I’ve written about bongs before, but not bubblers. They are both ways of passing marijuana smoke or vapor through water to filter it – the difference is that bongs use some external force such as gravity to propel the smoke through the water while a bubbler relies on the power of your lungs. It’s somewhere between a glass pipe and a gravity bong. Either way, you’ll be inhaling!
Let’s Talk About The Best Gravity Bongs
The gravity bong is a great alternative to regular smoking methods. It involves using gravity and air pressure to fill up the chamber with smoke, which can be inhaled in one powerful hit. There are several types of gravity bongs…
Bubblers, like bongs or pipes, are generally made of glass, although they can also be made of other materials like silicon or metal. Glass is the prettiest, and if it’s borosilicate glass it can be pretty sturdy!
Why Bubble?
So why use a bubbler? Well, they’re generally cheaper than a gravity bong for a start. Glass bubblers are easy to find – you can walk into any smoke shop in any city or town and see a variety of them for sale, often in the window! And while they’re more work than a bong they make up for it by being a uniquely pleasant sensory experience.
They look nice for a start – you wouldn’t mind displaying a collection of glass bubblers on a shelf. They come in all sorts of shapes and sizes, some very intricate. They sound good too – all that bubbling!
More than that, though – when you’re holding a glass bubbler and you start drawing down the smoke you can feel the turbulence in the water as a subtle vibration in your hands, and depending on the configuration of the bubbler you can almost feel the smoke bubbles burst as they reach your mouth.
They are also flexible – you can switch out the bowl for a banger to switch from smoking dry herb to dabbing, and most vapes have an available WPA (Water Pipe Adapter) so you can hook them up too!
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Bubbler Features
All bubblers have some features in common, and if you’re going to use a bubbler it might be good to know what they are!
The Bowl/Banger: This is where your material goes. These are separate pieces that fit into the bubbler. Bubblers typically have one of two sizes of female joint – 14mm (most common) and 18mm. Make sure you have the right glass bowl or banger to fit your bubbler!
The Percolator: Also known as the perc, this is what the smoke passes through to get into the water. They directly affect the size of the bubbles – bigger openings mean bigger bubbles. This matters because only the smoke that comes into contact with the water gets filtered and smaller bubbles mean more surface area!
The Water Chamber: This is where the water goes. There may be more than one and they may be connected in interesting ways!
Carb Hole: This is a hole you put your thumb over that prevents the smooth flow of air through the pipe. This is useful because it means that all the air is coming via the bowl and is therefore mostly smoke, but it means it’s more work to suck it in. When the bubbler is full of smoke, take your thumb off the carb hole and take a deep breath – you earned it! Not all bubblers have a carb hole – sometimes the same thing is accomplished by lifting out the bowl thereby clearing a path for the air.
Types of Bubbler
There are multiple types of bubblers you can get, each with its own features and characteristics. And here they are!
The Classic Bubbler
A bubbler has at the least a stem into which you can insert your weed container, a water chamber to fill with water, and a mouthpiece to inhale the smoke through. If that’s all it has, it’s a classic bubbler! These bubblers are great, cost-effective and easy to use.
The Recycler
This is more typically a dab rig, but it doesn’t have to be! A recycler has a second empty chamber connected to the first with narrow pipes. When you inhale not only the smoke but the water travels along these pipes into the second chamber where it filters the smoke again, thereby recycling the water! Fun to look at and a guaranteed smooth draw.
The Double Chamber (or Double Bubbler)
The double chamber bubbler is a bubbler with two water chambers instead of one. This provides an even smoother smoking experience by allowing smoke to filter through the first chamber and pass into the second chamber before entering your lungs.
The Freeze Pipe Bubbler
These bubblers make a point of not just filtering but cooling the smoke before it gets to your throat. They often have one or more freezable glycerin coils which need to be placed in the freezer for an hour or so before use.
Hammer Bubbler Pipe
These are generally small glass bubbler pipes that resemble, well, hammers. They only use a small amount of water and, in fact, they look like nothing so much as a standard glass pipe with a small water chamber added.
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Conclusion
No matter which style you choose, bubblers are a great way to enhance your smoking experience and add some variety to your marijuana consumption routine. They are a highly customizable item – the basic design can be expressed in a million different ways, allowing for all sorts of creativity and wildness. So go get yourself some bubblers and try them out! You won’t regret it. Happy bubbling!
