowers and mechanically trimmed flowers.

 

With lightly trimmed and mechanically trimmed I finish them out to my preference, removing sugar leaves

down to the stem.  I save those in the freezer until I have enough to make qwiso. 

 

One observation is that once the excess is removed the smoke is less harsh.  I have also shown others

how to remove these leaves and their opinion is the same... less harsh to smoke.

 

As has been stated previously ... if cg and pt communicate and agree... that's all that matters.

 

 

---

NOW... seeing "top shelf" (lol) flowers at a disp being sold at $100 per 1/4 that have dam sure been tumbled...

BUYER BEWARE.  Take a loupe and scope the buds if you must get your meds from a store front.

[pergamum362]

Trimmer machines...i prefer to give the work to less fortunate patients.

Edited October 31, 2016 by pergamum362

[trichcycler]

I've had tightly hand manicured flowers, lightly hand manicured flowers and mechanically trimmed flowers.

 

With lightly trimmed and mechanically trimmed I finish them out to my preference, removing sugar leaves

down to the stem.  I save those in the freezer until I have enough to make qwiso. 

 

One observation is that once the excess is removed the smoke is less harsh.  I have also shown others

how to remove these leaves and their opinion is the same... less harsh to smoke.

 

As has been stated previously ... if cg and pt communicate and agree... that's all that matters.

 

 

---

NOW... seeing "top shelf" (lol) flowers at a disp being sold at $100 per 1/4 that have dam sure been tumbled...

BUYER BEWARE.  Take a loupe and scope the buds if you must get your meds from a store front.

 

 

Is it possible that some machine trimmers have results that are similar to tumblers' ?

[pergamum362]

Is it possible that some machine trimmers have results that are similar to tumblers' ?

some machines, that is exactly what they do. Tumble it to break off dried leaves.

[Restorium2]

Is it possible that some machine trimmers have results that are similar to tumblers' ?

If you trim a lot you will see that there's no way a machine can see down into the buds and trim inside the basic outline of the bud. They don't have eyes. I don't even have to watch the video to know this. 

 

edit; I thought you were saying 'similar to hand trimming', sorry

Edited October 31, 2016 by Restorium2