Building RBA for Provari

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glassgal

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Way to go!! That's awesome!! Now how many more do you have to figure out?

Um... I think 7 more rebuildables? No... 6 more, I traded away the Diver yesterday. Next is Steam Turbine... COMPLETELY different... this one has posts...

The worst tho will be the Ithaka, it's got resist and non resist wires together, and I don't have a wire zapper, so not sure I can even do that one.

Thanks SonHouse and Paul.K:).

Here is the Steam Turbine guts...

Together
IMG_20131210_015950_zpssme1lsku.jpg


Apart (haven't figured out how the tank part comes apart yet... there's no place to turn it...
IMG_20131210_020037_zpslfsecjkj.jpg


That's the built part... little black poles??
IMG_20131210_020103_zpsx5tmv9ul.jpg


And it comes with a big pole and some wires (thankfully) and an O ring
IMG_20131210_020329_zpsojtqdjdi.jpg


This is by far the most interesting looking... I'd say gorgeous... tank!
 

glassgal

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kas122461

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I did it!!! WOWOWOWOOWW!!! I'm in awe!!!

First let me say that my previously delicious juice is actually very disgusting concentrated to this degree. o_O

But I had NO IDEA you could get this much concentrated flavor out of juice! My wire is 1.6 whatevers on the AO setting. At 4.8 v I'm getting a nic headache after 2 hits. At 5.1v, the Provari errors out. At 4.0, I get insane flavor, tho not insane vapor (which is great). It's comfortably flavorful all the way down to 3.2v. I have no idea why it works or how it works, tho I'm getting warmer... I feel like I grew up in a cave and someone gave me a lighter. The amazing thing is, it never tasted burnt, all the way up to error... why?

I only managed 3 1/2 coils in there and that has to be one of the most aggravating things I've ever done (no way to heat the wire with no butane, it kept boinging back!!!)... but the coils were perfect and all 3 heat exactly the same red, so I think I got the flow correct. I have NO idea if I want to do this again, but I can definitely see why everyone else does it!!

How often do you have to rewrap these??? (please don't tell me every day).

Once I get a coil the way I like it I just rewick with cotton a few times a week, the coil about once a month. I am using 30 gage kanthal in mine, but I did use 32 gage at first.
 

SpettroJoe

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Yaa congrats on your first coil. i use 30gage kanthal in mine and build i think 6 or 7 wraps for a 1.8ohm micro coil. i change the cotton like everyone else said around once a week or more often when changing flavors. when changing cotton i pull out old cotton, clean everything up then before putting in new cotton i put it on a device and dry burn the coil to burn off all the junk you will see on it and use a tiny brush to clean it off right after dry burn. then rewick the new cotton and your ready to go again.
 

Vicshalls

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This advise is so, so, so, so, so IMPORTANT!!

The wicks (or cotton which is superb ) MUST be able to be long enough to go to the bottom and laid down, covering those two areas where you see the "juice channels" that go into the round cylinder. If the cotton is not laid across that area, your tank will probably leak. If it ever does leak, the wick or cotton is not laid down in front of those two channels. Its that simple.

I get how important this is, but if that is the case then why does it seem the original wick is not like that? is it because it is diffrent material? I am trying to learn all i can before i go out and get any type of rebuildable.
 

SpettroJoe

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I get how important this is, but if that is the case then why does it seem the original wick is not like that? is it because it is diffrent material? I am trying to learn all i can before i go out and get any type of rebuildable.

the length is really important, if its to long and pushed to much or packed to tight by channels you will not get good juice flow and can get dry hits or burn your cotton if you using it. to short or not down in channel and you can get flooding that will leak out side through your air control. just from practice you will get to know how much wick to use and how to put the wick down in the sides just right to get great flow but not enough to flood your tank.
 

pelton54

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On my kayfun lite plus I wrap a micro coil with 28g kanthal 12 wraps gives me 1.6ohms, when I wick it I pull some cotton from my cotton ball and thread it through the coil, I then cut the ears flush with the outer diameter of the kayfun base
I juice up the wicks and then pull them up like bunny ears, put the cone on then I stuff the wicks down into the channels.
I consistently run my 1.6ohm micro coils at 5v on my provari and it hits like a dream with tons of vapor:)
My could usually start tasting funny after 3 days or so from the gunk so I rebuild every couple days which is fine because I like tinkering anyways


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glassgal

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Well, mine's vaping great, except I don't think I did a very good job cleaning out the machine oil before I built it:p.

I did the same thing Pelton54 does, but then stuffed the extra cut off pieces in the juice right above the holes just for a bit of extra padding, and its a perfect vape:).
 

pelton54

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Well, mine's vaping great, except I don't think I did a very good job cleaning out the machine oil before I built it:p.

I did the same thing Pelton54 does, but then stuffed the extra cut off pieces in the juice right above the holes just for a bit of extra padding, and its a perfect vape:).

Maybe I'll give that a try!

Not a bad idea


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glassgal

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OK... back to the Steam Turbine...

This one is giving me FITS... first, I could not figure out how to get the glass off the tank to clean it...

I tried everything short of smashing it off, cussing the entire time (loudly).

Juice.. nope. WD-40... nope. Soaking in boiling water... nope (knew this wouldn't work, metal expands faster than glass, but I wanted to clean it anyway). PRYING at the glass trying to wedge first fingersnails (of which I lost a solid 2mm off of each one), then, a pocketknife, into the space between the metal and the glass.... nope... but chipped a small glass flake off the edge like I was knapping it. oh boy. 3 hours of very painful finger pads later, I was seriously ready to throw the thing across the room...

