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Voltage & Wattage

wikkid1

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Greets undergroundvapers! :)

I'm sure there are many (many MANY probably) posts on this topic, and I have looked around through some of them, and some of my questions and concerns have been addressed, but some questions end up with conflicting answers, or answers that don't really answer the question (blanket statements like "If it tastes burnt the V/W is too high") but I'm basically looking for a simple answers to a couple simple questions... at least simple to those who understand the concepts. Being an electronics technology major I'm well familiar with the ohm's law and other basic concepts, it's how they're applied to vaping that's giving me pause.

So from what I'm understanding different coils (or resistances really) should be vaped at different Voltages to regulate the power output (wattage) to make sure the coil is hot enough but not overheating. I've got two kinds at the moment 1.8ohm (gladius and iclear 30) and 2.1ohm (aspire et-s) with their default coils, neither the tanks nor the coils are clones, not that it matters all that much.
Until now I've been manually adjusting the voltage on my ego ctwist clone and my mvp2 when I switch to a different resistance tank. Then just a few minutes ago I was (once again) looking at the power charts and noticed that something around 9.5W is suitable for just about any coil... *ding! and the idea bulb comes on*

Will the mvp adjust the voltage automatically to keep the wattage the same when resistance changes? I'll elaborate... I noticed that 9.5W or so is the top end of the ideal settings for all of my tanks - where I prefer to vape, warm but not burnt. So if I set the W to 9.5 will the mvp adjust from roughly [email protected] to about [email protected]? Or am I misunderstanding the whole concept...

Also, something that's been bothering me for a little while now... dual coil tanks. Testing the resistance using ohm-meter (or the mvp in my case, probably doesn't make much of a difference) does the readout show resistance per coil or the total resistance of both coils? Should the wattage be adjusted differently with dual vs single coil tanks?
 

BoomStick

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First, ignore the charts.
Variable wattage - you select a watt setting, the device looks at that, reads the total resistance of the attached load and calculates and applies the voltage required to achieve the watts you selected. The resistance is continuously checked so if you change the loads resistance the device will adjust volts accordingly to maintain the selected watts.

Something that needs to be understood is where the resistance is coming from. Coil wire comes in different thicknesses. Each different gauge has a certain amount of resistance per inch. Use more wire, resistance goes up. Less wire, it goes down. The thinner the wire, the more resistance per inch. Thicker wire, less resistance per inch. Also, putting two 1ohm coils in parallel gives you a total resistance of .5ohms. The point is it's not just about resistance. It's also about how much total wire your trying to heat. A single 32g coil measuring 1ohm and quad 22g coils measuring 1ohm require a vastly different amount of power to achieve the same temperature. An MVP with an 11w limit will not be able to power a dual coil dripper using thick wire. It will be fine for powering atomizers using coils made with really thin wire.
How you find the best setting for a particular atty and coil combo is screw on the atty. Set the mod to a low setting. Keep turning it up until you find the sweet spot for the particular combo of gear. I usually turn it up until I know I've gone too far, and then back it down until I know it's too low and just dial it in from there.
There comes a point when you have to quit thinking about it and play around with your gear. Understanding the theory of it all is important. Understanding how your gear performs when you apply all the theory is more important. Who gives a shit what some chart says. What setting makes your atomizer perform best for you?
 

wikkid1

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Thanks for a quick reply BoomStick :)
All you say is understandable and pretty common sense, perhaps I wasn't completely clear... I use the charts to make sure I don't damage the coils, which is basically why I'm so confused. Trying to figure out the proper ranges that I can use without damaging the coils/tanks/batteries.
Just starting out with vaping and it's not exactly a cheap hobby to get into so I'd rather not burn anything out and would rather like to prolong the coil lifespan to keep the costs down a little, at least until I go rebuildable (maybe) - wire and cotton is cheap.
 

Midniteoyl

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Thanks for a quick reply BoomStick :)
All you say is understandable and pretty common sense, perhaps I wasn't completely clear... I use the charts to make sure I don't damage the coils, which is basically why I'm so confused. Trying to figure out the proper ranges that I can use without damaging the coils/tanks/batteries.
Just starting out with vaping and it's not exactly a cheap hobby to get into so I'd rather not burn anything out and would rather like to prolong the coil lifespan to keep the costs down a little, at least until I go rebuildable (maybe) - wire and cotton is cheap.

