Carto filler material for wick?

[Jerms]

Another member in a thread brought up the idea of possibly using the filler material in unused cartos as wicking material in an rba. As I have some old cartos that I'll never use I thought it would be worth a try. This material came from a carto that's a year or two old, no idea the brand, but it's a KR808 mega-carto style that had a vertical coil. On the left is the unrolled polyfill (google search said polyfill is polyester fiber filling) and on the right is the "sock". The atty is a standard 510 for size comparison.

The first thing that surprised me, was how big the "sock" was, a lot thinner than the polyfill but the same size when unrolled. The sock I believed is used to prevent the polyfill from burning, and I think may be the best candidate for a wick. No idea the material of the sock, but it's woven (interlocking threads) and fairly soft. Cotton? Anyways, rolled up it would make a decent size wick on it's own for my dripping rba.

The polyfill is big enough for a couple wicks, but I don't know how much I trust using it for a wick. Any knowledge or experience with polyfil wick would be appreciated. One option would be to roll a piece of the poly into a wick and wrapping the sock material where the coil will touch. One thing I'm pretty sure of is neither material will hold up for a dry burn.

Any advice or ideas would be great. Is there a thread somewhere on ecf that's been done on this? I only have experience with silica wick in my dripping rba, so if the sock is indeed cotton I could use advice on anything I need to do to prepare it.

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[eddiezheadiez]

I'm almost positive that the "sock" is not cotton and polyfill is definitely not a suitable wick material as it will melt and create toxic fumes.

 

[Jerms]

I'm almost positive that the "sock" is not cotton and polyfill is definitely not a suitable wick material as it will melt and create toxic fumes.

I came to the same conclusion about the polyfill. Using the sock material to seperate the poly from the coil I can see working, as that's exactly what's going on in a carto, but since the sock material is big enough to just use as a wick that's my plan. How well it wicks, and how well it holds up is what remains to be seen. As many cartos can get a burnt taste going much higher than 8 watts, I'm guessing just the sock as a wick will also not hold up against higher watts too. I would try it now, but my current only RBA has only a day old silica wick that's working well. I will try it in a few days. If it works ok, I can get some use out of my old cartos that would be tossed anyways.

You said you're almost sure the sock isn't cotton. You're probably right, but any guess what material it might be?

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[Jerms]

Success! I decided to take out my 3mm silica wick and thread a "sock" wick in my already made coil. Rolled up, the sock was way too big to fit unless I wrapped the coil around it so I cut off a pretty small section that I could roll small enough to thread. I had to cut a couple times smaller because it was hard to thread through. I wetted it and rolled it as tight as I could but it was so soft and flimsy it took a bit. I finally got some of it through and pulled it the rest of the way with a tweezers.

I vaped with it a couple minutes before this picture and no burning while it's wet. It vapes very well so far, clean flavor with no break in time like silica. Wicks very quickly. So far, I'm really liking how well it vapes. We'll see how long it goes while still having a clean taste and not burning.

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[blondeambition3]

View attachment 182888

Success! I decided to take out my 3mm silica wick and thread a "sock" wick in my already made coil. Rolled up, the sock was way too big to fit unless I wrapped the coil around it so I cut off a pretty small section that I could roll small enough to thread. I had to cut a couple times smaller because it was hard to thread through. I wetted it and rolled it as tight as I could but it was so soft and flimsy it took a bit. I finally got some of it through and pulled it the rest of the way with a tweezers.

I vaped with it a couple minutes before this picture and no burning while it's wet. It vapes very well so far, clean flavor with no break in time like silica. Wicks very quickly. So far, I'm really liking how well it vapes. We'll see how long it goes while still having a clean taste and not burning.

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I'm extremely interested in hearing your final thoughts

 

[Jerms]

I'm extremely interested in hearing your final thoughts

I keep this thread updated! The original one I vaped on all day yesterday. Wicking and vape production stayed good. I'm not decided on the taste yet. Silica is all I've used in an RBA to compare with.

No break in period like silica which was nice and it stays in one piece without seperating in any way. The taste was clean, but I did sort of detect a faint cloth-like aspect to it. It was very faint and not really an issue. Moreso an issue for me is it seemed to mute flavors a little, flavor didn't come through as strongly as silica with the couple flavors I tried. I may get better results when I next use the whole sock for a wick and wrap a coil specifically for it. There was no burning, but when I removed the wick today there was the normal build up where the coil was from the dark juices I use. As I use gunky juices and need to dry burn, I won't get more than a couple days with a wick.

My conclusion for now is that for these specific old cartos I have, the sock makes a legitimate wick, but only to use up material in cartos I'm not going to use anyways, or in an emergency need some material for wick situation.

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