My Protank and Nova experiences.

Status
Not open for further replies.

roasted

Senior Member
ECF Veteran
May 22, 2013
180
52
USA
I really dig my vision vivis too. If you learn how to rebuild them they are much better than stock.
In regard to the "golfball through a garden hose" draw, you people may have some personal issues to work out because theres really no need to draw that hard on a vivi Imo.:)

If you get the pyrex vivi just be aware that its not made by vision so if that's what you're using it will most likely need different heads.

As for the funky oily taste, it is oil. These things aren't cleaned very well before leaving the factory and can have leftover machine oil on them. I always clean any new equipment before use, I alternate isopropyl alcohol and hot water until that plastic-y smell is gone, dry, and you'll be good to go.

I did clean it. Many times. In fact it was perfectly fine for weeks and weeks of continual use until recently when it cropped up. As per my last edit, I have been hitting this Protank hard tonight and have yet to experience that metallic taste again... Perhaps I was drawing way too slow and I was cooking everything instead? Hmm...
 

Alter

Ultra Member
ECF Veteran
Verified Member
Apr 2, 2013
2,711
6,942
BC Canada
I think its opposite..if you draw fast your pulling tons of air past the coil and its not getting hot enough to vaporize juice but hot enough to half cook it and start coating inwhich will burn once the coil get hot enough. Too slow of a draw and the coil gets too hot and burns the juice into the wick material.
The 1.8 ohm coil glows a lot faster than a 2.5 ohm coil. You have to adjust your drawing and find the sweet spot inwhich you get vape and not burn.
But your best investment is in some 32 kanthal, 1mm and 2mm wicking and some time spent on youtube learning to rebuild, then you'll wonder how you ever vaped those chitty stock coils once you vape off one you just built.
 

rswift90

Senior Member
ECF Veteran
Verified Member
Jul 11, 2013
147
162
Rochester, NY
EDIT - It's funny... not even two minutes after I posted this I got to thinking, eh, why is this tasting not-awesome anymore? I pulled everything apart and looked inside. I couldn't even see the individual coils. It looked like there was charcoal sitting across the top of the coils. I dryburned it a few times but I didn't see it heat up red, it just sizzled a bit and that was it. I ended up taking the head apart and looked inside. At this point, I had somewhat destroyed the head (never took apart a Nova head before) so I figured, eh, let's rip the wick out and see what happens. As I unwound the wire around the wick I could see little black specs of something breaking off the top of the coil. Looks like I was either due for a new head or I was... due for a new head. It's hard to say how much I've used this Nova as I used it here and there for never as my only device to gauge when the head needs changing.

At any rate, I dropped in a 1.8 ohm that came with the kit. I'm letting it soak up now while I do home work around the house and hopefully it'll be hitting like a gem then.

Do you guys dryburn your heads when you sense an issue, or do you do it out of preventative maintenance every so many x-days? I wonder if I had dryburned this Nova head earlier on had I been able to get more life out of it.

Roasted, being a newb I'm not sure if my theory is entirely correct. Based mostly on videos and my own experience with cleaning and dry burning coils. I notice that when I start a dry burn, they do sizzle and I do not observe any color change in the coil to red. Initially the coils are vaporizing the liquid left on the wick and the actual dry burning doesn't begin until a few pulses on a low voltage. I then crank up the voltage to about 3.8 - 4.2 and hold down my fire button for 5-10 seconds until the sizzle subsides and the coils burn red. I do this a couple times, blowing on the coils to get rid of the gunked up juice on the wick. I then rinse it under warm water and let it air dry. Hope this helps!
 

jmur

Aggie AND Moon's Acct., on retainer for Beckyblue
ECF Veteran
Verified Member
Jun 7, 2013
9,674
50,642
Connecticut
IDK. I'm more than extremely happy with the Nova, after about month and a half. Just ordered the glass tanks, as I have juice I've been afraid to use in plastic. Should be here tomorrow or so. But...this has been great. Super easy fill, great vape with a normal draw. Couple of probs I had were real easy to figure the source of due to the uncomplicated construction. I'm loving it. I'm a musician. We have a thing called GAS: Gear Acquisition Syndrome, where you just keep buying stuff, because it's there! I think I'm gonna avoid GAS here. Right now, I'm perfectly happy with my Vivi, and I think I'll stay in this spot for a while.
 

roasted

Senior Member
ECF Veteran
May 22, 2013
180
52
USA
I just developed the burn taste again. I pulled everything apart and looked at the tray that the head sits in. It looked super saturated. I took a tissue and dabbed up some of the extra liquid, put it back together, and it's good again.

While this is all well and good, I can't help but to look at the drops of liquid and think "doh!"

Perhaps the Protank 2 will be an improvement to help with this. As of now, this type of behavior doesn't excite me, but if nothing else, I'm happy to report that being extremely mindful of how the Protank acts/tastes/performs is a good way to keep things moving.

