Im going to strip one down for the switch and connectors then use the parts with one of my spare RC Li-Ion cells I have knocking around, it's most likley going to be one of these
Nazamataz's LoonGTotem Review
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My guess is that htey are doing so to keep the batteries exclusive to their product so we're forced to buy from them
Yup- the threads are a tight fit and were quite hard to get out- I screwed on some dead atomizer cartridge, just kept wiggling it tryign to be careful not to yank the wires out, and fortunately got hte threads out with only one broken wire- had to do some cobbling of soldering more wire on, but got it working- Now, the threads of the loong are just the tiniest fraction smaller (of course) than the SmartFixx battery and it doesn't fit as tight, but I think a bit of soldering will hold the threads in the SmartFixx battery- will have to mess with that more tomorrow. Gimme a little bit to fidn me camera- will try to get clear enough pics- I'll also show a tip I discovered to keep the paper on the loong cartridge instead of it gooping off & revealing hte metal underneath
Alright- here's a couple of Pics- the first one is the loong battery with the threads already taken off- you can see the tiny wires- one blue, one yellow (and believe me these wires are much tinier than they appear in this blown up picture- kinda hard to work with they are so thin)
Second pic is the threads all soldered up and ready to be popped into the black SmartFixx battery- you can see the bits of solder- the solder gun I used was too big for hte job, but we managed to keep the solder to a minimum, but there are still some globs despite our best efforts
Third pic is the whole thing assembled (it's a bit crooked because the threads didn't snug in tight- so will have to put a spot of solder to keep it all striaght and tight) You can see if you look close, a clear covering over hte end on the mouthpiece- this keeps the paper from gettign wet and coming off and exposing hte metal under hte paper- the plastic piece is the coverign that coems on the cartridges with a hole cut in center to allow vapor through
4'th pic is the whole thing assembled and working as you can see by the led
5'th pic is me exhaling a 14 hour old cartridge, and htis was with just a single drag and battery that is two hours off the charger now- not as fresh- vapor isn't quite what it is with fresh cartridge and fresh battery- but still not too bad- my cartridge that I'm using here is kinda worn out and refillign it isn't helping it at htis point very much- it's liek it's gettign clogged up and just now workign liek a fresh cartridge would- it's not bad at htis point, just not what a new cart can produce by any means- I had heck of a time tryign to capture the cloud on camera- and htis was hte best I could do- it just doesn't show up well with still cameras-
Second pic is the threads all soldered up and ready to be popped into the black SmartFixx battery- you can see the bits of solder- the solder gun I used was too big for hte job, but we managed to keep the solder to a minimum, but there are still some globs despite our best efforts
Third pic is the whole thing assembled (it's a bit crooked because the threads didn't snug in tight- so will have to put a spot of solder to keep it all striaght and tight) You can see if you look close, a clear covering over hte end on the mouthpiece- this keeps the paper from gettign wet and coming off and exposing hte metal under hte paper- the plastic piece is the coverign that coems on the cartridges with a hole cut in center to allow vapor through
4'th pic is the whole thing assembled and working as you can see by the led
5'th pic is me exhaling a 14 hour old cartridge, and htis was with just a single drag and battery that is two hours off the charger now- not as fresh- vapor isn't quite what it is with fresh cartridge and fresh battery- but still not too bad- my cartridge that I'm using here is kinda worn out and refillign it isn't helping it at htis point very much- it's liek it's gettign clogged up and just now workign liek a fresh cartridge would- it's not bad at htis point, just not what a new cart can produce by any means- I had heck of a time tryign to capture the cloud on camera- and htis was hte best I could do- it just doesn't show up well with still cameras-
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Here's one with a fresh cartridge in that I just snapped, sorry- couldn't add it to last post- had max pictures uploaded to that post- The cartridge in previous post with hte vapor is realy kinda shot- I'ver oversaturated the cartridge, and it's just not producing hte vapor as good as it should- however, the cartridges that have gone 30+ hours were working very well until about 26-27 hours or so, then they started producing vapor like the picture in previous post for a couple of hours until they finally died altogether, and that cartridge in previous post is hte one I used when testign out the project, and was hitting far too heavy, so it's possible that it's about burned out- the cartridge in the picture below is how htey normally work for a good many hours- much more than the 14 that I got with cartridge above post.
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Well my battery was still going strong too- but curiosity just got hte better of me and I took it apart anyways lol- I've still got enough of the wires remaining in the loong battery so that if I want to change back I can do so, but I'll just need to resolder it together to the threads- hopefully these SmartFixx batteries will hold out and work longer than the loong ones htough- will know better tomorrow
The SmartFixx did charge up in the loong charger- But somethign odd happeened when I screwed it into the charger- I heard a 'pop' sound and the led light glowed quite strong- I thought somethign had blown, unscrewed it- tried hte battery on a cartridge, everythign worked, so I screwed it back into charger, no pop this time, and everythign worked fine- charged up nice, works good- but not sure I'd trust it charging overnight- I checked to see if hte charger got hot or anythign, but it didn't. If anyone hears hte firetrucks rolling by, don't be alarmed, it's probably just my house goign up in flames- no need to panic lol
Well done Naz, this could be massive. I was wondering when some brave soul would take on modding batteries - guess the Loong is the perfect candidate, given how crap the pricing is on them.
