Convince me to use cotton

[AlexanderJ]

Hey yall -
Been a while since I've logged in, but I'm still a happy vaper of about four years now, and I regularly come to this site in troll mode to get great info and find ne juice and hardware advice. First of all, thanks to everyone for your help and advice, indirect as it may be.
I am a pretty well-versed vaper, I have a bunch of egos with protank minis for work and out and about, a bolt and a provape 1 at home. I have experience with rebuildables in the genesis style ss mesh side of things, and I've rebuilt various coils with silica and mesh, but I'm getting bummed with muted flavor lately. I have gotten away from rebuildables lately, in favor of simple fill and go protanks. I guess I'm not totally thrilled though, because as much as they are a decent vape, I know I've had better.

Which brings me to my big internal struggle.. I love the idea of the cotton wick drippers and kayfun style attys, but I'm somehow not convinced it wouldn't burn or be too finicky for an everyday vape. How often do you guys scorch the cotton and have to rebuild? Ever have a situation where the coil lasted longer than the wick? I feel like the cotton would be a nice wet, dense vape, but also have to be under close supervision to make sure you don't accidentally get a dry hit. It sounds horrible because I'd imagine the cotton will actually burn and send smoke into your mouth or lungs, where a burnt out coil or silica really just tastes bad.

I don't know. I could go on forever. Someone convince me. I'd probably start with a cheap igo or something before getting a kayfun type thingy...

Thanks in advance!

 

[Cavediver]

Now that I'm using a Kayfun clone, I'm rebuilding coils about once every three weeks, and re-threading them with cotton once, maybe twice per week. The Kayfun will give you one or two dry, off-flavor hits before you actually burn the cotton.

I also pull apart old Evod heads, cut / pull the silica wick out, dry burn, and then replace with cotton. Even if you don't want to wrap your own coil, this is a great way to get 2-3x the life of an evod head. There's a small learning curve regarding the amount of cotton you need for the evod, but you'll get it after a half dozen attempts (or less).

ETA: Since you've already got the wire, an igo would be a perfect place to start. Seriously. Do it.

 

[Bigflyrodder]

Once you go Kafun, you'll never go back. It will change your view on tanks forever. That being said, using cotton is wonderful! It wicks like a charm once you figure it out, you can stuff your RDAs with it if you like to drip a lot, you can easily change flavors in your RDAa as all you have to do is pull out the cotton, quick rinse, dry burn, rewick with cotton, fill and vape, and you can wrap perfect coils around something solid like a drill bit, needle tip, toothpick, etc. rather than trying to wrap around a silika or strand wick.

Need more?

 

[LEDBETTER122]

I use cotton as my only wicking, As long as you wet the wick before you screw it into your protanks it should not burn. I run a dual .25Ohm (It's a very hot coil) and I have never burnt my cotton.

It's the same concept as Wet wood does not burn, but dry wood does, as long as cotton is wet it won’t burn.

The flavor IMO is a lot better than silica and Ekowool, Ive changed my friends protanks into micro coils with cotton and they say it doesn’t even taste the same (In a good way).

 

[Spazmelda]

I was skeptical of cotton too, but I tried it out a few months ago and I'm sold. As someone mentioned above, you will get a few weird hits before you get a burn. In the beginning I had one instance of burning, but I quickly learned how to avoid that. It's super convenient, cheap, and gives a great taste. I find it to be less finicky than silica for day to day use.

 

[UnclePsyko]

Hey Alexander... I'd give it a shot if I were you.
The Igo would be a great RDA to experiment with and see for yourself if cotton is for you. I personally stopped using silica the first time I tried to rebuild a coil. I was struck by all the fibers floating around by just handling the silica. They were everywhere! Floating around under the desk lamp, stuck to my fingers like a strange silky powder, stuck to my reading glasses, etc... Immediately turning me off to silica. I understand that there appears to be no danger to silica since the fibers are still too large to get deep into the lungs and embedding themselves in the Alveoli like asbestos does but it was still a bit unnerving.
Cotton on the other hand is extremely easy to manipulate and feed into a coil without all the dust and fragments getting into everything. The flavor is richer and fuller (in my opinion) and the vapor production is impressive. As been said, cotton also will let you know when it's getting dry with a exceptionally harsh taste and throat-hit long before it burns (in terms of ignition/smoke). I change my cotton wick daily since I do vape NETs and they do clog up a coil and wick pretty quickly but my wife can easily go 3,4, even 5 days before her cotton needs to be changed out.
Once that time comes that the wick needs to be changed, it literally takes 5 minutes once you get a routine down. Just slip the old cotton out of the coil, dry-burn for a few pulses and thread a new wick in, saturate and your off and running again. Of course, if your coils are gunked, it will take longer to clean before re-wicking. Otherwise, it's simple and quick!
It's still dependent on the users preferences of course, there are many who have tried Cotton, Silica, Ekowool, Nextel, Mesh, ceramic and various combinations of materials and everyone has a preference. For ease and cleanliness, I choose cotton... and I've never looked back.

 

[Credo]

Liquid-flavor, mood, season-climate....for me these things are always changing at both physical and subjective levels...so there is no single answer.

Just try it for yourself and evaluate the properties/pros/cons.

