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CORESTA Meeting, Smoke Science/Product Technology, 2017, Kitzbühel, STPOST 06 (also presented at TSRC 2017)

The challenges of machine smoking the diverse cigar product category

BLAKE T.L.; AVERY K.C.; BALLENTINE R.M.; BROWN T.P.; MELVIN M.S.; CARPENTER M.; STUTT K.; MORTON M.J.; WAGNER K.A.
Altria Client Services LLC, Richmond, VA, U.S.A.

In May 2016, the U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA) issued a final rule to deem cigars to be subject to the Federal Food, Drug, and Cosmetic Act (the FD&C Act), as amended by the Family Smoking Prevention and Tobacco Control Act (Tobacco Control Act). As part of this regulation, the FDA will require manufacturers to report the quantities of harmful and potentially harmful constituents (HPHCs) in cigar filler and smoke. The ability to machine smoke cigars is critical for generating meaningful HPHC data. The CORESTA Cigar Smoking Methods Sub-Group has been the main driver for the development of cigar smoking methods. This Sub-Group has published several CORESTA Recommended Methods (CRMs) which enable the determination of nicotine-free dry particulate matter (NFDPM), nicotine, water, and carbon monoxide. The diversity in shape and size of the cigar product category creates challenges for smoke collection and often requires product specific solutions to achieve acceptable analytical results. Custom cigar holders that meet the requirements of CRM 64 will be described and compared to the commercially available cigar holders. The custom cigar holders enable the collection of smoke from untipped and tipped cigars and provide for improved ease of use and reduced variability over the commercially available holders. A comparison between the two styles of cigar holders for the determination of smoke yields for nine commercial cigar products will be presented.