Which Smartfixx is that? I don't have anything from SF so I'd be interested to know what model number/style the device is and if there are any other batts of similar diameter that you think might work.
I haven't soldered anything in years (and even when I did the blobs were like golf balls). Jeez, smoking was a walk in the park compared to this - it seems like I'm either dusting off an old skill or frantically trying to develop new ones every day.
Emp
Which Smartfixx is that? I don't have anything from SF so I'd be interested to know what model number/style the device is and if there are any other batts of similar diameter that you think might work.
I haven't soldered anything in years (and even when I did the blobs were like golf balls). Jeez, smoking was a walk in the park compared to this - it seems like I'm either dusting off an old skill or frantically trying to develop new ones every day.
Emp
The SmartFixx is the penstyle battery- I think it's a pretty standard one as several other brands atomizers will fit the SmartFixx- the one I got from Cashme fit hte battery just fine and I think NJoy atomizer will fit as well- probably several others- The SmartFixx battery tubing was just a wee bit larger- the loong threads don't snug in quite snug enough to keep it from twisting when screwing in the loong cart, but I'm goign to have to figure a way to snug it up to where it should be so I can screw in carts without it twisting. I think a spot of solder between the threads and the battery housing will work just finr- but will make it a little harder to take the htreads off if the battery goes dead and I have to take hte htreads out again to puti n new battery
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nice pics naz, that last one is impressive. looks like your face blew-up. is that common for a loong or is it just a good shot? i wonder if there is any batts out there that will accomodate a perfect fit, only one way to find out i guess. keep us posted on how long you're getting on a charge. im getting closer to that pay button.
edit: hey still wondering what any of you payed at customs for this jobby..what's the dealio?
edit: hey still wondering what any of you payed at customs for this jobby..what's the dealio?
Nope- that is common- for many hours- it just doesn't quit bellowing the vapor until either 1: I've gooped up the paper with refilling (for some reason I can only get abotu 10-12 refillings, and hten the whole hting just starts producing less and less vapor until it completely craps out, but these 10-12 refills last for hours, which has gottem me higher than 30+ hours reffilling, and as low as perhaps 20+ - When my cartridges have crapped out at 9 and 10 hours, it was due to the atomizer prematurely burnign the paper that surrounds the heating coil- I chalk it up to waiting too long before refilling, or perhaps less than optimum cartridge aseembly or something- One hting I'll say is that you kinda got to be on your toes and aware of hte vapor aftera coupel of hours. If it starts gettign hot, then it's time for a refill) and 2: As mentioned, the paper will burn that surroudns hte atomizer- when htis happens, it will keep producing vapor like you see in last photo, but it will be quite hot and taste bad, and hte whole kit and kaboodle will begin to break down and totally crap out in an hour or two if you don't refill it.
I'm smoking one right now that I've had in since 11:00 A.M, and it's still giving me clouds liek you see in the last photo, and I expect it will continue to do so for a good many hours still, judging by my experience with htese so far.
The fit can be solved with a crimper- believe me, the threads of the loong are just barely too small- it wouldn't take much crimping at all- the actual thread casing takes soem pressure to get down into hte battery casing, but it's just a wee bit too small and will twist if I'm not careful screwing on the cartridges.- I'm certain just a spot of soldering will solve this very easily- I should have doen the spot last night when I had the solder gun out, but was tired, and just wanted to try out how the battery worked.
The SmartFixx battery I used was an old one, and doesn't hold a charge as logn as a new one would (Incase the experiement didn't work- I didn't want to fubar a brand new one incase soemthign didn't work) and I'm goign to have to dissassemble hte whole thing and do the project over again with a new SmartFixx battery, but now I know it's fairly simple, I just have to get a smaller soldering gun for a bitm ore precise soldering.
I wasn't charged import or customs fee- just paid loongtotem, and that was that- no extra charges. But, I'm in U.S it might be different for UK- not sure
Added: The charge is still going on the SmartFixx battery- but again, this is an old SmartFixx battery, so not sure how much longer a new one would last. I will probably dissassemble this one soon and putit on new battery- but may take awhile- gonna use htis batrtery till it craps out I think- no sense throwing oen away that is still working ok
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Well that was a miserable failure- Broke the threads on the loongtotem tryung to crump in into the SmartFixx battery- should just gone with hte soldering liek I had originally planned- Crap! Warning- the thread casing is very thin and fragile. I don't know if I cna repair this, but even if I do, it's goign to be just that much more fragile. Ugggh- Oh well. live and learn.
I'm not sunk yet htough- I'm going to take the htreads out of another SF batter, file it down to where just the insert is left, solder that onto the broken loong threads (it was the insert part that cracked/broke, and it shoudl be golden- might even be an easier way to go about this as all I'll have to solder for wires is the positive wire- the ground wire will be already connected to the SF insert- Yep- I'm down but not out yet lol 
if it was my world naz you would get a medal of honour for services rendered to the e-cig alliance, sorry its not. best i could probably do is wangle a blue peter badge for you, but these are probably meaningless your side. please give that smartfix a decent burial, its lone bold stand against loong wont be forgotten.
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