What’s up vapefam!
SirRisc here with another gear review!
I’ll be looking into an RTA today that is, in my humble opinion, underestimated and often unnamed in discussions.
The OBS brand seems to lack familiarity among vapers and it shouldn’t.
So I’m here to tell you a bit more about one of their RTAs, the OBS Crius.
The OBS Crius was sent to me for the purpose of this review by FocalEcig.com!
Premise.
OBS is a relatively unknown brand and gets little attention unfortunately.
Nevertheless does OBS release quality gear like the TVTC tank or this Crius, they even had a dripper a while back that wasn’t all that bad.
But the market is oversaturated with gear from bigger companies, and a smaller brand like OBS gets overlooked.
So why should you get an OBS Crius over let’s say a Subtank? Let’s find out!
Specifications.
- Stainless Steel
- Quartz glass
- Adjustable, brass 510 pin
- 4.2ml capacity
- 22mm diameter, 65mm height
- Quartz glass widebore driptip
- Juiceflow control
- Side filling
- Wick retention ring
Packaging.
This kind of packaging seems to have become a standard lately, a clear plastic casing with a cardboard wrap around it.
The wrap shows two OBS Cruis(eses, Crïi, Criu?), one in silver and one on black with the branding next to it.
In the box you’ll see the usermanual first, which is very nicely and extensively illustrated.
It shows you how to fill the tank, how to take it apart, how to clean it, how to wick… Very nice!
Underneath the usermanual are the goodies… the RTA itself, a spare Quartz glass, and a yellow screwdriver (blue screwdriver model).
If you lift up the foam insert, you’ll find a bag of cotton and a bag of coils, spare screws and a couple of spare o-rings.
The package…
Performance.
The OBS Crius is an underestimated RTA in comparison with things like the Bellus or the Subtank.
And it shouldn’t be, because it performs very well and it actually looks quite nice too.
There are a few things it does differently from the others, like the wick retention ring or the side filling mechanism which slides up.
The first thing you’ll notice when taking it out of the plastic casing is that it’s very light.
It’s made up from a thinner stainless steel than most other RTAs and this does have a few consequences.
For one, it will heat up a fair bit quicker. In itself this doesn’t really affect the performance but it will change the flavor slightly.
The other consequence is that it’ll retain heat for a lesser period of time, it will cool down much faster making it an excellent tank to use with temperature control.
Which brings me to the next point…
I’ve been using the OBS Crius almost exclusively with stainless steel on a temperature controlled mod (the Joyetech Evic VTC Mini, which will be my next review) and it’s excellent!
The tank is easy to build on, easy to wick, and performs like a champ.
From what I’ve gathered the OBS Crius has been sold with a few different decks so far, this one being the two post deck (not the Velocity deck, but equally easy to work on).
This means it’s a two post deck with ample room that can take coils which measure up to 3mm in inner diameter without having to struggle too much to fit them, in fact it’s the first RTA I own that hasn’t been a struggle to fit somewhat bigger coils.
The postholes are nice and big and will fit thicker wires easily too, the screws can be a bit sharp and clip your wire though.
You can solve that by sanding down the screwpoints with a very fine grain ever so slightly.
Wicking is made easy due to the wick retention ring on the deck, and the juicecontrol takes care of the more viscous juices.
That said, max VG is no issue for this tank, it’ll keep wicking like a boss.
The wick retention ring is not removeable, and I was sceptic about that at first but it makes sense.
It’s part of the juiceflow control mechanism and will position your wicks 100% correct each and every time.
The juicecontrol simply works. You can leave it wide open for max VG juices, or you can grab the glass and turn it to close slightly if you have higher PG content in your juice.
I’ve tried wicking the OBS Crius with rayon, KGD and regular organic cotton balls, and none of them failed to wick properly because of the wick retention ring.
It’s freakishly easy and freakishly forgiving, but it can leak if you neglect to stuff enough wick in the channels.
On the bottom you’ll find two big airflow holes that could probably fit a small plane.
The base is essentially entirely hollowed out and two big airflow holes provide the coils with plenty of cooling from the bottom out.
The airflow control ring has a range of 90 degrees and is not removeable, its knurling also functions as the grip to unscrew the tank from the base.
On the top you notice a black imprint that says UP. There’s also some strangely formed knurling on the top that provides grip to pull the topcap upwards.
Doing so will reveal a big hole in the barrel where you can quickly fill your tank.
The top is held in place with o-rings so it can leak slightly in your pocket if you’re not careful, having a vapeband cover the part is a good idea!
Filling the tank is easy but also requires a bit of a routine, because you’ll need to close down the juicecontrol if you don’t want it to start leaking through the airflow.
Note that this has happened to me with any of the previously named wicking materials.
Aesthetics.
The OBS Crius has a bit of a modern design, the knurling is made to distinguish the tank from all the others and OBS succeeded in that.
Its large glass barrel is quite nice and shows the chamber with two logos, the OBS logo and the (in my opinion) beautiful Crius logo.
The wide glass driptip takes some getting used to but is actually quite nicely done and matches the large glass section perfectly.
The OBS Crius has a styling that may not please everyone, but I think it looks great.
Pros and Cons.
Pro.
- Very forgiving in terms of wicking
- Looks great!
- Knurling everywhere it matters
- Big deck for larger coilbuilds
- Sidefilling works perfectly and quickly
- Glass driptip
- Ample airflow
- Juice flow control
- Spare glass included
- Laughs at max VG
- Best illustrated manual of 2015
Con.
- Need to close the juicecontrol for sidefilling
- Loud and turbulent airflow
- Screws are a bit sharp
In conclusion.
The OBS Crius is often overlooked but it shouldn’t be. The Crius is an excellent RTA and it’s very forgiving.
It does clouds just fine, but the strong point is flavor. Oh man, the flavor… especially with stainless steel builds in TC mode.
The ability to control the juiceflow is simple and works perfectly for those thinner juices but it’ll take max VG like a boss too, making it an excellent tank for both flavorchasers and cloudchasers alike.
In essence this could be considered a bastard child of the Innokin iSub Apex (flavor) and the Smok TFV4 (clouds bro) in terms of performance.
Would I buy another one? HELL YES! Should you buy one? If you’re looking for a good allround RTA, HELL YES!
In closing I would like to thank FocalEcig.com for sending me the OBS Crius for review!
And of course all of you who read my reviews, thank you very much!
I’m always looking for more opportunities to review! Do you think your stuff has what it takes? Get in touch!
I can be reached on my website, via DM on Instagram, on the Facebook page, via DM on Reddit, or via DM on ELR.
#staycloudy !
SirRisc disappears in a cloud of lemon cereal scented vapor
… And that’s with building a dual coil 24g ss, installing them(I loooove the velocity deck). Omg the flavor in TC ss on the x cube 2, which works really good with no tinkering at all 
