Wet burning Titanium Coils to clean

Hardware Atomizers and Tanks
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I should put a disclaimer riight up top. [DISCLAIMER:] Building, using, maintaining Titanium coils is for advanced users only! Improperly firing can cause damage to coils, mods, or you(!) Never follow any of my advice. Accept personal responsibility and as always advised, never dry fire titanium coils as they can produce toxic chemicals you subsequently can inhale.

Ok… My only con when using Ti wire is the inability to burn off the crust. Also my particular brand of wire has some machine oil or other residue which I must remove on a freshly wrapped coil. So I have two problems new coils and used coils. I found a solution and it’s been working perfectly. My coils don’t change color and look unchanged after I am done. Remember the goal is to not overheat while dry or trigger “Low Atomizer” on your TC mod.

I was switching out flavors and rewicking. I screwed apart the tank and rinsed under water to get out the old juice, then I tried to carefully rinse some juice from the base/build deck with the wicks in place, and the wicks got water on them. The coils were crusty so I screwed it back in the mod and pulsed it with the water-soaked wicks. I watched them sizzle and black crust coming off onto the cotton. What?! I fully fired it and watched them sizzle relatively clean without any discoloration of the metal itself.

I was actually able to freely and fully fire as long as the wicks had a nominal amount of water with no bad visible negative change/effects to the wire. Now here’s where my disclaimer comes in. I didn’t then send these off to the lab and there is plenty of titanium wire vape-hate out there, so attempt at your own risk!.

However if you try you may notice a similar experience. For me if the wire is still it’s original metallic color it makes some sense to me that no toxic compounds were created. Also water boils at 212 degree F so temperature is quickly controlled as long as they are wet with water. When I’m done there is still a little blackness on top which wipes of with a dry paper towel.

So what about new wicks and new virgin coils? Being a cheap bastard I save all those Japanese cotton layers you peel off …what? I just put 'em in a little baggie. Well I just found a use for them! Wick up your virgin Ti coils with some of that waste cotton skin …add some water and fire that oily manufacturing funk right offa there. In my case the wicking actually changes color (and I can smell oil) …I slide it down a little and fire again (wet of course).

Hmm would work for any coils …oh wait you can just dry fire your SS or Kanthal coils, but this method still might help to not anneal any virgin coil wire …also make sense to perhaps use distilled water for this especially if you have hard water. Using distilled water might eliminate any other chemicals you might expose your Ti wire to while Wet Firing.

NOTE: use your allen key to check for tightness of the coils on your build deck

Remember DO NOT DRY FIRE titanium wire vape coils

Vape on B’s!

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I know Ti shouldn’t be dry fired, but I do with 22ga Ti only. I lower my wattage to 15 watts which doesn’t glow the coil, but is sufficient to glow the crud. Then I water rinse right away.

I’ll definitely try your method. It seems a lot safer than what I’m doing… Thanks for the share.

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Way to go bro, thanks! :+1:

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The “toxic chemicals” you mention is titanium oxide. It is a white powder. The actual likelihood of getting the coil hot enough to actually release any into your respiratory system is pretty slim. Also in question is the actual toxicity of it to begin with.
Pro_Vapes, don’t you handle a lot of titanium oxide on a daily basis? I thought you mentioned that before.
Titanium oxide is mostly used as pigment in white paint. Do you have white paint in your house? Chances are you do, and it is pigmented with titanium oxide.
Just saying.

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Yep… tons of it over a 30 year period… me and my co-workers. It’s among the mildest materials we use. No recommended PPE (Personal Protective Equipment).

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I’ve been dry firing my Ti for a good while now. I remember when I first started using it I was a bit intimidated by it and what I had ready about Ti oxide. Now I do around 25 watts and pulse. Sometimes I’ll get them too hot and they’ll glow…here comes the Ti O. When that happens I just get out the toothbrush and abrasive toothpaste and go at it. Right now I’m getting around 6 month off a single 22ga Ti build.

If you decide to try the toothpaste thing just remember to get all the toothpaste out. It likes to hide in nooks and crannies.

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That is a great idea to dry burn with the water. Can’t wait to try it. I can never seem to get the coils clean so I have just been tossing them and making another.

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This is why I stick to the Kanthal A1 wire… I’ve accepted the fact I’m stupid, I do not know enough about metal and I don’t need to try new things.

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All I can say is Wow! I just tried your method on my .10 24 gauge duel build and it worked like a charm! I wonder how many times one can do this to a coil before having to rebuild? This just opened up a world of possibilities for me because I really like the flavor of Titanium, and I love a titanium clapton or fused claptons, however, the juice that I vape tends to gunk up my coils rather quickly, therefore, I tend to stick to more simpler builds because I am replacing them every week or so. But now, I can clean the my builds and make them last longer! Yay! Great accident!

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It should be possible to clean the titanium coils in warm water with a small brush to remove any gunk

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I have tried that and the black gunk doesn’t come off all that easy, but with the method listed in this thread, it came off really easy on regular simple coils and I will try it on my claptons to see how well it works…it may work better to get the gunk out of all of the nooks and crannies…or making it easier to brush away the gunk under water after burning it maybe…idk but I’m gonna try!

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