Ego-T Drag Resistance Inconsistent on New Attys

[goodsignal]

So, I have noticed a considerable variance between new Ego-T attys bought at the same time from the same vendor using the same juice. Some of them drag nice and easy. Some of them drag really hard. I like them when they're nice and easy.

Does anyone know what's going on with the inconsistency?

Are there any tricks to getting better airflow from the slow draggers?

 

[ledouxmike]

Unscrew your atty a little bit and see if the draw changes, if it does, you can carefully grind the little holes on the atty next to the battery. At least that is what was said in another thread a while back.

 

[goodsignal]

Yeah, I've tried that. It affects it a little, but not enough to make much difference. I mean a couple of my attys are like sucking through a skinny red WD-40 straw -- not very enjoyable to vape with. And they came that way new (I know, bogus!). All the cleaning in the world doesn't help either.

From reading through threads, and thinking about this image from Uncle Screwtape:

I started carefully messing around with one of them; and it's fixed! It's the smoothest draw ever! And the flavor is better. But I did so many things to it that I don't know which was the key that worked.

With more reading and my experience so far, I'm starting to think that the really tight draw may be due to the heating coil and/or the wick being too close to the air vent at the center of the atty, causing an impeded air flow.

 

[goodsignal]

I've figure it out and I'm rather excited about it! I have adjusted three new attys with fairly tight draws, into attys with very, very nice airflow.

It's all about that first piece from the left in the photo above. Though it has a nice hole right through the center, that gets sealed by the battery. It does in fact have another side hole below the threads that you can't see (unless dismantled) where pretty much all the air comes through.

What I have done is use a curve shaped dentist's pick to: reach down, around into the side hole; push it in tight and wiggle it around to expand the hole.

I'm not sure if the brass is just very thin there and I'm actually able to stretch the hole bigger with the leverage I'm putting on it. Or, if you look at the battery contacts, there's an off-white rubber gasket that electrically insulates the positive lead for the battery; I think that rubber gasket could be getting in the way. Wiggling the dental pick is likely pushing any air constricting gasket out of the way.

It's really great having all this airflow. The flavor is much better. I don't have to drag so long to get a nice, thick, rich exhale of vapor. And by not having to drag hard, there seems to be much less of a vacuum created in the atty chamber, which seems to have made the occasional tank leak and atty flooding way less common.

It rocks! and I'm excited to hear some feedback from other people that end up trying this.

I think, the only word of warning I have is that when I was prying around in there, the center electrode that pushes against the battery would push out of place a bit. I don't know, maybe it could pop off, or the gasket could break if pushed too hard, or it could separate from the wire to the heating coil? None of that has happened to me, but it seems like a possibility.

 

[Addicted2Vap]

would it be possible to post a pick of the exact place you're talking about?

 

[goodsignal]

Of course.


Feel around the edge of the brass cylinder, below the threading that secures to the battery.

 

[Stonemull]

Jut finished my dismantle .. will post a link to video here a bit later when I have edited out some rubbish.
The hole you mention is the only real restriction and is in brass, the atty connector is also a hollow cup and has a plastic lid on it internally with the larger lower hole diameter in it.
So the only small holes in the airflow are the one in the side of the atty (above the threads .. maybe 0.6mm or so and the small slot under the heater in the ceramic cup.

 

[bigtimeweb]

Jut finished my dismantle .. will post a link to video here a bit later when I have edited out some rubbish.

Looking forward to that!

 

[Stonemull]

YouTube - ego-t examination ego-t heater in bits..

went with lo-res in the end .. takes so long to upload. the battery connector is in the last 30 seconds or so.

this vid is an earlier stage of ripping it to bits showing more than just the heater side of it

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=l68sUqQQl3o

 

[goodsignal]

Stomemull, that video is so great. Thanks!!!

So tell me, was there any plastic or anything just on the inside of the side-hole on the brass battery connector? What it looks like from the video is basically airspace and the couple of wires until you get to the little plastic cap with the center hole? Not having taken any attys apart yet, I would like to know if the dental pick technique above is pushing some plastic or gasket out of the way, or if it's actually making the side hole bigger. Knowing that would probably help me improve my technique.

 

[Stonemull]

no plastic .. the centre battery connection is quite long and protrudes past the hole, comes to within a mm of the top plastic cup. So go too deep in the hole and you are poking the centre battery connection.
There is probably 2mm air gap before hitting that post, nothing else in there, instead of opening up that hole, a messier but simpler solution may be to drill a hole straight through at the correct height, through the side skirt, through the battery connection holder and through the battery connector up where the hole is. The wire is soldered on above this point so they are not likely to be damaged.

