Let's talk about power.

[DaveP]

Nah... Not really...

If we had a 2000mAh battery.... 2000*3.7/1000 = 7.4Wh

So if we had a regulator that was 90% efficient we'd have 6.66Wh or 23976 Watt seconds

So if we set our regulator to output 20 watts we could run that continuously for 1199 seconds.... If we had 4 second draws that would be about 300 puffs...

If we ran at 50 watts we could run continuously for 480 seconds... or 120 4 second puffs...

Run at 10 watts and we get 2398 seconds... or 599 puffs...

It's not PERFECTLY exact... LOL... but it's pretty darn close...

To the OP... What everyone has been saying in this thread (very well I might add) is that a watt hour is a watt hour no matter what... There are other variables that affect it, but for the most part the load isn't going to make any difference... If you draw the same power out of a battery it's going to last the same amount of time, regardless of how that power is configured.

With a regulated mod you have efficiency losses, plus any extra accessories. Screen displays, MCU's, etc all draw a little extra power themselves which you don't have in a mech. Plus with a mech as the battery voltage depletes you are actually running at lower and lower wattages, meaning drawing less and less power... So yes, a mech is going to last longer in that regard. With a regulated mod you're going to be drawing the same power throughout the entire life of the battery.

I agree with everything you said, rusirius. We all hear about people who say they get two days out of an AW 2000mah 18650. I get about 6 or 8 hours, but my PV is seldom out of reach. There really are people who vape only on breaks and during lunch at work and don't chain vape at home. For those of us who don't have restrictions on our vaping time, we can burn the charge out of a battery in a much shorter period.

A built in cumulative vape time counter on every mod would be an interesting source for conversations about battery life. Then, all we'd have to talk about is whether juice concentration affects the heat and power output of a coil and whether a glowing dry coil burns more power than a cool wet coil at the same voltage.

 

[Davantrac]

And here's me thinking 1 must be better than the other. I always try to break things down to the simplest level, it's just the way my mind works. I can pull engines apart and rebuild them without reading books on them, but if I try to read the book first I get bored and wouldn't bother, I'm mechanically minded is what I'm trying to say not electrically minded. To me wiring is like plumbing flow and return = positive and negative! I don't need the numbers for my basic level.
Think I should give up trying to figure out to much and just use what's recommended the way I enjoy it lol.

 

[rusirius]

I agree with everything you said, rusirius. We all hear about people who say they get two days out of an AW 2000mah 18650. I get about 6 or 8 hours, but my PV is seldom out of reach. There really are people who vape only on breaks and during lunch at work and don't chain vape at home. For those of us who don't have restrictions on our vaping time, we can burn the charge out of a battery in a much shorter period.

A built in cumulative vape time counter on every mod would be an interesting source for conversations about battery life. Then, all we'd have to talk about is whether juice concentration affects the heat and power output of a coil and whether a glowing dry coil burns more power than a cool wet coil at the same voltage.

Absolutely... It all comes down to how much power is being drawn for how long. If I'm running at 8W on a 2200mAh battery and taking 60 puffs a day then I'm going to get days of life versus someone running a 2600mAh battery at 40W and taking 600 puffs a day needed to swap their battery several times over that same period.

As for glowing a dry coil versus wet, etc... As a coil heats up it's resistance goes up, meaning less wattage is drawn for the same voltage. So dry burning in that case would actually require less power than a wet coil. However, it also depends on the mod. If it's a VW mod and measures the resistance once at firing and then outputs a fixed voltage based on that calculation then the dryer the coil (i.e. the hotter it gets) the less power is drawn. However if it constantly measures and re-adjusts the voltage then it won't make any difference at all. Even though you could see slight differences from this, keep in mind kanthal changes resistance very little over a few hundred degrees, so even then the difference is going to be VERY slight... You'll see more change out of how often the display is on, etc.

 

[rusirius]

To me wiring is like plumbing flow and return = positive and negative! I don't need the numbers for my basic level..

You're more right than you know. The flow of electricity is very much like the flow of water. Voltage is like the "pressure" of the water... Current is how much "flow" you have. Resistance of a load is like the resistance of pipes.

Not that it matters typically, but one thing that often confuses people is that electricity flows from negative to positive, not the other way around.

 

[Davantrac]

You're more right than you know. The flow of electricity is very much like the flow of water. Voltage is like the "pressure" of the water... Current is how much "flow" you have. Resistance of a load is like the resistance of pipes.