To this day I have no 'one' single favorite wick material (or even atty design). Variety is a good thing. Some liquids/flavors I want silica, some steel, some cotton, and some hybrids or even multi-coil builds with cotton or silica on one side and steel-mesh on the other.

The nice thing about cotton is when in a hurry...it's flat out easy to work with with fewer tools. It's also really easy to find and very inexpensive.

 

[RoseB]

If this doesn't convince you nothing will

 

[kslice917]

I actually only got into rebuilding my coil heads for my AeroTank this past week and decided to use cotton for the wick. So far, I haven't burnt it at all. The flavor taste great and overall the vape is really smooth and cool - a great improvement over the factory coil heads. My only complaint about using cotton over silica is that it seems like I have to prime the cotton wick each time after not using it for a few minutes. That is, I hold the fire button and drag on it about 3 times - then I start to get a good vape. Not sure if I'm doing something wrong (too much cotton?) or if that's just how it is. Either way, I don't seem to mind it any more and love the fact that my juices wick up in about 10 seconds instead of 10 minutes!

Just ordered the EHpro Kayfun Lite + Clone yesterday and it's supposed to arrive tomorrow. I can't wait to start rebuilding with it and see what all the hype is about!

FYI - I've seen a lot of people talking about boiling their cotton to get the cotton taste out. I personally believe this is more of a preference that varies by person. I literally use the cotton straight out of the bag and have never tasted a difference. Just give it a try, that's the only way you'll know if you like it. If you don't, try tweaking it. If it still doesn't work, maybe it's just not for you. As for the burning - as long as you're not firing the thing for 10-15 seconds each time or letting the wick run dry, you shouldn't have any problems.

 

[Jjshbetz11]

Yous gonna use cotton see.... or I'm gonna send my boys over to your house see...

 

[D. Waterhouse]

It's cheap and it works.

 

[emus]

I vape unflavored.
Cotton wick lasts 100+ml.
Coil lasts 100+ ml but develop flavor robbing coating after a few ml.
Cotton gives taste alarm w/o suffering any damage.
New cotton wick and clean coil allows faint flavor of PG undertones to pop; very clean taste.
Nuance PG undertones subside after a few ml because coil deposits; not wick deposits.
In other words, cotton wick lasts much longer than coil stays clean.
Cotton is free; already in da house.
Can rewick cotton in a couple minutes.

 

[BeRight]

Each to their own when it comes to wicking material - there are advantages and disadvantages to each - and associated risks of each.

I would never ever try and convince someone on which wicking material to use.

I do use cotton yarn (peaches and cream brand - found at walmart - boiled of course) for my RDAs.

Flavor is good for me and the rope shape is convenient for re-wicking. I re-wick my RDAs daily and dry burn coil (28 gauge kanthal micro coil lasts a long time).

With some experience you can tell when you are running low on liquid before burning wick - especially with RDAs.

In my RTAs, pro tanks, evods: I use hollow ekowool with cotton yarn inside only because it seems more durable to me and I re-wick less frequent.

If you really want to be talked into cotton wicks - watch Rip Trippers youtube videos - he rebuilds everything and anything with cotton and vapes at high wattage without dry burns.

 

[Lucky1384]

It took me a while to get to grips with cotton, but now I would never go back to silica in an RDA!

The trick for me was using much less than I imagined I would use so I'm not choking the wick when it expands with juice. The thing I love about cotton more than anything is I'll often only vape 1-2ml of a certain juice before switching to something else, and with cotton I can simply pull the old out and slip a new piece in. No messing and fussy cleaning! A couple of $ and you have a supply that could potentially last years.

I find when dripping that one puff will be fine, and when it's time to drip the flavour will change immediately. As long as I drip after that sudden change, all is well. I haven't scorched any wicks yet, it's just slightly discoloured where it sat in the coil. Oh yeah, and the flavour!!

 

[JeremyR]

I bought 40ft high grade silica. 2 weeks later got cotton down, expensive silica sits in a drawer, never went back to it. Now im on hemp fiber, wick outlasts the coil!

Less is more, light and fluffy don't compress

 

[Dan_The_Viking]

Just ask your self WWJD?

 

[Dan_The_Viking]

Cotton can get pretty racist though. So trudge carefully.

 

[Joe13]

100 feet 30 gauge kanthal - $7.00
Bag of organic cotton balls from CVS - $2.00
Nail clippers - $1.50

Enjoying better vapor and flavor while never having to buy another coil - PRICELESS

 

[PGR-Scooter]

I have been using a micro coil and cotton for several months in my Kayfuns and Taifun GTs and love it.
My coils last thru many wicks and the wicks are very easy to change once you determine the right amount.
Hint, less is better.
This is basically all I have been using until last night when I decided to try some of the ceramic Readyxwick in my new REO.
I'm liking that a lot as well but it's too soon to tell if I will stay with it or if I will try it in my other RBAs.

 

[Nightcall]

I use Sugar n Cream cotton yarn I bought from Michaels. I like the yarn better than cotton balls or rolls because yarn is much easier to work with. I do get a cotton taste if whatever im using isn't wicking fully, but overall I don't have any desire to use anything else like silica. Cotton is good. Ive never burned it.