Don't like that one either?
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Kanthal is an alloy of Iron, Chromium and Aluminum. There is no core of Iron, it's the same composition through and through.
The metallic taste you experienced was probably ash from the burnt off juice gunk. After dryburning coils must be thoroughly cleaned. I scrub with a toothbrush, rinse with water and repeat a couple of times. Only takes a couple of minutes.
Takes about the same amount of time to just wind and install a new coil, too. No running water or sink required.
I have a pair of Aliens that are 2 years old and still work like a champ. Dry burned and cleaned regularly, I dislike rewicking, let alone spinning up new coils.
Some tanks are just a PiTA to coil like the quad coil deck for the Crius+, awesome flavor but requires a little work.
Some tanks are just a PiTA to coil like the quad coil deck for the Crius+, awesome flavor but requires a little work.
I always drill spin mine to straighten it, then a solid tension build.
Hiding in the corner here. I dry burn all my coils regardless of material type, brand new or used, and check the screws are still tight. For some reason I found my Bellus and Titanium would always loosen. Ti pulsing at ~8-10 watts. SS 15-20, just so I see them each glow from the inside out.
And nothing tastes better than a new build.
Yes that is what I used to say too. As Kanthal is just iron-chromium-aluminium (FeCrAl) alloys. But this leaves some interesting questions. And I am not a welder or anything. But I always thought you can't weld aluminium to iron. They just don't mix.
Also heating Kanthal to a slight glow causes the aluminium to form a protective layer of aluminum oxide (alumina). But Kanthal only contains 4-7.5% of aluminium. If mixed, how would this be possible? Also we can do a science experiment. File or sand down one side of a piece of Kanthal, now try to form the alumina layer. If it doesn't form where it was filed, then the outer layer must contain aluminum and inside does not.
And why doesn't Kanthal rust (it contains over 60% iron)? Except when the center is exposed, now it rusts like crazy. Just like iron does.
I first thought that too. Until I realized the smell only comes from those Crown RBA coils. Every other dry burning I ever did (and I used to do many of them), never ever smelled anything like that. Here's another science experiment we can do. We can take a fresh unused Crown RBA coil (I still have some, I won't vape with them though) and heat it up and see if the same smell is there or not.
Oh yeah... I should also mentioned that the only SS coils I ever dried burned was those Crown RBA coils. I never did it will other SS316L wire. Maybe I should take a torch to a piece or put some in a RDA and heat it up and see if I get the same smell.
I tried to steam cleaning Ni200 coils a few times. It seems to work pretty well. Just leave the old wick in place and run the coils and wicks under running water and get that wick just soaked. Also make sure there is wicking touching the whole length of the legs (or they could start to glow). Now fire the coils under TC and watch steam cleaning going to work. You are going to need lots more wattage, since water soaked coils are hard to heat up. As I learned that even at 100 watts, a .08Ω 26/32g Ni200 Clapton coil would barely get to 210°F. Maybe it is time for a 400W mod.
I used to steam clean my Ti coils back in my DNA40 TC days, but not with the wick in place. I used a wet pipe cleaner as a temporary wick inside the coils; it allows you to keep sliding it to a new wet section.I tried to steam cleaning Ni200 coils a few times. It seems to work pretty well. Just leave the old wick in place and run the coils and wicks under running water and get that wick just soaked. Also make sure there is wicking touching the whole length of the legs (or they could start to glow). Now fire the coils under TC and watch steam cleaning going to work. You are going to need lots more wattage, since water soaked coils are hard to heat up. As I learned that even at 100 watts, a .08Ω 26/32g Ni200 Clapton coil would barely get to 210°F. Maybe it is time for a 400W mod.
Now that I'm back to mechs, I still do that, after dry-burning the crud off my Kanthal.
I make my own fused claptons, takes too long and too many feet of 36g SS to just pitch them. Besides, I'm one of the lucky ones that can't tell the difference between new coils and dryburned/washed ones.
Sounds like you have some experiments to run Bill, but I'm 100% sure the kanthal is an alloy. The Fe and Al don't have to weld together to be alloyed together, the molecules are mixed/alloyed together but do not form a new compound.
Al oxidizes much easier, faster and at a lower temp than Fe or Cr. The Al molecules at the surface of the wire are the first to oxide (form Alumina) and the Al molecules deeper in the wire migrate to the outer wire surface through the boundary layers between the Fe and Cr molecules as the wire gets heated repeatedly. The more times the wire gets heated to red hot the more Alumina builds on the surface but the rate at which Alumina builds on the wire surface slows as the Alumina thickness.
Fe does not oxidize nearly as fast as Al when only exposed to ambient air (oxygen) but can oxidize quite quickly when exposed to water. I have rusted up my kanthal coils by quenching them under water while still glowing hot from a dryburn pulse.
ETA: Now if you're thinking that most of the Aluminum molecules in the wire migrate to the surface to form Alumina and leave the core of the wire as purer iron, no. The formation of Alumina on the wire surface is on microns thick and doesn't effect the wire's alloys more than jusy barely below the wire surface.
I'm not a Metallurgist Bill but have done extensive research on the formation of Alumina. Years ago there was a member on another thread that seemed to know everything about Kanthal and Alumina so I took his word for it at first, but after a while he was saying some really weird things and began contradicting himself. I took it upon myself to get to the bottom of it through internet research and lucky me, one of my father's cohorts was a NASA scientist who specialized in developing high heat resistant Alumina coatings in Jet engine nozzles. Anyways, I discovered that the member was a complete fraud.
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How much would it cost to buy a spool of wire already fused Clapton? I buy a 15 foot 26/32 Clapton Ni200 wire for about 5 bucks. Which is about 45 coils for me at about 10 cents each.
Original Focusecig Clapton Wire Box - $3.95 Free Shipping|GearBest.com
Oh it's only $3.95 now.
How much would it cost to buy a spool of wire already fused Clapton? I buy a 15 foot 26/32 Clapton Ni200 wire for about 5 bucks. Which is about 45 coils for me at about 10 cents each.
Original Focusecig Clapton Wire Box - $3.95 Free Shipping|GearBest.com
Oh it's only $3.95 now.
Wow, the prices have really dropped in the last two years!! I enjoy spinning up my own 26/36 Fused Claptons but not enough to pitch them out for every rewick, and as I mentioned I can't taste any diff anyway. That and I'm pretty fussy about my build symmetry. It takes me 15-20min to put a dual coil build in that I'm happy with. You'll get no argument from me on pitching coils, there's nothing at all wrong with putting in new coils instead of dryburning and rewicking if that's what makes you guys happy.
Wish they would come out with TI fused claptons in that price range, I'd hang up my drill......
Well I ran one tank dry and time to clean the tank and thrown in a fresh RBA for this test with unused installed coil. My Triade 250C didn't have SS316L, but just SS316 profile. Tried that one and 200°F, smelled just hot wire. 300°F, same. At 400°F and three of 5 wraps were glowing. That isn't right. Still nothing but common hot wire smell.
Ran Steam-engine and I measured and it is a 3mm ID, 5 wraps (spaced), @ 0.3Ω. And it says it should be 25g SS316L. Looks more like 28g to me. Ran my Crown SS profile for stock SS coils with nickel legs (set at TCR 0.00125) and no glow even set to 600°F. Hard to tell, but it seems like the real temperature is much lower than that.
Tried wattage mode and at 4.5 watts I could get 3 wraps glowing about the same as earlier. Still can't smell anything but common hot wire smell. Tried at 15 watts and I got bright red glow and still the same smell (just hotter). So IDK.
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