The only area I can see a problem is swarf dropping into the battery connector and shorting the atty, the insulator is a mm in depth so its pretty unlikely with a mm size hole though.

 

[Stonemull]

I did a quick follow up test .. remove atomiser, suck thru cart and place finger over battery hole or not .. makes very little difference on mine. SO drilling holes or opening up the bottom hole will make very little difference to my current atty.

 

[goodsignal]

Drilling through the side as Stonemull described is what I tried first. I kind of discovered it by accident:
I drilled a 1/16" hole in the side of my tightest dragging atty based on Kardenm's suggestion here: http://www.e-cigarette-forum.com/fo...39915-new-ego-tank-system-54.html#post2827101
And it worked awesome! But then I tried plugging the hole up with my thumb, just to test the difference, and it still was dragging great. What the...??? I even covered it with electrical tape and still, dragging great. That just made no sense. It turns out, that by total luck, I drilled in exactly the same place where the side hole is on the battery connector. The drill bit must have poked through and opened up that side hole, rendering a fantastically performing atty.

Yeah, some of my attys draw just great as purchased and there's no need to improve them. But there seems to be some manufacturing inconsistency going on; at least for the batch of attys I ended up with. And as Stonemull discovered first hand, the side hole appears to be the tightest bottleneck in the system for airflow, followed by the slot in the bottom of the ceramic cup holding the heating element.

If you don't have the right tool, drilling through at exactly the right spot on the cone is an option. With a dental pick, the whole situation is improved in less than 20 seconds.

Maybe I just got a bad batch and I won't have to mess with expanding that hole on future attys. But if I do, I think I'm going to modify my dental pick by cutting off some of the tip. At current length, it pushes the center battery connection around when it's poked through the side hole and I'm prying around in there. That way I'll be able to pry the side hole open without interfering with any of the internal components. Even though it sounds like the wires or other internals are not likely to get damaged, I would rather mess with as little as possible.

 

[jazdale]

Thank you, thank you, thank you.

The little hole on the side of the brass piece that touches the battery is the g-spot.
I simply bent the last 1/8 inch of a dental pick to form an L.
It doesn't need to dig very far to fix it.

 

[goodsignal]

Haha! Nice analogy! A little hard to reach. Does wonders when you find it.

 

[Stonemull]

logic can't argue with success .. unless its placebo effect

Do you think you are opening up the brass hole or maybe moving something that is perhaps partly blocking that hole, thinking juice residue here.

Now i need to buy a dentists pick .. damn. Always wanted one anyway.

 

[goodsignal]

Ha! I think I almost wrote a dissertation inspired by your last post in http://www.e-cigarette-forum.com/fo...39915-new-ego-tank-system-54.html#post2869746

I would be willing to bet that you happen to have a pretty darned good atty in your hands. And if it's a good atty, opening up the side hole won't make much difference. Read my dissertation for a detailed explanation as to why I think this.

Do you think you are opening up the brass hole or maybe moving something that is perhaps partly blocking that hole, thinking juice residue here.

That's exactly why I was asking you for your dismantling expertise on whether the gasket went all the way down or if there was some plastic thing in the way. From your video and what you say, it seems fairly clear right there. And if it was juice residue, that could probably be remedied by a good cleaning soak, or just by poking a bent paper clip into the side hole. I'm stretching metal when I pry that dentist pick around.

And you know, I've only brought a few atty to life this way. Even at 100% success, three attys is within the realm of Placebo. I'm willing to accept that possibility. That's why I'm eager to have other people try it on their poorly drawing attys. It was really encouraging to read about Jazdale's success. But that's only one. And who knows, nicely drawing attys could very well be the norm. I may just have really crappy luck that three of my five were mediocre and poor.

And for those who haven't read my dissertation, if the side hole isn't the smallest hole (read bottleneck) in the system, than making it bigger probably won't help much.

 

[Stonemull]

I totally agree with you, was just posting my thoughts, the placebo thing was a bit of stirring.

I find it odd that a variable in manufacturing is a drilled hole .. seems a very odd kind of thing to be inconsistent.
With that in mind, maybe something else about that hole is causing the issue. There is no insulator there, a possibility is the solder joint for the atty wire, mine is opposite the hole but perhaps no thought is made as to where the solder is placed, though it is above the hole I could see that being a variable. In fact the solder on mine clashes with the little plastic cap and I did think that soldering further down would be an improvement .. perhaps assembly line person #27 solders differently to person #4.

Hopefully you will have a peek when one of the attys dies and we find out what the blockage was.

 

[SmokingRT]

Here is my prob.... my T attys are to airy what do I do about that? Kinda like goldilocks' bears huh? help appreciated