What is A Homemade Bong?
A homemade bong is a general term to describe homemade water pipes, as well as other pipes that do not use water. Homemade bongs are typically made because a typical bong or other class pipe is not available to smoke dry herbs you may have on hand. While often difficult to make or of a crude assembly, homemade bongs beat the alternative of not being able to smoke available dry herbs.
How to Make a Homemade Bong?
There are no set instructions on how to make a homemade bong. In fact, there are a variety of designs you can use, depending on the materials you have on hand. If you are just making a pipe, the designs can be relatively simple, whereas if you are trying to make an actual bong, the steps become more complex.
Common Supplies for a Homemade Bong
Before deciding on if you want to go for a simple or complex route, you need to take inventory of what supplies you have available. This can help limit your options to what kind of bong you are able to make. Here are some common supplies that can be used to make homemade bongs:
- Fruits and vegetables (like apples or potatoes)
- 2-liter soda bottles or other sizes of plastic bottles
- Aluminum soda cans
- Empty tubes from pens and markers
- Paper towel tubes
This is not an all-encompassing list. After reading some of our examples homemade bongs below, you may find that you have something on hand that would work perfectly for a homemade bong of your own design!
Cool Homemade Bongs
How to Make a Gravity Bong
If you want to make a true bong and not just a pipe, a gravity bong is one of your easiest choices. All you need is a plastic bottle and preferably some foil! Here are the steps:
- Get a plastic bottle (preferably a 2-liter soda bottle). Remove the cap and cover the open end with foil.
- Poke the foil with holes.
- Cut the bottom off of the bottle. The top half of the bottle needs something it can rest inside. You can use a separate piece for this (like a small bucket), or you can cut your original bottle to where the top half will rest inside.
- Fill the bottom half (or small bucket) with water.
- Place the top half of the bottle inside the bottom half that is filled with water.
- On the top bottle that has the foil, place your dry herb (for best results, be sure you grind it first).
- Light the dry herb, and slowly pull the top part of the bottle out of the water. DO NOT remove it completely from the water! As you pull the top half slowly, the water will pull the air through the foil you punched holes into, and you should see it begin to fill with smoke.
- When there is plenty of smoke, remove the foil and inhale the smoke!
How to Make an Apple Pipe
This design will serve more like a simple pipe as opposed to a bong or water pipe. However, it can get the job done in a pinch!
- Get a large apple (the variety doesn’t matter, but a softer apple will make this a bit easier).
- You will want something that is a sturdy empty tube, like the body of a pen or a small marker. With that tube, you will make two tubes.
- The first tunnel will be at the top of the apple going down, ending roughly in the middle of the apple. The top of the tube will serve as the bowl for your dry herb.
- The second tunnel with mee the first perpendicularly in the middle of the apple. This can take some guesswork to get perfect, so you may want one or two apples you can make mistakes on. When done properly, your tunnels should make an “L” shape inside the apple.
- Pack a small amount of dry herb on the top tunnel of the apple. Apply flame and inhale. The smoke will travel through the tunnels you have carved into your lips!
- The apple will serve as a slight cooling agent for the smoke as well as giving it a very light sweet taste.
- We do not recommend consuming the apple after smoking is complete.
How to Make a Soda Can Pipe
This is another easy pipe that can help you get dry herb smoked in a pinch. All you need is an empty soda can something to poke holes with (like a needle):
- Gently press in the middle of the can to make a deep indention. You do not want it touching the other side of the can, but you do want it deep enough to easily hold dry herb (this dent is going to be your bowl).
- Once you have a good dent for a bowl made, use a needle (or something similar) to poke several small holes in the middle of the dent (this is where air will flow from your dry herbs).
- Make a slightly larger hole on the side of the can (somewhere around 1/16th of an inch wide) between the bowl and the open mouth of the can. This will act as a carb hole while smoking.
- Remove the tab from the can.
- Apply a flame to both the carb hole and the bowl before putting your dry herbs on. This will help burn any liquid, sugar, or chemical residue that may be present from the can.
- Now, put dry herb in the indention of the can, apply flame, and draw air through the bowl, into the can, and into your lungs!
It should be noted that the health risks of using aluminum to smoke are somewhat inconclusive, so while doing it once in a while probably is not going to hurt anything, we do not recommend it be your regular smoking pipe.
How to Make a Toilet Paper Roll Pipe
Toilet paper rolls actually work pretty well as heavy-hitting steamroller pipes! You do need to be extra careful about not setting the pipe (or the surrounding area) on fire, but they can still get the job done!
- Get a toilet paper roll and make sure all paper has been removed.
- Get a sharp knife or razor and cut a small, square opening on top of the roll furthest from the side you plan on using as your mouthpiece.
- Take a small piece of foil and cover the hole you have just made.
- Use a needle or other smaller object to poke small holes into the foil. If it doesn’t feel secure, you can tape the foil down.
- Pack a small amount of dry herb onto the foil.
- Apply flame and take a hit! Since the opening of the toilet paper roll is quite large, you may need to breathe harder than you are used to on a glass steamroller pipe. If you are having trouble getting enough airflow to get a good hit, use your hand to cover the opposite end of the roll. This should create enough of a drag to get a good hit in.
Gravity Bong vs. Bukket Pipe
You frequently see these two pipes compared and mentioned as alternatives to traditional bongs or pipes, so we thought they were worth mentioning here. As you know, a gravity bong, homemade or otherwise, uses drag produced by moving water to create a hit without the smoker having to draw air manually. A bukket pipe also does not require manual drawing but employs a different method than using water.
Instead, a bukket pipe uses its accordion design to pull air through the bowl by means of simply moving the pipe. So, just like an accordion produces sound by having the player pump air through movements, a bukket pipe produces your hit by the smoker pressing the pipe body up and down to create airflow. It is definitely possible to make your own bukket pipe, but the process is more complicated than making a gravity bong or a simple pipe.
What is a Homemade Percolator Bong?
A percolator bong is a water pipe that uses a series of tiny holes to force smoke to diffuse before it actually gets inhaled. So, a homemade percolator bong is simply a homemade bong where you also have made the percolator! A homemade percolator bong is far, far more complicated than other styles of homemade pipes, as you need to not only construct the body of the pipe but also the internal mechanics for the percolator.
You can make the percolator out of all different kinds of materials. Straws situated into plastic bottles, empty prescription bottles, and any other kind of MacGuyver-like system work. This is not a system that you would want to build in a pinch, but rather as a DIY project. Building your own percolator bong will take ample time to complete successfully.
Homemade Bong vs Homemade Percolator Bong
The big differences between these two are going to be their respective complexity. A homemade bong can be relatively simple; all you need is a plastic bottle. Gravity bongs are likely the easiest to build, but making a more classic bong is not that difficult, either (all you need is something to act as a downstem towards the bottom of your bottle and something to act as a bowl).
Homemade percolator bongs, on the other hand, require extensive setup. Not only are you crafting the body of the bong, but you are also going to be making an intricate system that allows smoke to diffuse, all the while figuring out how to get that system inside of the bong you have made. It is definitely possible (some people make a hobby out of it), but the level of work, the materials needed, and the expertise recommended far outpaces what one would want for a simple bong or gravity bong.