The Basics
In order to experience the full flavor of your favorite hash oil, you'll need to focus on the quality and cleanliness of your nail. This post only refers to improving the quartz nail smoking experience.
First and foremost, high quality quartz will give you a high quality experience. Nails made in unregulated factories can contain traces of lead and other unwanted particles, which we definitely don't want to be vaporizing our hash off of. Although it's expensive to buy American made quartz nails, they will last several years if maintained correctly.
Preventing Buildup
An important habit to form is to q-tip the excess hash left in your nail - every time. Failing to do this can make removing buildup extremely tough. If you don't have any excess, you most likely took your dab too hot, we'll talk about how to take care of that later.
After taking a hit, use a dry q-tip to soak up any hash that you didn't smoke. There will still be small amounts of hash oil in your nail, some people like to torch the rest off. I did that for quite some time. I've been left with cloudiness on my nail when using the torching method, I'm picky about that. I want my quartz looking flawless, to me that's part of the experience. It just feels way cooler to be using a crystal clear nail, plus you can always watch your hash melt from the outside.
Some people use ispropyl alcohol after a dry q-tip. I also did that for a bit. It works well, but it doesn't effectively remove all of the leftover hash. Also, you can't really use alcohol on your nail while it's hot. It's easier to get the residue off while it's hot, before it has a chance to dry. Personally, I use a glass cleaner by Dark Crystal Glass. I'll continue to talk about it below, but basically it removes hash better than alcohol in my experience.
What if you burn hash onto your nail?
If you were to try to torch off burnt hash like in the photo below, you'd be left with grayish scars on the nail. If you were to rid this burnt residue by torching all the time, you'd eventually have a dark gray nail with no possibility of returning to a crystal-clear nail.
If this happens, try using a solution similar to DarkCrystal Glass cleaner ASAP. Try your best to not let the residue dry. Using a cleaner instead of torching will extend the life of your nail immensely. I was aware of glass-cleaning products that also work for quartz, but I avoided them because I was unsure of toxicity. I wanted something oil-based and non-toxic. As you can see by the ingredients below, it's all natural. You can use it to clean your piece, but I use it solely for q-tipping. It's the only thing I've found that can help a nail recover completely from a hot dab.
If I take a dab too hot, I'll soak my q-tip in my solution and use it on the warm (not hot) nail. If you use it without letting your nail cool a bit, the solution will just evaporate. I like using it while the nail is warm though, it's much easier to get gunk off that way. In the video below, you can see how I use DarkCrystal after a very hot dab. Usually it wouldn't take this long to clean, but I couldn't apply much pressure due to trying to keep my hand out of the shot. This solution is really effective at diluting burnt hash residue. You'll be left with little black specs sitting on the surface of your nail, this is residue that your nail would have absorbed if you had only q-tipped and torched.
Personally, I use DarkCrystal's solution after every dab. It's nice to not have to burn off excess residue after each hit. I also feel like this solution protects the nail from deep scarring in the future. If you've used this stuff on your nail enough, it seems to get much easier to scrub tough residue off. If you're not worried about cloudiness or grayness in your nail, then this solution would be best for cleanup after hot dabs. I've had this Mayoral nail for 6 months now, and it's still in mint condition. I love the 4mm base of this nail, and there's a slight curve (similar to QCB, but not as extreme) at the bottom to help prevent oil from running down the neck into the piece.
Here's where I bought my cleaning solution.