It reminds me of my car with its failing clutch and endless list of odd behaviors. Put anybody else in the driver seat and pretty much all of their instincts with driving it are, well, wrong. Put someone in there who knows every little hiccup the car makes throughout any given day and they can operate it like a Cadillac.

EDIT - Five minutes after posting this I got the burnt taste again. Even when cleaning it out again and firing it back up it persisted. I think I'm going to retire this Protank or use it as a last resort spare. In happier news, I got my glass Nova in today. It performs just as I expect - dang well. I will say though, I got the silver Nova.. The Vamo V2 (stainless steel) is pretty shiny, and the Nova tip is black. The silver of the Nova doesn't match the stainless steel much at all. In the event I had to order again, I'd just go with a black Nova, but at the end of the day I'm a functionality over looks kind of guy. My car, as an example, is one of the most embarrassing pieces of machinery in existence - but the thing turns on, it goes when I hit the gas and stops when I hit the brake. I'm all right with that.
 
Last edited:

MissAmerican

Super Member
ECF Veteran
Mar 11, 2013
374
136
Los Angeles, CA
I have the same issues with the protank, constantly leaking, gurgling, or dry hits. At first I thought it was the company I bought 2 packs of heads from, so I find another site and buy 2 more packs only to have the same issues. Its so bad that I don't even get an hour out of one, in fact I don't even get 10 minutes without it leaking all over the place. I'm done with it I've spent too much trying to get it to work. I have put it away and went back to my trusty cartomizers.
 

roasted

Senior Member
ECF Veteran
May 22, 2013
180
52
USA
I wanted to update this thread with some new findings. I was doing some reading about the EVOD and Protank and it seemed apparent that for my Protank and I to live happily ever after, I'd have to just order EVOD heads. Then, literally hours later, I read that the EVOD head was being discontinued, and Kanger was refocusing their head shipments to be all Protank based... so EVODs would now use Protank heads and of course Protanks would use Protank heads. This was a pretty substantial bummer, so I discounted this plan almost immediately.

Curiosity got the best of me and I ordered a SmokTECH DCTank. Unfortunately, I haven't even filled the thing up yet and already I can tell it'll be a flop. Reason being the carto, when inserted into the tank, has a distinct metal on metal feeling/sound, indicating that the o-ring is not making appropriate contact. I can only imagine this sucker will leak... but whatever. Likewise, it seems as if you cannot replace the o-rings on the pyrex units, which is what I have. Yet another *doh!* out of the gate.

Fortunately, I'm a curious person, so along with my order of the SmokTECH, I decided to pick up a new 5 pack of Protank heads. Reason for this is I read that the heads were slightly altered once the EVOD/Protank head shift took place. Whether this is true or not I am unsure, but it was a rumor going around that I picked up somewhere on this forum. Being slightly bummed about the SmokTECH findings, I decided to pull out a new Protank head. What also instigated me to give the Protank another shot (despite having the heads here, I was still skeptical) was I called the local vape shop to discuss with them what carto tanks they have in stock in an effort to get a carto tank in my hands tonight. The guy I spoke to, who was clearly unbiased and was all about "use what works for you man", indicated that he prefers his Protank over most other carto/clear/whatever devices that are out there. I told him about my Protank woes and he informed me that he read about an issue from Kanger directly regarding their heads. It was something about the mineral oil that was used during the manufacturing process that rendered a lot of recent batches with terrible flavors. This got me wondering... is it possible that my brand new pack of heads that arrived today are actually perfectly okay? And so, the ball began to roll.

This time, like every other darn time, I washed the head off thoroughly, let it fully dry, then installed it in my Protank. I put a drop of liquid on the ends of each wick along the bottom plate of the Protank. I let it sit for a minute or two, filled the tank, and put everything together. Then I did a few dry hits to kind of draw the liquid in more. Again, this is all old news - exact same protocol as before.

Then, it happened. I fired the Protank and I received the sweet taste of my black cherry/peach blend with a massive cloud of vape. Say whaaat? Yes. Exact opposite of what I was facing when I posted this thread originally. No overwelming burning taste whatsoever, no "why did I waste money on this stupid thing!" feelings, etc.

So far, it's been a relatively short run (about 2 hours), but I have yet to experience any sign of a burning taste. As I said no less than 60 times so far, this is exactly opposite of what I experienced before. Before, it was one hit and BAM - I felt like I was vaping recycled motor oil.

I'm going to keep this going a bit and see how it does. So far, so good. I'm not betting the farm on it yet, but I'm becoming more optimistic with each drag. I'm really liking what I'm seeing here. Considering I (as unbiased as possible) started this thread to simply share my frustrations, I feel like I owe it to post a follow up now that I'm experiencing a rather positive situation here.

Vape on, friends. *crackle crackle* --- 'hoooooooooooo'
 
Status
Not open for further replies.

Users who are viewing this thread