Not that it matters typically, but one thing that often confuses people is that electricity flows from negative to positive, not the other way around.

Is that why I get cold water through the hot tap.

 

[Davantrac]

You're more right than you know. The flow of electricity is very much like the flow of water. Voltage is like the "pressure" of the water... Current is how much "flow" you have. Resistance of a load is like the resistance of pipes.

Not that it matters typically, but one thing that often confuses people is that electricity flows from negative to positive, not the other way around.

Is that why I get cold water through the hot tap.

I only posted this once

 

[DaveP]

Absolutely... It all comes down to how much power is being drawn for how long. If I'm running at 8W on a 2200mAh battery and taking 60 puffs a day then I'm going to get days of life versus someone running a 2600mAh battery at 40W and taking 600 puffs a day needed to swap their battery several times over that same period.

As for glowing a dry coil versus wet, etc... As a coil heats up it's resistance goes up, meaning less wattage is drawn for the same voltage. So dry burning in that case would actually require less power than a wet coil. However, it also depends on the mod. If it's a VW mod and measures the resistance once at firing and then outputs a fixed voltage based on that calculation then the dryer the coil (i.e. the hotter it gets) the less power is drawn. However if it constantly measures and re-adjusts the voltage then it won't make any difference at all. Even though you could see slight differences from this, keep in mind kanthal changes resistance very little over a few hundred degrees, so even then the difference is going to be VERY slight... You'll see more change out of how often the display is on, etc.

I'm sure someone is reading this thread and rolling their eyes, but some of us like to theorize, me included. I can't help but think of the juice in the wick as a liquid cooled heat sink. When you take a hit, the air flow is analogous to the heat sink fan on a CPU.

Sometimes, visualizing things in terms that I'm very familiar with helps to create a mental picture. I'm one of those who visualize the variables and create little working models in my head. When I'm walking around whistling a guitar riff I'm frequently visualizing the fingerboard patterns as I whistle.

The other day my wife's smartphone did a little 3 note tune and my first thought was, "That's a Root-2nd-9th!".

 

[rusirius]

I'm sure someone is reading this thread and rolling their eyes, but some of us like to theorize, me included. I can't help but think of the juice in the wick as a liquid cooled heat sink. When you take a hit, the air flow is analogous to the heat sink fan on a CPU.

Sometimes, visualizing things in terms that I'm very familiar with helps to create a mental picture. I'm one of those who visualize the variables and create little working models in my head. When I'm walking around whistling a guitar riff I'm frequently visualizing the fingerboard patterns as I whistle.

The other day my wife's smartphone did a little 3 note tune and my first thought was, "That's a Root-2nd-9th!".

Yes, you're absolutely right. Vaporization of the liquid absorbs the heat from the coil and drawing removes that heat in the form of vapor. That means the temperature of the coil will change, but the power will not.

Now in the case of the dna40 the exact opposite is true. Since it monitors the temp of the coil if you have the power set to a point high enough to maintain the set temp at a hard draw then the cooler the coil gets the more power is put in to maintain that temp. Add the draw is slowed or the coil dries out, power is dropped. But again that's a device specifically made to adjust power, that's what makes it so special versus a normal mod where power output is fixed regardless of the current temp of the coil.

 

[Davantrac]

Back to the batteries then, what I'm getting is mah is mah no matter what type of battery. So for example all 300 mah batteries used in exactly the same way will last the same amount of time? So what is the basics of each battery? IMR, I'm guessing safety. Lithium, smallest? There must be a difference.

 

[WattWick]

IMR for safety. LiPo for high storage density (more mAh per gram battery), high amp outputs and flat discharge curves.

ICR because they're fairly cheap? I don't know.

They're all lithium ion batteries, tho. See lithium ion more as a category of batteries than a kind of battery.

 

[wshanncap]

One advantage of the regulated mod is (if you turn the watts/volts lower than the normal pull of the coil according to the ohm calculator) is that the mod will suppress the power output which extends the battery life. Of course the opposite is true if you crank up the watts/volts. I usually run my V6 at 10 to 12 watts on a 1ohm coil. That is less than the coil would pull on a mech mod (3.36 amps, 12.45 watts) and so my battery lasts a little longer. Make sense?

 

[Davantrac]

Now that does make sense immensely.
Also the li-po has the advantage of being a smaller battery for the mah capacity.
Now I'm getting my head round it.

 

[The Cloud Minder]

HA-HA-HA-HA!

