So, I read some reviews and watched a couple of videos about the Blu Plus+, most quite positive, and was intrigued by the system. However, I didn't want to spend $40 on a starter kit that I'm not likely to use regularly. Blu then came out with the $15 Plus Xpress kit that basically doesn't include the portable charging case. So, I picked one up from a Walgreens with a coupon for $8 off. Taxes and all, it cost me under $8. It also came with a $10 off coupon for a three pack of tanks. I picked up a pack of Vivid Vanilla and paid just over $5. It all totaled just a bit under $13. Not bad for a 510 battery and charger (both of which I needed to replace in my arsenal anyhow) and five tanks.
So, quality wise, it's standard Blu fare. The battery lasts me about 2 and a half hours between recharges and takes about 40 minutes or so to recharge. Not great, but not too bad. The charger works fine, nothing special there. All siad, though, Blu REALLY has stepped up their quality with the 510 batteries. A couple of hours out of a tiny, 62mm battery is not too shabby.
Really, the big "thing" here is the Blu tanks and that they don't use a polyfill cartomizer. It's apparantly a miniature clearomizer or glassomizer... without the clear or the glass parts. A tankomizer, if you will. Is all the hype deserved? I'll say this: they DO chuck out a lot more vapor than any cartomizer I've ever used with a stick battery. Flavors come in really powerfully, for better or worse, and a tank lasts me (moderate to heavy vaping) just about a whole day. Not bad for a tank that's the size of a carto. It keeps the length of the ecig at about 100mm, or about the standard size of a cigarette.
Here's an issue, though. The flavors: if you don't like the Blu flavors, you probably won't like these too much. They taste just like any other Blu flavor, just stronger. The Vanilla is perfectly fine and tastes like a vanilla flavored cake. Pretty pleasant, actually. I've always liked the Blu Cherry Crush, and those are still just as good in the tank format. Blu has a few new flavors for the tank system, too, but I haven't heard anything about them or had the opportunity to try them. The two included tobacco flavored tanks taste like cheap vending machine coffee, but so did the old cartos and the disposables. It's not horrible or even rbad, per se, but not particularly pleasant, either. Just kind of there. And I know from personal experience that the menthol flavor tastes like spearmint flavored cheap coffee. Taste is subjective, but there my opinion is.
If you can find a flavor you like, it's actually quite a nice system. Much nicer, even with the PCC that I didn't get, I'd imagine (it rapid charges the batteries in 20 minutes). However, there's one HUGE gripe that there's no getting around: The cost of the tanks. They're $15 for a three pack. Five bucks a piece. Five bucks a day for me. That's pretty ridiculous for what has to amount to something like 0.5 to 0.8 milliliters of juice. And, unless you're willing to get a drill out and cut a hole into the side of the tank, there's no way to refill these. That's pretty shady... and expensive. Oh, and no bulk discounts on the Blu webpage, either. Poo.
I really do like the kit for what it is and how it performs. It's really an awesome starter kit, especially the kit with the charging case. However, the price of those tanks is flat out obnoxious. I'm going to try my hand at drilling out and refilling a used tank with my own juice and see what the results are. It won't affect me too much since I don't have the PCC (the hacked tanks don't fit in the PCC once they're refilled, negating a whole lot of the usefulness of the case). Maybe I'll like it better if I can easily refill the tanks and can do it multiple times before the coils and/or wick burn out.
For now, though, even though it's a really nice system and certainly the best performing standard length cigalike on the planet, I really can't recommend the Blu Plus+ system... it's just too bloody expensive to replenish. We'll see if my opinion changes when I attempt to refill the spent tanks.
So, quality wise, it's standard Blu fare. The battery lasts me about 2 and a half hours between recharges and takes about 40 minutes or so to recharge. Not great, but not too bad. The charger works fine, nothing special there. All siad, though, Blu REALLY has stepped up their quality with the 510 batteries. A couple of hours out of a tiny, 62mm battery is not too shabby.
Really, the big "thing" here is the Blu tanks and that they don't use a polyfill cartomizer. It's apparantly a miniature clearomizer or glassomizer... without the clear or the glass parts. A tankomizer, if you will. Is all the hype deserved? I'll say this: they DO chuck out a lot more vapor than any cartomizer I've ever used with a stick battery. Flavors come in really powerfully, for better or worse, and a tank lasts me (moderate to heavy vaping) just about a whole day. Not bad for a tank that's the size of a carto. It keeps the length of the ecig at about 100mm, or about the standard size of a cigarette.
Here's an issue, though. The flavors: if you don't like the Blu flavors, you probably won't like these too much. They taste just like any other Blu flavor, just stronger. The Vanilla is perfectly fine and tastes like a vanilla flavored cake. Pretty pleasant, actually. I've always liked the Blu Cherry Crush, and those are still just as good in the tank format. Blu has a few new flavors for the tank system, too, but I haven't heard anything about them or had the opportunity to try them. The two included tobacco flavored tanks taste like cheap vending machine coffee, but so did the old cartos and the disposables. It's not horrible or even rbad, per se, but not particularly pleasant, either. Just kind of there. And I know from personal experience that the menthol flavor tastes like spearmint flavored cheap coffee. Taste is subjective, but there my opinion is.
If you can find a flavor you like, it's actually quite a nice system. Much nicer, even with the PCC that I didn't get, I'd imagine (it rapid charges the batteries in 20 minutes). However, there's one HUGE gripe that there's no getting around: The cost of the tanks. They're $15 for a three pack. Five bucks a piece. Five bucks a day for me. That's pretty ridiculous for what has to amount to something like 0.5 to 0.8 milliliters of juice. And, unless you're willing to get a drill out and cut a hole into the side of the tank, there's no way to refill these. That's pretty shady... and expensive. Oh, and no bulk discounts on the Blu webpage, either. Poo.
I really do like the kit for what it is and how it performs. It's really an awesome starter kit, especially the kit with the charging case. However, the price of those tanks is flat out obnoxious. I'm going to try my hand at drilling out and refilling a used tank with my own juice and see what the results are. It won't affect me too much since I don't have the PCC (the hacked tanks don't fit in the PCC once they're refilled, negating a whole lot of the usefulness of the case). Maybe I'll like it better if I can easily refill the tanks and can do it multiple times before the coils and/or wick burn out.
For now, though, even though it's a really nice system and certainly the best performing standard length cigalike on the planet, I really can't recommend the Blu Plus+ system... it's just too bloody expensive to replenish. We'll see if my opinion changes when I attempt to refill the spent tanks.
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