I decided to watch the Doc Dave video... and he says... make sure you put the tank on your battery to remove the glass. Hrm. Can't hurt... not even 2 secs later it pops off by continuing to screw towards the threads. UGH UGH UGH!!!! Now it pops on and off easily with a drop of juice for lubrication... grrr.

So great! I am not putting juice in it after having loaded it up with WD-40, so I boil everything, soak it in dish liquid, rinse, boil some more, soak in vinegar, soak in water again. Crystal clear water, ready to go.

Now remember, this thing already had a mesh build on it. I looked at it... looked OK to me... so I put it on the Provari to see the dryfire... and POP!! E-1 Error. Uh. What?

I unscrew it again, look all over it with a 40x scope... looks fine to me... nothing touching what it shouldn't touch... Pop! E-1 error again. THANK GOODNESS for Provari, by now, I'd have blown up any other battery already...

I am STUMPED. I have been watching videos on rebuilding dual mesh configurations (basically a double Genisis?), and it LOOKS just fine... it's the factory build. The only wear on it is from soaking and cleaning... what the heck is shorting?????????

Help?!
 

glassgal

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Here is photo of horrible shorting stock build... can anyone see what's wrong with it????

4bde381d-bc81-422f-a8b3-32cdbef5049e_zps7245823a.jpg


HELP!!! HELP!!!! :p

Oh... and for the life of me I can't figure out how these steel mesh poles WICK liquid?? If they aren't for wicking liquid... what are they for??? Some videos say cut it short... well, then how does it touch the juice to get any if it's shorter than the level of the juice? I'm soooooo confused by this build...
 

Thrasher

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yea I was waiting for this since the first pic of those wicked nasty coils lol. as for your question some people cut the wicks short so they dont touch the bottom of the tank and short out the coil. but if the wick and coil is prepared properly it doesnt matter. when they are shorter you just tilt the atty to keep them wet. and its usually just a mm or 2 off the bottom not really short.

so to begin somewhere.............

the mesh is an excellent wick when set up right. but it has a learning curve, then in dual mode it is twice as annoying.

next is almost all dual wicks will be too low of a resistance for the provari. can you get the provari to read the resistance?

next will be working on some new coils as those look like a monkey wrapped them. (par for the coarse from china clones)

with mesh the trick is getting a nice even wrap, with perfect tension all the way around, then slowly firing the mod to work out any shorts.

even though it wont be the ideal set up i suggest pulling the coils and setting up one wick/coil for now to understand what your dealing with, then going for a dual afterwards.


P2160057.jpg

as you can see here the coil tension is pretty even and the coil is glowing perfectly. uneven tension and improper spacing will lead to nothing but problems.




in a dual coil setup you will have to make some high resistance coils for the provari - say you make (2) 2ohm coils the resistance will only be 1 ohm.

genesis atomizers have the highest learning curve but some of the best vapor. with the turbine you just stepped up from easy mode with the kayfun to What da F! mode.
 
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glassgal

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Oooohh... first... THANKS Thrasher!!!!

2nd... ...?!

This tank is beautiful! Let me count the ways... nah, you can see for yourself. I really want this to work!!! (where else can I find a tank that looks like it's surrounded by jelly bean cutouts? And that's not to mention the untold hours I just wasted out of my life separating the stupid jelly beans from the glass, then the glass from the body? Retreat is not an option!)

Ok... first, I need to know why there's a problem with this one... because without knowing, I may just do it again when I build it myself, but have nothing to look at to compare.

So 1st thing I realized, based on what you said.. was what error? And doh... Provari was set to 4.2. So I dialed it down to 3, and it fired:).... BUT... ONLY 1 pole fired, and the coil never glowed (is that a mesh thing or a build thing?).

Checked AO and it's at 1.6 ohms. That's ok.

The other pole doesn't fire at all, so it's got to have a short, but darned if I can find it.

I unscrewed the middle post a bit, I found a thread that said that could be related. Didn't help the dead one. The thing is, I cannot see any difference at all between the one working and the one not working... so any idea why??

(I agree with you about 1 pole at a time, but I want to understand the concept before I try my own wrap).
 

Thrasher

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the best I can tell is the factory wraps look very loose and uneven.
the two wicks look to be slightly different sizes and add in the loose wire and the resistance wont be even, which will cause one side to fire before the other.

as for glowing/ not glowing etc. usually when first setting up a mesh wick you try to make the coils glow on the dry wicks. doing this exposes shorts, and helps you adjust the coils to glow evenly, if not properly set up first, you cannot do it when they are wet but you WILL taste it lol.

put a few drops of juice on both wicks and fire it again to see if you get vapor from both of them, dual coil is tricky they have to be pretty even for them to heat up evenly.

This video is for the Z atty pro, but is a very excellent understanding of how to set up and adjust a coil on a mesh wick.
 

glassgal

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OK! I'm going to go pass out, but I will definitely study this more... I had no idea to what degree the evenness of the coils must be for it to work. Watching that Karen video, I realized by seeing just how much time she spent adjusting them. That helped a LOT. I get it now. And... just messing with that, I got the 2nd coil to fire. So I am much much more aware of the problem now and what the fix might be.

Thanks!!! Will try some more later:).
 
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