Everyone who helped me start! Quick update!

[KillTheNoise]

Welp I got home from work at 6ish tonight, and without taking a shower or ANYTHING...I unwrapped my AGA-T2 and goodies and went at it!

I started with the 400 SS mesh and 30g Kanthal-A1 wire.

I oxidized using the method of burn it, water bath x2...then juice the wick and burn it x3 (used unflavored 100%pg). Turned out fine I guess...don't know what a bad one would look or function like.

The first coil I wrapped didn't work out, but it was due to the nuts on the positive post not being tight enough. The design of the 3 nuts is not a good one to me, it's too hard to tighten the two nuts tightly while trying to keep the post from spinning in the device. Maybe there's an easier way to do it, but my first impression was a bad one.

So, second coil...I wrapped it around a drill bit, tightened the nuts (took two needle nose pliers, but I got them tight, and the coil is staying there), tested the coil which went very well (only took a few runs to get it glowing evenly), then slid in my wick and filled it after another couple test runs. It fired well with the juice, so I tried vaping it!

The tutorial I was watching while doing this said to leave the fill hole screw out, but I found it to make the draw WAY TOO airy. So I put the fill screw back in and it's vaping like a champ!

I'm not getting an incredible flavor, it's right along the lines of my cartos, but I think this is from the wick just not being broken in? Haven't tried a big range of wattage so far, so I'm still testing it out, but all in all it went VERY smoothly.

A couple follow up questions though.

1. How will I know when to change the wick/wire?
2. Switching flavors...do I need to rewick it every time I want a flavor change or just drain the tank and refill it with something different?
3. I've read that wicks can take anywhere up to a couple weeks to be "broken in", any truth to this?
4. How can I tell when I can stop tilting it every time to allow proper wicking?
5. I used 5 wraps of the 30g Kanthal and I get 1.3ohms...is the only way to up my resistance to use the 32g, or can I simply use 6-7 wraps or braid my 30g?


Again, thanks to EVERYONE here for the help, I believe this went MUCH smoother for me than a lot of beginners, but research is KEY! Yall rock and I can't wait to rebuild this thing again!!!

 

[vapdivrr]

Welp I got home from work at 6ish tonight, and without taking a shower or ANYTHING...I unwrapped my AGA-T2 and goodies and went at it!

I started with the 400 SS mesh and 30g Kanthal-A1 wire.

I oxidized using the method of burn it, water bath x2...then juice the wick and burn it x3 (used unflavored 100%pg). Turned out fine I guess...don't know what a bad one would look or function like.

The first coil I wrapped didn't work out, but it was due to the nuts on the positive post not being tight enough. The design of the 3 nuts is not a good one to me, it's too hard to tighten the two nuts tightly while trying to keep the post from spinning in the device. Maybe there's an easier way to do it, but my first impression was a bad one.

So, second coil...I wrapped it around a drill bit, tightened the nuts (took two needle nose pliers, but I got them tight, and the coil is staying there), tested the coil which went very well (only took a few runs to get it glowing evenly), then slid in my wick and filled it after another couple test runs. It fired well with the juice, so I tried vaping it!

The tutorial I was watching while doing this said to leave the fill hole screw out, but I found it to make the draw WAY TOO airy. So I put the fill screw back in and it's vaping like a champ!

I'm not getting an incredible flavor, it's right along the lines of my cartos, but I think this is from the wick just not being broken in? Haven't tried a big range of wattage so far, so I'm still testing it out, but all in all it went VERY smoothly.

A couple follow up questions though.

1. How will I know when to change the wick/wire?
2. Switching flavors...do I need to rewick it every time I want a flavor change or just drain the tank and refill it with something different?
3. I've read that wicks can take anywhere up to a couple weeks to be "broken in", any truth to this?
4. How can I tell when I can stop tilting it every time to allow proper wicking?
5. I used 5 wraps of the 30g Kanthal and I get 1.3ohms...is the only way to up my resistance to use the 32g, or can I simply use 6-7 wraps or braid my 30g?


Again, thanks to EVERYONE here for the help, I believe this went MUCH smoother for me than a lot of beginners, but research is KEY! Yall rock and I can't wait to rebuild this thing again!!!

the answer to the first question is hard for me, i have been vaping on gennys for maybe 7 months or so and never actually felt the need to change my wick or wire, i just do it after a while, more so for the wire, i just recoil my wick every 2 to 3 weeks. as for my wick, same thing not that it is bad, i just change it like after 2 months, or until i try something different. but really never changed either because they werent performing. you dont need to rewick when changing flavor, just empty the juice, dry burn the wick and go. sometimes i will syringe some water into the tank and swish, then syringe back out. i dont see that my wicks take this long to be broken in, imo if the flavor is not there in a few days, it really wont get much better.cannot reply on your 4th question, my device always wicks at the angle that i vape at, i always tilt my device to a 45degree angle, its just natural that way. you can add more wrapps of 30g to get a higher resistance, but i wouldnt go over 7, to many wraps slows down response time. but a 5 wrap of 30 should be a great vape at 4.0 volts, you can try 32g but the flavor will diminish slightly

 

[KillTheNoise]

Wow that's impressive these can go for so long without NEEDING to be re-done, really can save some loot with these things! Also a relief about the flavor changing, can't get any easier.

