The Vaping Thread

[jsecordphoto]

Here's the kicker... Within a 15 minute drive of my house, I have no fewer than 15 vape shops. Not ONE of them carries overlapping brands of liquid. It's astonishing how many people are in the game on this. I'm kind of hoping the market saturation dries up a bit so I can start finding the same stuff at multiple shops. As it stands, I end up buying something different almost every time, unless I happen to end up at the same shop... which only happens as an accident of convenience.

Buying a different brand/flavor every time is both a blessing and a curse. I probably have 30 half full bottles of vape juice on a shelf in my bedroom.

And Yeah, I think the FDA is going to bring Thor's hammer down on this pretty soon here as well. I expect choices to drop as sharply as prices go up.

that's crazy. I have one shop like 15 minutes away but it's in a college town and they run out of all the good juice so fast. The other shop I usually go to is like 45 minutes away, but my buddy owns it so he'll hold onto any juice I want and it's nice to go in and try out a bunch of new stuff he gets. It's awesome how much free juice he gets sent by companies because they want him to start carrying their stuff, there's always 5-10 new flavors to check out. The issue I find is a lot of juice will smell really good, but the flavor will be lacking.

 

[Stradawhovious]

that's crazy. I have one shop like 15 minutes away but it's in a college town and they run out of all the good juice so fast. The other shop I usually go to is like 45 minutes away, but my buddy owns it so he'll hold onto any juice I want and it's nice to go in and try out a bunch of new stuff he gets. It's awesome how much free juice he gets sent by companies because they want him to start carrying their stuff, there's always 5-10 new flavors to check out. The issue I find is a lot of juice will smell really good, but the flavor will be lacking.

In Minneapolis you also can't swing a dead cat without hitting a gaggle of hipsters, and there is a new brewery opening every weekend... so this many shops probably isn't typical to other, less hipster infested demographics.

And yeah, smell and flavor aren't always related. One of my favorite juices is Anise and cinnamon flavored (pretty spot on too), but the vapor smelled like a fresh urinal cake so I stopped using it.

 

[Stradawhovious]

Well, just got back from the vape shop with my very first RDA. (rebuildable dripping atomizer). Nothing fancy, just a generic no frills 2 coil unit.

So much for not going down the rabbit hole, but if I'm going to be off the cancer nails for good, well... I need variety.

I decided to buy pre-built coils instead of starting in making my own... so I may have cheated a little. First impressions after getting this thing all put together....

DANG THAT'S A LOT OF VAPOR.

I had to max out the wattage of my battery mod to 75 watts (which would be REALLY hot with my other tanks) and the vapor is still really quite cool, but I have about 3x the vapor production of even the new Aspire Cleito I just picked up.

I NEED A LOWER NIC CONTENT JUICE.

Even with the relatively low 6mg juices I'm vaping now, I think it will be far too much for me with that much vapor production.

Granted, I will only be using this in place of the cigars I would smoke during back yard BBQs and such, it will still be nice to have.

 

[weepete]

Lol mate, aye I've dropped nic too though I could easily go back to the 18mg. But I'm a bit of a cloud chaser anyway and even on a 0.9ohm dual coil at 45watts the vapour production is more than 0.4ohms on my mech. If you are dripping then the clouds can be huge. I order most of my e-liquid online if I want to get a spesific brand, same with atties and mods.

What coils did you get?

I've heard really good things about the Sacredmods Stro Mini V2 as a dripper. IME clones are just never quite as good as the originals, but at their price point some can still be excellent. There's a whole lot of good sub $50 RBAs/RDAs on the market ATM. I do prefer my tanks though.

Building your own coils is not as difficult as it sounds *barring claptons, triple stacked dual coils and the other crazy stuff. I'd highly reccomend a wee coil jig like this one Amazon.com: Coil Master 6 in 1 Coil Jig with Authenticity Scratch Code - Perfect Micro Coils (BLACK)`: Arts, Crafts & Sewing

Also one of these: http://www.coil-master.net/product/coil-master-ohm-meter

The major issue is wicking normally. Easy enough with a dripper but RTAs can take a bit of trial and error and even then can be hit or miss. I wouldn't go back to stock coils though.

 

[Stradawhovious]

What coils did you get?

Just some generic single twist looking coils. All built up it registers at .27 ohms, and at 75w I'm getting what I consider to be pretty decent sized clouds of vapor, far cooler (temperature wise) than I expected. It's a very interesting experience for sure.

I will eventually get into building coils if I decide I enjoy this dripper thing... I just didn't want to tool up and decide it wasn't for me, so I stuck with the prefab for now. And as fas as the atomizer for less than $50, I got the RDA, coils and cotton for $30... so there's that.

I will admit I have no idea what I'm doing this far down the rabbit hole, but I look forward to learning!

 

[weepete]

Yeah, drippers can chuck out the clouds, and generally more flavour than tanks. I'm suprised at the 0.3 ohms, I could never get that to be a cool vape but maybe it's thicker wire. I did a 0.25ohm build on a mech but with 28 gauge and it was a fierce spluttery affair that didn't last long.

