I’m not really much of a reviewer, let me get that out of the way before I expound. I won (much to my shock) a “gleem” Sourcemore contest about 6 weeks ago for a Vandy Vape Rath RDA. The item was on pre-order on their site, but a nice representative sent me a confirmation email stating that they would ship me one upon availability. About thee weeks later the same rep emailed that they were shipping and they asked me to post a public “social” review. Not sure if this is the forum they had in mind but I am obliging.
Out of the box it is nothing terribly innovative or ascetically intriguing. The stainless steel version I received is substantial (thick barrel and top-cap/af control), the 24mm atty deck large, clamp styled but more conducive to a single coil than dual (although I have seen reviews with dual coils). The top airflow honeycomb holes are angled down towards where the coil sits on the postless ceramic clamp style deck. The ceramic clamp walls are anchored (pressfit) with 5mm slotted flathead screws (nice and beefy).
I have had no interest in standard dripping lately since getting hooked on the Pulse V2 squonking mod, so I immediately decided to install the included bf pin. The standard pin comes out easily, but then another screw that holds the deck together needs to be removed; the deck parts fell out on my desk. There are the 2 clamp mechanisms (with the set screws attached) and a little tiny seemingly plastic “t” part, that I believe is merely a spacer to raise the ceramic clamps level with the top of the deck (the positive and negative post walls). Well even with my +1.5 readers the part was too f’n small for my fat fingers to play with and I decided that it was worth a chance to forget about it.
I figured that if I was able to get the squonk pin in and it held the rest of the deck together, worst that would happen is that I would have an atty short and have to reassemble it. Besides, I was able to install the pin and clamps on the first try although they were anything but intuitive. (I watched DJSLB review the atty and although he installed the squonk pin he didn’t include that in the video, I’m sure intentionally).
They included (2) fused ni80, 3mm diameter claptons @.28 ohms ea; they looked pretty clean so I used one of them. There is room for up to at least a 4mm coil, probably only limited in size to the total length of the coil. They should have included a coil sizer but I cut the leads to 5mm (thanks Djslb).
This is getting long for an RDA review (you see why I don’t do these much). Anyway I got it wicked and took it for a vape. …I’ll cut to the cons now: The tolerances of all the “0” rings is awful, they are way too tight even with a double lube job. The af control wide open is quite a loose draw for my liking, and the ability to close it down without getting uneven airflow is limited to making it only semi loose (as wide open as I can tolerate). - Did I mention that it is virtually impossible to change the airflow even though there is beautiful knurling when the atty is attached, due to the 0 rings. The barrel also is almost impossible to put on the deck due to the terrible tolerances and the 0 rings. I am using an old broken mod to align to the top-cap and af control for fear of damaging my working mods, the thing is so damn stiff.
The vape is airy and fairly flavorful, the ni80 claptons turned blue and tasted off, so I put in a 22guage round ss316 7 wrap build. Beyond all the flaws and the fold out instruction manual in 8 languages (that doesn’t identify the plastic “t” part or how the deck dissembles / assembles), it vapes.
So finally in conclusion, thanks very much Sourcemore! I would be exasperated had I spent $35 and waited for 6 weeks to try this one out, but now KNOWing it intimately, and all it’s intricacies, it’s a good option when I want to chuck clouds from a single coil RDA. -end
