Powermatic Cooking - Recent Questions, Troubleshooting & Support
The injector will not retract
One of 2 things. First is to push the reset button to get it to retract. Then make sure you are not over packing it with tobacco. If all that seems fine, maybe the gear mechanism inside has failed. I know from mine they were known to have plastic gears in the beginning, then were changed to hold up better.
Jam up
Use a small screwdriver and insert it in the tabbaco outlet to get the tabbaco out. be care full not to overstuff when filling.If you get a lot of jams the tabbaco can be to moist. if so let it dry out a little before inserting. Also the bottom of the bag 'shake' will jam the machine.A nice tabbaco that is very easy on any machine is a virginia blend.
Tobacco only goes half way down thetube
inspect that the rubber piece that holds the tube.Chance's are that it is worn and needs to be replaced. it wont hold the tube all the way if it is worn. A quick fix is to cut a piece of eraser of a pencil and glue it to the holder.
Tube will not fill near filter
Trick i have learned is to put a small amount of tobbaco in the chamber now move it side to side with your finger tips. Now add more tobbaco to the chamber as you normaly would.It will fill the tube better If that does not work out for you try virginia blend tobbaco it will work better in any machine...
Why cant i get a decent cigarette out of my powermate II mach.
I am going to go under the assumption you are using 100mm tubes. I just switched to kings to make life easier but here is how I filled my 100mm to the filter with good compaction and a trick to get it to the filter. I tightly pack the tobacco against the left side, sticking my finger in the chamber and pushing pretty hard to compact to the left side, I then just do a light poke for the rest of the compartment. Here is the trick part, take a finger and put light pressure pushing on the filter towards the machine, but not so hard it bends the tube and also no so hard that when the injector probe comes out it pushes your finger away from the machine. Using this method I would get around 9 good packs with one redo out of 10 injections. The key is to have enough pressure to hold the filter at the point where the plastic tab usually pushes out and then let the probe push your finger away from the machine. Only very light pressure is needed to make the difference. If the cigarettes are not packing tight you are not compacting enough tobacco in the chamber. There is a fine line though, you need to find the balance as stuffing too much in will cause it to bind up, you just need to find the balance. Once you figure it out it will go very quick, I stuff mine while on the phone and can do around a pack every 2 to 3 minutes or so and get a cigarette that can not be distinguished from a store bought one.Another tip: I use old cigarette packs as containers for my DIY smokes, you can do the same here with a plastic case. If I do get some that are not fully pushed against the filter using the above method, or if the pack just seems a little loos I put them aside and at the end I load them all in cigarette packs just like they come from the store, filter up (otherwise I have a habit of smoking filters from years of them being positioned this way!) and once the pack is full (add good ones if there is space for them to move around, it will not hurt them) turn the pack upside down so the lid is on the bottom. Now tap them firmly about 10 to 20 times against a hard flat surface. This will move the tobacco towards the filter if there is a space or pack loose cigarettes. Warning: From my experience :) Do not over stuff the machine or using the compacting method do not over pack the tobacco, find a good medium. If you over pack the smokes will be solid and very hard to drag from. Do not smoke cigarettes that are hard to rag from, the extra force needed by your lungs followed by introducing smoke into your lungs will result in pain and maybe worse, but I only made that mistake once.Good luck!
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