Yes, the VW device will automatically adjust the voltage to suit to the coil's resistance and keep it at the wattage you desire.

And, to answer the other question: Everything you have will handle 9.5w, so if thats what you like, then set the MVP2 to 9.5w and let it adjust the voltage to get there..
 

BoomStick

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Yeah, I don't see an MVP hurting anything. Not with it's low power limit.
As for rebuildable's, get a mod with 20w or more and a well made kayfun and see what you're missing. A single coil rebuildable like a kayfun isn't hard to build at all. It's absolutely worth it.
 

wikkid1

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Thanks for your replies Midnite and Boom :)

Boom, the reason I said simply rebuildable as opposed to sub-ohm is because I don't really care for the whole sub-ohm thing. I'm thinking of rebuildable at about the same resistances I have in the current coils, maybe a little lower like 1.2-1.5.
I don't much care for insane clouds, plus the safety of sub-ohm'ing is questionable at best - none of them batteries were designed for the type of loads that sub-ohm builds require, actually Sony and (I think) Panasonic are quite a bit unhappy that their batteries are being used this way... of course the demand is insane so they're keeping their concerns quiet, at least until somebody gets hurt. There are many other factors there and I'm not going to go through them, don't want to turn this into a discussion on merits of sub-ohming...
Basically I'm considering it as 1. a type of hobby/something to do and 2. so that I don't have to buy them brand name coils and constantly worry about getting cheap clones, or sometimes just crappy builds by brand names. I mean, I could grab any RDA and stick a 2ohm coil in it and basically use it the same way I use my current tanks but without the pre-built coils.

Now since we're already talking about sub-ohm... either of you guys familiar with the new piece by Aspire? (Aspire CF sub-ohm battery) They're saying it can work for anything 0.3ohm to 1.0ohm... would be curious to see how it actually performs. If it works well it would probably be the cheapest way to get into SO'ing at only 30 bucks, and Aspire is generally pretty good quality from what I can tell.
 

madmonkey

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If I may chime in...I don't have a CF battery but I know they will fire the loads, but they will only fire them at what the battery can put out...from what I've seen and people asking me about it the regulator chip in it doesn't do a very good job and some of them just drain like an unregulated mech mod so your voltage drops as the battery's power level goes down. If you're not planning to sub ohm something it would be totally fine, but something like the Istick would probably be a better bet, I don't know what the new 30 and 50 watt versions fire down to but the 20 watt fires down to one ohm and it's just fine for driving higher coils like that up to 20 watts. I run my Kayfun at about 12 watts and it's usually a 1.3ish build.

What Boomstick was saying about different wire gauges and different power levels is very relevant...you really wouldn't want to use a thicker wire than 28 gauge if your planning to stay in the 1+ ohm range....I can build a .5 dual coil 26 gauge setup and be happy with it just firing on a mech just fine fully charged...or I can build a 24 gauge single coil that I've claptoned with .4 flatwire and unless I put it on a regulated mod and fire it above 28 watts it's going to perform terribly because of voltage drop... the build of the coil matters greatly....even with the same watts/resistance/voltage two different coils can have different ramp up times and that can vary the vape greatly.

The vape charts are based for the most part of averages heavily based off of high gauge nicrome built china premade coils (some newer ones have sub ohm numbers but still have to take into account these coils.) Nicrome burns out more easily than a Kanthal coil will. The best way you're going to get the best taste is to turn your mod all the way down and then turn up till you're happy with the taste....the Aspire/Innokin coils are mass produced and no matter what some will last a long time, some will last a day.

I don't use the Innokin tanks but the older style dual coil Aspire ET-S heads don't like high voltage...I don't care what they printed on the damn things I think out of 20 something heads I could run one higher than 4 volts without it burning up instantly before I gave up on them....where as the never style BVC single coil heads are made with a thicker wire. If you have one of the dual coil heads and one of the BVC coil heads the BVC is going to take longer to heat up at the same voltage even though it's only a single coil and it will run at a higher voltage because of the thicker wire and do so without burning out as long as it's wicking right. Those coil heads are tiny and they heat up very fast even at lower voltages, it makes them..."touchy" for lack of a better word.