I love crushing puny mortals in my Gauntlets of Death, and melting their puny tanks and aircraft to piles of steaming slag using ... my ... hmmm, .... oh, not THAT kind of power.

 

[AttyPops]

Back to the batteries then, what I'm getting is mah is mah no matter what type of battery. So for example all 300 mah batteries used in exactly the same way will last the same amount of time? So what is the basics of each battery? IMR, I'm guessing safety. Lithium, smallest? There must be a difference.

1) mah is mah, but it's like calorie and fat counts on food labels....approximations and somewhat believable. Some manufacturers are better/more-correct than others.
2) mah doesn't really tell you about the internal resistance of the battery. And THAT will determine the amp rating, and also the stress on the battery, and also the efficiency...because the more resistance, the more energy is lost to heat. So higher mah would seem to be better, but it uses higher resistance materials and thus is less safe in some instances (depending on the magical material it's constructed from). It's a science, and everyone is still working on it.
3) So value safety and failure-mode results over mah. And check amp ratings.


So basically it's been somewhat of a tradeoff between storage capacity and amp-output (aka low resistance). Safer batteries store a bit less density of electrons but they flow them better. See? And like I said, everyone is looking for that magic does-it-all system, using bacteria, carbon nano-strands, etc with the electrolyte. There's articles all the time about 3x or 10x battery improvement. Still hasn't hit yet. Just google "super-battery" or some such.

 

[edyle]

Back to the batteries then, what I'm getting is mah is mah no matter what type of battery. So for example all 300 mah batteries used in exactly the same way will last the same amount of time? So what is the basics of each battery? IMR, I'm guessing safety. Lithium, smallest? There must be a difference.

Yes; 2 300 mah batteries should be able to vaporize the same number of millilitres of liquid.

The difference is 1 battery may have the ability to do it faster.

The batteries we use, also used in remote control applications and in mobile phones, are all lithium based batteries.
The IMR batteries are supposed to be lithium-manganese batteries; there are the older types simply called lithium-ion batteries which are less safe to use.
There are also lithium polymer batteries.

 

[DaveP]

The page at this link to Battery University explains the types of lithium batteries and quite a bit about their individual personalities. They are all lithium based, but with varying chemistries in the anode and cathode.

High-Power Cobalt-Based Lithium-ion Battery - Battery University

Energy densities of common battery chemistries

 

[four2109]

Now that does make sense immensely.
Also the li-po has the advantage of being a smaller battery for the mah capacity.
Now I'm getting my head round it.

Just grab an istick or an egrip to use while you learn all about batteries. (Joye is coming out with a rebuildable base so you can still build your own coils for the egrip.) For $30-$50, You'll wonder why you were so worried about batteries in the first place.

 

[Davantrac]

Just grab an istick or an egrip to use while you learn all about batteries. (Joye is coming out with a rebuildable base so you can still build your own coils for the egrip.) For $30-$50, You'll wonder why you were so worried about batteries in the first place.

I'm not worried about batteries, I'm just like everyone else, I want to know which is best. And the best way to learn about batteries and which is best, is to ask all the knowledgable people who I've tried them with different types mod. Experience is better than books.

 

[Miata GT]

Thanks everyone. What I got from that was basically vape what you like there is very little difference in battery life (time) as long as I buy quality, trust the guys who design the stuff. The time difference between them all is of little significance to worry about. With that sentence and me being still pretty new on the scene what I'm saying is all good batteries will last roughly the same time. The little thing in my head that niggles is watching comments that say I can make xxx last 3 days etc when all my batteries no matter what I put them in or what atty at whatever ohm only seem to last about 12 hours or so give or take a bit.
I find like real stinkys and vaping, I do it more for the physical habit than the enjoyment and maybe a bit of nic hit, but is don't really enjoy it. So I'm looking to set up a nice to look and feel mod with good reliability and make a good atty and juice to suit that and me.
Physically small as possible, but last up to 24 hours would be nice, carry about 5ml of juice and need no fiddling with. Weight doesn't bother me, I'd rather be small and heavy than big and light. The styling of the kato box and micro stick with atty inside I like that's why the egrip appeals to me.
But again thanks everyone.

What you're describing is a Reo Grand.
reosmods.com

 

[Davantrac]

What you're describing is a Reo Grand.
reosmods.com

You may be right but I'm still a beginner. Only been building coils for a month and don't fancy trying that bottom feeding job. All I've heard is good stuff about them, never a complaint, but I'm not ready.