Is it safe to use spit balls (jelly balls) in my water pipe as a diffuser?

It sounds like sodium polyacrylate from the description. Put that name into YouTube and you’ll find lots of entertaining videos showing its uses. It’s also the stuff inside those packets that say “NOT FOR CONSUMPTION” inside jerky bags and such. I don’t know specifically whether it’s safe to put in your bong, but since it’s used around foodstuffs, it’s probably reasonably stable.

Makes sense, thank you sooo much for finding out what they’re made of. What I was thinking though, if the balls absorb water then they wouldn’t be able to melt, right? I saw this show about a survival specialist guy and he was able to boil water inside a plastic bottle because the water prevented it from melting…Would the jelly balls work the same like that as long as I keep them hydrated?

This article talks about the use of sodium polyacrylate in keeping pot plants moist, and says that it will have a negative impact on the taste, but mentions that it will take months to do so. In the absence of heat it will take months to break down, but it says nothing about what will happen when heated. With a cursory look around Google, I can’t find anything which discusses the effect of heat on hydrated sodium polycrylate, I’m afraid.

Hmm..Maybe I should try burning one and see what happens. >_>

Well I tried it and nothing happened. They stayed cool, wet, and no smoke was created from what I could see. And my room doesn’t smell funky…So maybe..They wont melt =O

“Well I tried it and nothing happened. They stayed cool, wet, and no smoke was created from what I could see.”

If you applied flame directly to the ball when you tried that, then I’m sure that smoke entering the water chamber in your pipe will have even less heat impact on them.

I’d say that close to 100% of the heat energy from a flame is spent in burning what’s in the bowl, so that the smoke in the chamber isn’t much warmer than what you inhale. I’d say that if the chamber smoke was hot enough to melt a ball, then it would definitely be too hot for you to inhale.

To test my hypothesis, try putting an ice cube in the water chamber. I’ve done that myself, and I’ve never seen the heat from the smoke in a water chamber show any indication of melting the cube.

I say its probably not a good idea. Yea it may not melt it but you dont know what could leech off of it into the water/smoke when its heated.

@SmashTheState being safe around food in a sealed packet is totally different that actually in the medium the smoke is passing through to your lungs.

I look at it like this yea 90% chance it could be safe but at the same time it could be quite bad with its effects not readily noticeable. Thus its safer to just err on the side of caution and not do it.

I would just use a regular snake, unless you decide to add some peanut butter!