Those dual coil heads are made with super thin wire and they just heat up super quick and burn themselvs out so I understand your concern about not wanting to blow all your money on coil heads...most of us are vaping on a budget. A coil burns out one of two ways...the wicking material gets clogged with use and age and can no longer wick properly, or the coil gets too hot and one of the leads snap. I am not telling you which one too use but if you're going for life the BVC heads might be a better bet for the money, they just seem to be build more ruggedly...

I hope some of this helps...
 

wikkid1

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Thanks madmoney! The BVC coils are the ones I think I like best anyway... for some reason I just don't like the BDC ones, I can never get a consistant vape with those, the dual coils that have the exposed wicks I do like but it feels like anything below like 40% full tank ends up as dry hits. So that pretty much leaves me with BVC, so far haven't found anything wrong with them to complain about :cool:
 

madmonkey

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Yeah, no one likes the BDC heads...we're all nice to them, we don't want to hurt their feelings, but they suck...years ago the whole "dual coil" thing started in the Cartomizer years....honestly I think it was fad type thing done to hype up the sales claiming "more coils, more vapor, more flavor." And that was true...kinda.....BVC heads are basically mini cartomizers you screw into a tank especially made for them....what people sometimes forget to mention was that dual and triple coil cartomizers were also a huge pain in the ass...when they worked right they were awesome sure...but because they are vertical coils that were stacked and spaced in the tube they often would wick unevenly and one coil would dry out and burn it's part of the filler while the other one was wicking fine that was closer to the holes punched at the bottom of the carto...one burned coil still ruined the damn thing...then when clearomizers came out they were single coil designs because they were still figuring out how to make clearomizers and the space for the coil was smaller and one coil was easier to fake their way threw with it....then as time went on the dual coil clearo's came out to entice the dual coil carto lovers over, and they're still working the bugs out with dual coil clearo heads IMHO...I say this because now they're coming out with the BVC and the sub ohm heads and even Kanger's Subtank OCC heads are once again single coil....they haven't worked out a good first attempt at a dual version. RDA's are different because they have larger chambers, use thicker and better wires and if they're designed for dual coils you've got the room to work with them and work them right...not just trying to cram more coils into something designed for just one. :)
 

wikkid1

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Those are kind of my feeling on BDC, they're just sucky. The nasty thing is that when I went to the local B&M they didn't have any single-coil tanks for sale. I ended up getting a gladius because I needed a new tank - and I hate the damm thing. Then I ordered the aspire tanks (et-s I think) from MVB and these are great, small-ish but still great.
 

madmonkey

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I've got a couple ET-S glass tanks but I prefer the Mini Nova glass one's for those series of Aspire tanks...I don't use eGo batteries much anymore and I like using ceramic or delrin drip tips with them because I use my cheap stuff for work and I work outside...if you've ever bit a freezing metal driptip not thinking about it and warming it up cause it's been in your pocket...well...you only forget once :) I love Innokin stuff, don't get me wrong. I still say they make the most reliable eGo batteries and before I lost my VTR it was my favorite workhorse...I just never got into their tanks, I prefered Kanger for how simple they are to rebuild and even though I am disappointed with their hit and miss quality of their dual coil stuff, I am looking forward to getting a Sub Tank when the prices drop...I don't need anything more than the gear I have so to justify buying stuff I wait till it's been out for awhile, had the bugs worked out a bit and the price has dropped in favor of the "next big thing". I've vaped this far with out it, I can wait a bit longer :)
 

wikkid1

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Innokin seems to make good stuff, I don't like the gladius because of it's air-flow mainly, but that's the main selling point of the piece... just made an un-informed impulse buy :/
I'm really enjoying this et-s and it's actually surprisingly large. The details say 1.6 or 1.8 but I'd say it's more like 2.5 or so because it seems that the entire tip is hollow. Like I'd have it full to a point where I can't see the air bubble in the little view ports but if I tip it I can see that there's plenty of room to add more juice. It's currently pushing the iclear 30 into second place for me, the iclear seems to soak up juice at an extraordinary rate, I feel like I can almost watch the juice level drop as I'm hitting it - not liking this multi-wick thing that they tried with this tank, but it tastes wonderful, when it's able to wick quick enough.
 

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