I’m using Nichrome 80 round 24 AWG in a RDTA setup. After putting on a new coil, I used to do the usual thing of firing it up without any wick to detect for hot spots. In the process the wire would lose its sheen. I don’t really do that anymore because I’ve been using the same setup and know pretty quickly if there are hot spots, so I skip that step altogether and put the wick in right away, meaning that the wire still has that shiny sheen to it.
Haven’t noticed any difference in taste/quality, but should I be concerned in any way, especially regarding health, of not burning off the wire sheen? E.g., especially if there’s some sort of coating that necessitates burning that off. Just don’t want to be inhaling anything that I don’t need to.
3 Likes
In the process of making the wire used to make a coil the manufacturer adds a light oil to the wire. Pre burning a coil burns that oil off. Pulsing the fire button at lower wattage till the smoke stops coming off the coil is recommended.
9 Likes
In addition to what @rcleven said, you’re also burning off any human oils and salts from your handling the wire. Plus it’s good to check it’s firing properly … you could have a hot leg.
8 Likes
I take it you’ve never watched M.A.S.H. It’s “Hot Legs”. Plural, not singular. Just ask Frank.
Gull darn young whipper snappers.
4 Likes
Even experienced builders pre-burn the coil. Lightly pulsing hotspots are random, plus the oil makes it a must.
For health reasons
Just don’t get sidetracked. I’ve built RDAs, RBAs, RTAs, RDTAs, gennys, and even rebuilt podmod coils a few years back. I was rebuilding and wicking an RDA and forgot to put the cap back whilst in the middle of a conversation and burnt my lips on the coil.
I have been building since 2015-2016, but errors can and do happen still.
Note to self was to not rebuild whilst my partner was trying to have a convo with me.
Not to mention the burning of coil marks into your fingertips or thumbs over the years.
2 Likes
AKA kissing the dragon. 
Luckily, I’ve never done that.
Same here. I started with rebuilding Nautilus BVC coils with SS early 2016 from Rip Trippers before he became a caricature of himself. Nearly everything afterwards was quite easy … till I reached 1.5mm Caliburn G coils. Those took a few tries. 
Yes nautilus was great tbh at the time, the UD belus when built right was good too I got 3 prototypes given me for the belus 2 by UD but didn’t like the releasesd second version the prototypes we’re better, and the Atlantis RBAs still fit in the boros and the nautilus coils but now much better RBAs out now for AIOs I like my cloud Mods cloud v1 v3 v4 RTAs and the First Cloud Mods boro RBA. I have been debating on if the buy the Cloud X
But I still use my Dvarws throughout the week but then I look in my cupboard and think I don’t need anything else now last RTA I bought was the Fat Rabbit MTL V2 and it’s just sick an easy to build wick RTA 4ml never leaked once.
But these Xros pod Mods and are just so convenient
Picked a few up last year and just stacking up used pods for now to spend time
Because Luckily there’s kits for Xros pods to remove base. And swap out that little mesh coils and rewick I have 50 new mesh coils to play with when I have time to rebuild a few pods at a time.
Yeah rip tripper went a little strange. He used to have some great build videos guides was ahead of others way back.
I also used to like watching another YT reviewer Ohmboy Josh, he has not put anything out in a long
while the mini josh explained how he made his builds. Found some great guides from him and Rip Trippers way back when.
.
But I have now just gone back to basics as this hobby took too much time up building fancy wires stocking up on all sorts of different wires different cotton different RBAs even diy mixing having like 10 different strawberries and blueberries blackcurrants concentrate creams creams and literally hundreds of other flavors has taken over half the kitchen cupboard space plus the time it’s consuming when I should be just kicking back and enjoying myself.
Especially now my eyesight not what it once was either.
So have opted for mainly single coil RBAs AIO RTAs as the years went by.
Being more conservative with juice consumption too mainly because misses make me clean the windows and mirrors if vaping indoors during winter.
Thing just Evolved from clouds bro clouds on Mechs
to sqounk mods back to AIOs
which then also led me back to single battery mods low wattage builds
Single cell mods
I have found the mixes I mainly like now.
Which makes things a little simpler I can switch up to using whatever at home and then skip a pod in my pocket for walking the dog or going out.
Whilst keeping my nicer stuff at home.
I even built a sqounk mod out of a noisy cricket v2 mod and posted it online years ago on a vaping forum showing how I did it.
I have also been fortunate enough to have pre
Stocked up on freebase before TDP hit and also picking up the odd bottle shots here and there
Lots of supplies to keep me going if they ever did ban it or restrict things in good until I decide to give up.
3 Likes
Ohmboy Josh was also a fave of mine. The first time he did mini Josh I was very surprised. Then maybe 2 years ago I see mini Vic. LOL
I also still have a Bellus. I was using Titanium in it, but the hold down screws kept loosening, so that was a bother. I think I put it down after a week, never to be used again. Then IIRC a Griffin 25, and went through a tankful in a few hours at 80 watts. This hobby was gonna become expensive with alot of juice consumption. So I bought another RDTA that iJoy Limitless with 5 or 6 different build decks. It was the (by far) most dense flavor I ever had. My wallet hated me. So I went single coil and been happy ever since.
I bought a Serpent (wife stole that) so I replaced it with a Serpent 25, Ammit to Ammit 25, now stuck on the OG Taifun GT4 also a 25mm. I was in heaven, so bought 3 Taifun GX’s same build deck RDTAs.
Today I’m vaping 2 Boro’s, 1 with a Maven RBA at 36w, the other with a Psych at 30w. And a pod at 15w. My submarine (favorite) has the 510 connector stuck inside, with the positive pin loose.
Same here.
1 Like
Back when TI wire was the thing, you couldn’t dry burn the wire, so some of us would take a paper towel with alcohol on it and run the wire through it a couple of times before coiling. I got into the habit of doing that with any single wire builds. Pretty surprising how much gunk is on them.
3 Likes
I dry burn everything. Single wire Ti01 usually around 10 watts, as well as wipe it in a paper towel like you. I still use it in some boros occasionally at around mid 20’s watts.
Probably back around 8 years ago Temco and Sandvik formed a vape specific company Vapowire selling Kanthal, Titanium, Nickel 200 by the spool. I managed to get quite a lot for free from a store that just couldn’t sell it as well as some ‘Invar 36’ (I had never even heard of it but it’s at steam engine). It was all pretty clean.
https://imgur.com/22-24-26g-ti01-from-left-to-right-f9sJcDy