I set up my Royal Hunter tonight, dual coiled with 15 wraps of 26 gauge (0.4mm) kanthal with a 2.5mm ID. Total resistance is 0.9 ohms when set up. The ramp up time is huge and it pretty much won't vape below 35W but it plesant at 50W and up (am vaping at 75W with it now). Got two new e-liquids, an Element pink lemonade flavour (tastes like skittles to me) and is 80% VG but is a really lovely vape. The other is Pure Evil's Sloth from the 7 deadly sins range, which smells like a strong ribena but I'll try that tomorrow.

 

[Stradawhovious]

I set up my Royal Hunter tonight, dual coiled with 15 wraps of 26 gauge (0.4mm) kanthal with a 2.5mm ID. Total resistance is 0.9 ohms when set up.

I have no idea what you just said. I'm sure if you give it a couple months I will have complete comprehension of it.

I got tired of the voltage droop from the .4 ohm coil on my 75w mod almost immediately, so I ran out today and got a 200w Wismec Reuleaux mod that runs on 3 18650 batteries. If that droops below firing wattage at 55 watts I will be amazed. That, and it fires that RDA I just bought at 100W famously.

I should be set on mods now...

But knowing me, that won't stop me from getting more in the future.

 

[weepete]

No worries mate it's just the size, material and type of the coils. In paralell coils the total resistance halves so my coils were around 1.95 ohms each.

My local B+M has them too, the dude behind the counter was trying to sell me one last time but I shyied away as I didn't have any paired batteries never mind a charger that would take all 3 at the same time. It might be somthing you should look into with that mod, the last thing you want to do is pull too much current from one cell as it could vent, especially at the higher wattages.

Oh and BTW its really worth checking your batteries are suitable (Sony VTC4s are pretty good as are VTC5s if you can get them as are Samsung 25Rs and LG HQQs) but be careful as there are a lot of fakes out there that are putting low drain batteries in a high drain wrap. I'd get on the vaping forums (Planet of the vapes, Vaping underground and UK Vapers are the ones I go to for info) and get learning about power calcs, high wattage vaping and coils quick sharp. There's been a few cases of people trying to run before they can walk and ending up with their atomiser embedded in their face.

What was your new RDA?

 

[weepete]

Here's a handy online calculator for various things

Steam Engine main page

And here's a good site with battery info:

Torchy the Battery Boy: 18650 Batteries / Chargers

Torchy is who I get all my 18650 batteries from.

 

[AlanKlein]

The wife and I are still trying to get the father-in-law to try vaping.

His current daily setup is 4 packs of Marlboro Red.

I smoked 2 1/2 packs of Newport a day for 35 years and stopped 21 years ago with the help of Nicotine Anonymous.

Nicotine Anonymous offers help for those who desire to live free from nicotine

Nicotine Anonymous is a non-profit 12-step fellowship of men and women helping each other live nicotine-free lives. Nicotine Anonymous welcomes all those seeking freedom from nicotine addiction, including those using cessation programs and nicotine withdrawal aids. The primary purpose of Nicotine Anonymous is to help all those who would like to cease using tobacco and nicotine products in any form. The Fellowship offers group support and recovery using the 12 Steps as adapted from Alcoholics Anonymous to achieve abstinence from nicotine.

 

[Stormchase]

on year 9 of vapeing. currently have a RONNIN tank with .6 coils. top fill and i can change coils with full juice. I forget the name of my mod... 80 watt cooking at 35-40 with the temp at 260. current setup cost 70 bucks. good clouds. I have spent thousands and its the better one so far. I dripped for a couple years an burned out of building decks. juice wise i do premium. my favorite is Propaganda brand " Illuminati". i could drink the stuff! 120 ml runs $75. second is Time Bomb "TNT" runs a couple bucks cheaper. $72 i think. all at 3-1.5 mg. i get a contrasting house flavor to stop flavor lock.

 

[weepete]

Sweet, you must have got in pretty early on the vaping thing then!

 

[Stradawhovious]

juice wise i do premium. my favorite is Propaganda brand " Illuminati". i could drink the stuff! 120 ml runs $75. second is Time Bomb "TNT" runs a couple bucks cheaper.

Any idea on what the VG\PG blend on the propaganda liquids might be? I checked their site, and couldn't find anything. I assume it's a fairly high VG if you're firing it at .6 ohms... I wouldn't mind giving this one a try.

 

[Stradawhovious]

In looking for new vape juice vendors, I stumbled across this...

ZampleBox | Best E-Liquid & Best E-Juice Subscription | Best Vape Liquid

It seems to be the "jelly of the month club" for people who vape. It's a recurring monthly service that sends you 3, 6, 0r 11 bottles of juice per month, at random, based on a flavor profile you set up before hand. Price is reasonable... and they seem to have all premium juices.

I signed up for their "Gold" package which is 6 bottles (80-100ml) per month, and it's only $29.99 delivered. If I were to buy 90ml of premium juice anywhere else it would be over $60.

Seems like a good way to try new things and save some cash. I realize they won't all be winners, but sometimes surprises are fun.

If anyone decides to sign up for this, let me know. If I put your names into the site I get free stuff and you get a discount. Or don't. Either way.

 

[rodbender]

Anyone want to tell me how to get rid of the throat hit i get from a vape I'm a 3 pack + smoker and tried the vapes but the throat hit make me cough worse