SirRichardRear
AKA Anthony Vapes on Youtube
VU Donator
Diamond Contributor
Member For 3 Years
Reviewer
Hi All, Anthony Vapes back here with my review of the Vandy Vape Paradox RDA, please see the bottom for disclaimers and links. Note: This is marked as a sample version.
Introduction:
The Paradox RDA is the latest RDAs from popular vape manufacturer Vandy Vape. They came onto the scene in 2017 with a ton of gear and have been a pretty hyped company ever since so probably don’t need no introduction. They’ve had a pretty good year IMO but have had some missteps along the way as well but their recent kylin II RTA was excellent so at minimum should have a strong finish to 2018. The paradox is a single coil restricted DTL RDA with an included squonk pin. It’s designed in collaboration with fix_RB reviews who i don’t know who that is but looking it up appears to be a russian youtube reviewer with a pretty good size following. It’s available in 2 colors SS, and Matte Black. Looking around online i see it around the 30 USD price range so typical price point for a VV atomizer.
Manufacturer's Specs
album
Initial Impressions
When I first got this RDA i was pretty impressed with the design of it. It’s not new or groundbreaking and pretty similar to a lot of single coil RDAs we’ve seen like the Mjölnir, flave, wasp nano, C4 etc in that it’s a single coil RDA with a similar deck design and a side airflow that goes through the posts. Still it’s a proven design that works well so i was curious to how it’ll stack up to the others.
Build Deck and Wicking (pics above)
Let’s talk about the build deck now. It’s a pretty basic 2 post deck. Coil leads will need to go opposite ways when wrapping like most decks this style. The main difference in this one compared to many (save for the flave RDA) is that instead of having post holes or post cutouts you use the head of the post screws to trap your leads to the deck. Normally not a big fan of that as that style has mostly died off save for a few stragglers (hastur mini and flave come to mind recently) but in this case the screw heads are simple massive so it makes it pretty easy to do. You just unscrew them a little, slide your coil leads in, then tighten down. Very simple and easy to build on. Not anything innovative but pretty similar to the design to my own Mjlölnir RDA because it just works and is easy to do. Also since it’s a top down it won’t twist leads on your flat wire like all of these style and plenty of room for some wide wires. The post screws are some nice massive good quality flat head screws and it comes with 2 spares so nicely done there. My only complaint on the deck which is a major issue however is the negative is not milled but instead screwed in. Now mind you it’s not the first one and won’t be the last one and not an issue on it’s own design wise (but is a dealbreaker for some) however this one caused some issues for me. The negative post doesn't stay in place well even when fully tightened down. You have to be really careful because when you screw down the negative post it can move and touch the wall of the juice well causing resistance to be jumpy. There is very little clearance there so you need to be really careful when building. I had to use a screwdriver to keep the negative in place when installing my coil. Not sure if anyone else pointed this out. Overall an excellent build deck that is really easy to build on even for beginners, outside of the issues with the negative post which killed it sadly. They should have milled it or put in a notch system to keep it in place.
Wicking on it is quite easy. It’s an RDA so nothing fancy just drop your leads to the bottom.
Performance
Performance wise, I used it as a Single Coil RDA only as intended. I ran 4 builds in this a fancy 3mm ID build, a fancy 3.5 mm ID build, a fancy 4mm ID build and 1 simple round 4mm ID build. For size I found it worked well with all those sizes and as many wraps as you can fit comfortably in it. I’d say 3-3.5mm ID is the ideal. The flavor is great one of the better single coil RDAs for sure and even worked great with the simple round wire. Overall a very good single coil RDA flavorwise.
Introduction:
The Paradox RDA is the latest RDAs from popular vape manufacturer Vandy Vape. They came onto the scene in 2017 with a ton of gear and have been a pretty hyped company ever since so probably don’t need no introduction. They’ve had a pretty good year IMO but have had some missteps along the way as well but their recent kylin II RTA was excellent so at minimum should have a strong finish to 2018. The paradox is a single coil restricted DTL RDA with an included squonk pin. It’s designed in collaboration with fix_RB reviews who i don’t know who that is but looking it up appears to be a russian youtube reviewer with a pretty good size following. It’s available in 2 colors SS, and Matte Black. Looking around online i see it around the 30 USD price range so typical price point for a VV atomizer.
Manufacturer's Specs
- Length:23.5mm
- Diameter:24mm
- Capacity:1.5ml
- G.W(included Package):105g
- Annular Airflow
- Top Dome Form Bell
- 1 Paradox RDA
- 1 ACCESSORY Bag
- 1 User Manual
- 1 510 Drip Tip
- 1 PEI Drip Tip
- 1 510 Adapter
album
Initial Impressions
When I first got this RDA i was pretty impressed with the design of it. It’s not new or groundbreaking and pretty similar to a lot of single coil RDAs we’ve seen like the Mjölnir, flave, wasp nano, C4 etc in that it’s a single coil RDA with a similar deck design and a side airflow that goes through the posts. Still it’s a proven design that works well so i was curious to how it’ll stack up to the others.
Build Deck and Wicking (pics above)
Let’s talk about the build deck now. It’s a pretty basic 2 post deck. Coil leads will need to go opposite ways when wrapping like most decks this style. The main difference in this one compared to many (save for the flave RDA) is that instead of having post holes or post cutouts you use the head of the post screws to trap your leads to the deck. Normally not a big fan of that as that style has mostly died off save for a few stragglers (hastur mini and flave come to mind recently) but in this case the screw heads are simple massive so it makes it pretty easy to do. You just unscrew them a little, slide your coil leads in, then tighten down. Very simple and easy to build on. Not anything innovative but pretty similar to the design to my own Mjlölnir RDA because it just works and is easy to do. Also since it’s a top down it won’t twist leads on your flat wire like all of these style and plenty of room for some wide wires. The post screws are some nice massive good quality flat head screws and it comes with 2 spares so nicely done there. My only complaint on the deck which is a major issue however is the negative is not milled but instead screwed in. Now mind you it’s not the first one and won’t be the last one and not an issue on it’s own design wise (but is a dealbreaker for some) however this one caused some issues for me. The negative post doesn't stay in place well even when fully tightened down. You have to be really careful because when you screw down the negative post it can move and touch the wall of the juice well causing resistance to be jumpy. There is very little clearance there so you need to be really careful when building. I had to use a screwdriver to keep the negative in place when installing my coil. Not sure if anyone else pointed this out. Overall an excellent build deck that is really easy to build on even for beginners, outside of the issues with the negative post which killed it sadly. They should have milled it or put in a notch system to keep it in place.
Wicking on it is quite easy. It’s an RDA so nothing fancy just drop your leads to the bottom.
Performance
Performance wise, I used it as a Single Coil RDA only as intended. I ran 4 builds in this a fancy 3mm ID build, a fancy 3.5 mm ID build, a fancy 4mm ID build and 1 simple round 4mm ID build. For size I found it worked well with all those sizes and as many wraps as you can fit comfortably in it. I’d say 3-3.5mm ID is the ideal. The flavor is great one of the better single coil RDAs for sure and even worked great with the simple round wire. Overall a very good single coil RDA flavorwise.