I guess next time I wrap it I'll try the 30 at 7 wraps and see what it does.

I still find my draw to be more airy than I like it, and when I move the air hole the TH gets insane. Would moving to 500 mesh tighten that draw?

I want to thank you the most divrr, your comments helped me greatly and I really appreciate that.

 

[StaircaseWit]

Glad it worked out so well for you.

Your wick won't take as long to break in if you don't oxidize that much. Just do a quick flame pass on your mesh to burn off machine oil before you roll it, and the you can lightly oxidize the top half of the wick if you want, but it isn't really necessary.

Other than that, you're on your way. You're the first person I've ever heard say the draw on the AGA-T2/+ is too airy. Most consider it a very tight draw. Was yours purchased modified in any way? (there are people selling modded versions of this atty)

 

[KillTheNoise]

Glad it worked out so well for you.

Your wick won't take as long to break in if you don't oxidize that much. Just do a quick flame pass on your mesh to burn off machine oil before you roll it, and the you can lightly oxidize the top half of the wick if you want, but it isn't really necessary.

Other than that, you're on your way. You're the first person I've ever heard say the draw on the AGA-T2/+ is too airy. Most consider it a very tight draw. Was yours purchased modified in any way? (there are people selling modded versions of this atty)

I'm actually kind of disappointed I didn't have any troubles, lol!

I made sure good and well it was oxidized, I may have over-done it, but I'm not getting any weird flavors or anything so I guess it's okay.

It isn't modified at ALL...I've been trying it with the air hole in diff spots, diff power ranges, fill screw in and out, and they're all too airy. I don't know really what else to do, it's not a huge problem because there is TONS of vapor coming from it, it's just too easy to poof on it.

 

[vapdivrr]

Wow that's impressive these can go for so long without NEEDING to be re-done, really can save some loot with these things! Also a relief about the flavor changing, can't get any easier.

I guess next time I wrap it I'll try the 30 at 7 wraps and see what it does.

I still find my draw to be more airy than I like it, and when I move the air hole the TH gets insane. Would moving to 500 mesh tighten that draw?

I want to thank you the most divrr, your comments helped me greatly and I really appreciate that.

i do not believe the mesh will affect the draw, also i often hear about being able to adjust the draw by rotating the topcap away from air hole, for me, it just doesnt work, the vapor production decreases dramatically and the vapor gets nasty and harsh, i always keep the wick at hole, maybe it can be off to one side by maybe 1/16 in at most. more the most part the aga-t has a pretty tight draw(unless they changed it with the aga plus) compared to other devices. theres alot of other attys that have a much more airy draw. i do like a tighter draw myself. at this point i believe theres not much you can do except get used to it. i know they say with bigger air hole devices that you need to take a slower more steady draw instead of a shorter harder draw. i once bought a cheapy clone device and found the draw way to tight, so i slightly drilled it out. it then was way to airy, so all i could do was to add a piece of clear tape to cover part of the hole, it worked fine, but ultimately got rid of it for other reasons. i suppose if you were good, you could add some jb weld, or somekind of apoxy resin to moddle it. litteraly you can use a good coil/wick set-up for months, all i do is dry burn every couple days. i use some sweet juices, and they do leave a residue on the wick and coils, so like i said, i just dry burn and its like new. sounds like your up and running, that was quick. also if you have set-up the coil in a way that the wick can be slid out of the coils, you can take out the wick and rinse it with water, then give it a heat-up, then re-install into the coils when you change flavors.

 

[vapdivrr]

i am not to sure on this, but you mentioned that the draw is airy. now i make my wicks a little bit smaller than the wick hole, but maybe if you made a fatter wick that filled the wick hole completly then maybe the draw might tighten up. this is just a quess and i am not sure this would work like that because i never tried it. maybe someone else can comment.

 

[Railrust]

Your right....that is the first time I heard it was too airy....

 

[Thrasher]

you cannot change the draw of a device with the wick. the air is not coming from the wick so thats not going to do anything.
several people have used JBWELD to fill then redrill the holes smaller on topcaps. others have used a piece of tape and poked a hole in it the size they want. i read a post where someone stuck a tip of a plastic needle tipped bottle in their airhole.
usually with a geni its just a matter of getting used to the draw of the device and relearning how to puff on them OR moving to a different one with a draw you prefer.

this is why many topshelf models have blank caps for sale to drill yourself. you can maybe see if there is anyone selling a cheap topcap for it, find another model the same diameter and get that top cap or get used to it.

 

[KillTheNoise]

I have like 30 dollars invested in this, so I'm not too worried about buying a blank top cap or filling it, then redrilling. I have just adjusted my draw and it's working fine. It is still more airy than I like, but for around 30 bucks I'm happy.

I was having issues with a new wick/wire setup but I got it this morning after attempting it sober, and it's vaping great. Have a 30awg wire @ 2.0ohms with 400 mesh and I'm not even a 1/4 way through a tank and the flavor/vapor production are immense compaired to my first two setups.

Guess everything with RBAs is a learning process. I want a nice expensive one already, because the positive post and nuts that secure the wire are horrible, but I'll give it some time!

Thanks for everyones help again.