Cleaning Used Heads

[Meggiewegs]

I see a lot of people just rebuild, but I'm not ready yet.

What is an effective means to just clean the gunk (besides dry burns)? I remember people mentioning soaking in alcohol and boiling. Does this just clean wick gunk or does it work on coils, too? If so, what do you use? How do you do it?

 

[Requiem33]

I tend to do a couple different methods. The boiling tends to work ok, but if the coil is really gunked then I'll soak in vinegar to eat away some of the gunk then boil dry burn rinse and repeat as needed to get it clean. Sometimes though they are done and it's replacement time.

 

[DavidOck]

You might try an ultrasonic cleaner. Sometimes that can de-gunk the coils.

But why not dry burn? Easy to do, and very effective.

 

[MysticalNyte]

I've bought some cheap vodka and let them soak in a container for a bit-about 30 minutes.
Squeeze flavor wicks dry with paper towel, let parts air-dry and I also dry inside my ProTank with a Q-tip to get out excess moisture.
Some others recommend Isopropyl Rubbing Alcohol in place of vodka.

 

[DavidOck]

Isopropyl is labeled for external use only. Not sure I'd want to inhale it. Of course, it's such a small amount it likely isn't an issue.

 

[Flavored]

I've had success in putting the coils in a thermos and soaking them in boiling water twice (the thermos will keep the water very hot for a couple hours). Still, once I learned how simple it was to dry burn and rinse, I stopped the boiling thing altogether. I now replace the coils with my own.