So, more weird updates from the strange camp:
A month or so back, I reviewed the Aro tank, and in my experience, I was utterly tee'd off at the fact that three heads in a row tasted "burnt" in my opinion (far more burnt than the burnt of Kanger heads), and that with the Smoktech coils, I found that my experience was common in how these heads are extremely hard to get apart, extremely hard to get back together, and even can get stuck on the base quite often. Many who use this tank said they had to keep pliers handy whenever fooling with it. And alas, the last head of mine got stuck on the base (no tight screwing at all, I'm very careful with that) and I simply gave up on it.
So I rinsed the head and base together, let it sit for awhile collecting dust, and tonight, I try to see if I can get a decent vape out of it. Luckily, the 3rd head was the only one where the head column seemed to want to go back on and off with ease, though the head was stuck on the base, so I inspect the coil, no signs of damage or bad wrapping (actually, the Smoktech heads are the best wrapped that I've seen in pre-builds, go figure...), but a few strands of flavor wicks fall out and get a little dusty, so I decide to leave the flavor wick thinner and use a thicker juice (as it did leave some gaps.)
Right away pretty much, even with my thickest juice, Caramel Swirl by VCV, %100 VG, it flooded (however, it did taste ok), so I had to take the base back off, use a twisted up paper towel to poke in the hole in the bottom of the base, slowly dry it out that way, do the same with the inner coil chamber, and get it nice and generally dry. I take some unboiled organic cotton (that indeed says "Cleaned with peroxide" on the bag), and make a little tiny flavor wick on top of the remaining silica wick. I try it out, and flooding is corrected.
For the continuing vapes, I still get a clean flavor, but like my experience with flavor wicking the Protank heads, just hardly any juice flavor at all. Seems to be wicking fine, no bad tastes, a lot of vapor. However, with vaping with both the silica and cotton flavor wicks (wicked where the cotton isn't touching the coil), right away, I get a very dusty feel in the mouth, and I start coughing like crazy. Literally, a cough after every puff. I start to feel my asthma flaring up, and generally, the small testing starts to give me a pretty bad coughing fit. In combination with the dusty feel in my mouth with the sudden addition of the cotton flavor wick, and with how the vapor started tasting ever so silghtly cotton-y with that wick added (where it didn't with the flooded yet only-silica test), I knew that this reaction was indeed from the chemicals or dust in the cotton.
On a positive note, I think it's something that I managed to get a clean vapor out of the Aro tank - I do think the Smoktech coils are just junk and I'm impressed with my ability to make them taste ok.
On a negative note, the one thing I want to say to everyone here, because really, I do care about others' health in the vaping world: I highly suggest everyone boil their cotton.
I know a lot of people don't boil their cotton, and it has me a little worried. I know that I'm the guy who has a sensitive throat like it's something unreal, but you know, really, if it effects me, it could end up effecting anyone. I'm probably one of the lightest smokers here, so that's probably why I'm the guy who's always tasting bad tastes and gagging on drier hits. But I have a human body just like everyone else.
At the end of the day, everyone's free to do what they wish, but I want to say that I'm personally not testing with cotton again until I put forth the effort to boil and clean it, and really, with my reaction to it - with just inserting a little cotton in a head on top of another silica flavor wick, the cotton not even touching the coil - I really want to shout out and say that, you know, to me, it seems there really are some feedoffs from the cotton, and that I couldn't sit with it and accept it as a healthy thing, for what it was doing to my breathing and coughing. I'm sure many out there have a tougher throat than I do, and have more of an eagerness to vape with whatever simply wicks the best for them, but all I'm saying is that I really, really, really suggest cleaning the cotton. Not trying to make a scare, just posting my reaction!
Bonus question: Like on another thread, I do not understand why both the Protank and Aro heads, at best, are only giving me such muted, non-existent flavor. It'd be different if it tasted dry or there was little vapor, but there's a lot of it, and the vape generally seems pretty cool and moist. Raising the voltage didn't do much other than give more taste and feel from the cotton. Anyone know any remedies for this? I've already tried making virtually the most microscopic cotton wick I can...
