I can confirm after days of trial and error the taste is down to the coil. On the aga I had real issues with the small tail of wire between the mesh and the positive terminal so be mindful of that as well, I overcome this by taking 2 of the small nuts off and putting on the post a ball point pen spring cut to half the size larger than the post with a small washer sitting between that and the top nut allowing me to just slip the wire between the washer and the nut, it minimized the length of the wire between the post and the wick and makes it much easier to tinker with. I can not emphasize just how much easier this made life for me, I found that the 2 nuts under the one you fasten down would twist as i tightened and would either pull the top loop far tighter than it should be or give me a twisted sweeping tail resulting in a larger tail and a prone hot spot.
I had little success with coils wrapped out side of the unit and mesh and only got consistent results directly wrapping the coil on the mesh and then inserting. I found it best to start the wire wrap and then instead of just wrapping turn the wick and let it take the wire as it goes keeping slight tension on the wire, much more accurate for me and kept a more uniform wrap.
Try and hold the whole coil between your thumb and finger to hold it in place and insert. Tricky as it is you should be able to tighten in the negative end while still holding between your thumb and finger, with the device in your other hand slide your thumb and finger off of the coil on to the positive tail and then slip under the washer. pulse the unit with very short blasts watching for the coil lighting, if you have a hot spot (coil glowing far more than the other parts) fiddle a little with the spot that immediately stops glowing and then pulse again, if the whole coil glows and none of the tails you are good to go. i find it beneficial to dry burn a few times once the coil is all set and heating evenly.
If you need to tweak the wire that is not in direct contact with the coil to adjust the mating of it with the positive or negative terminals or just to uncoil or adjust your wraps out side of the device make sure you place your thumb over the last part of the wire to make contact/you wish to make contact with the mesh, this will prevent you lifting the wire off of the mesh and then having a part of the coil that sweeps around the mesh and does not make contact when you re-seat it. (a issue i had for a couple of attempts)
Make sure you are heating the wire before using it ,just enough until it glows moving up and down the wire 2 times to burn any production residue left and temper it to allow the coils shape to hold once you wrap it.
I apologize if this is going over things you may already know. I have attempted to relay what i found beneficial while i was screaming obscenity's at my aga but be assured you will get there, its a dream once you get it it just isn't nice getting there.