A month or so back, I reviewed the Aro tank, and in my experience, I was utterly tee'd off at the fact that three heads in a row tasted "burnt" in my opinion (far more burnt than the burnt of Kanger heads), and that with the Smoktech coils, I found that my experience was common in how these heads are extremely hard to get apart, extremely hard to get back together, and even can get stuck on the base quite often. Many who use this tank said they had to keep pliers handy whenever fooling with it. And alas, the last head of mine got stuck on the base (no tight screwing at all, I'm very careful with that) and I simply gave up on it.
So I rinsed the head and base together, let it sit for awhile collecting dust, and tonight, I try to see if I can get a decent vape out of it. Luckily, the 3rd head was the only one where the head column seemed to want to go back on and off with ease, though the head was stuck on the base, so I inspect the coil, no signs of damage or bad wrapping (actually, the Smoktech heads are the best wrapped that I've seen in pre-builds, go figure...), but a few strands of flavor wicks fall out and get a little dusty, so I decide to leave the flavor wick thinner and use a thicker juice (as it did leave some gaps.)
Right away pretty much, even with my thickest juice, Caramel Swirl by VCV, %100 VG, it flooded (however, it did taste ok), so I had to take the base back off, use a twisted up paper towel to poke in the hole in the bottom of the base, slowly dry it out that way, do the same with the inner coil chamber, and get it nice and generally dry. I take some unboiled organic cotton (that indeed says "Cleaned with peroxide" on the bag), and make a little tiny flavor wick on top of the remaining silica wick. I try it out, and flooding is corrected.
For the continuing vapes, I still get a clean flavor, but like my experience with flavor wicking the Protank heads, just hardly any juice flavor at all. Seems to be wicking fine, no bad tastes, a lot of vapor. However, with vaping with both the silica and cotton flavor wicks (wicked where the cotton isn't touching the coil), right away, I get a very dusty feel in the mouth, and I start coughing like crazy. Literally, a cough after every puff. I start to feel my asthma flaring up, and generally, the small testing starts to give me a pretty bad coughing fit. In combination with the dusty feel in my mouth with the sudden addition of the cotton flavor wick, and with how the vapor started tasting ever so silghtly cotton-y with that wick added (where it didn't with the flooded yet only-silica test), I knew that this reaction was indeed from the chemicals or dust in the cotton.
On a positive note, I think it's something that I managed to get a clean vapor out of the Aro tank - I do think the Smoktech coils are just junk and I'm impressed with my ability to make them taste ok.
On a negative note, the one thing I want to say to everyone here, because really, I do care about others' health in the vaping world: I highly suggest everyone boil their cotton.
I know a lot of people don't boil their cotton, and it has me a little worried. I know that I'm the guy who has a sensitive throat like it's something unreal, but you know, really, if it effects me, it could end up effecting anyone. I'm probably one of the lightest smokers here, so that's probably why I'm the guy who's always tasting bad tastes and gagging on drier hits. But I have a human body just like everyone else.
At the end of the day, everyone's free to do what they wish, but I want to say that I'm personally not testing with cotton again until I put forth the effort to boil and clean it, and really, with my reaction to it - with just inserting a little cotton in a head on top of another silica flavor wick, the cotton not even touching the coil - I really want to shout out and say that, you know, to me, it seems there really are some feedoffs from the cotton, and that I couldn't sit with it and accept it as a healthy thing, for what it was doing to my breathing and coughing. I'm sure many out there have a tougher throat than I do, and have more of an eagerness to vape with whatever simply wicks the best for them, but all I'm saying is that I really, really, really suggest cleaning the cotton. Not trying to make a scare, just posting my reaction!
Bonus question: Like on another thread, I do not understand why both the Protank and Aro heads, at best, are only giving me such muted, non-existent flavor. It'd be different if it tasted dry or there was little vapor, but there's a lot of it, and the vape generally seems pretty cool and moist. Raising the voltage didn't do much other than give more taste and feel from the cotton. Anyone know any remedies for this? I've already tried making virtually the most microscopic cotton wick I can...
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The ops results vary greatly from the results of the majority on many things. That doesn't mean he is wrong about this or anything else, just that his experiences may not be in line with the larger group. 
