Need help rebuilding Aspire BDC heads please!

[Festizious]

Looks like my post in the coil building section is MIA so I'll repost it here, which is where I think it belongs? I'm new here so IDK but I could use some help. I'm rebuilding my Aspire BDC heads with 32ga Kanthal micro coils and they seem to shorting out on each other. I'm fairly new rebuilding coils but have a fairly good grasp on electronics and such. I have a mech mod with an RSST I've been rebuilding with great success, doing sub ohm builds (yes I do the math, I stay at about .5 ohms and use a sony vtc3 battery, safety is important) but these Aspire heads are a different beast to rebuild. Only been vaping for about 2 months and just want to rebuild the heads in the Aspire I bought as a starter for fun and to save money (I still use my Aspire mini on my 1100mah ego twist clone when I'm out and about) I've rebuilt two different heads both with 32ga Kanthal. One had 10 wraps per coil (both coils) and came out two 2.5 ohms the other I did 6 wraps per coil (both coils) and it came out to 1.6 ohms. I use cotton as the wicking material The problem is the ohms seem to jump all over the place on my ohm meter signifying a short. It seems to me the legs from the upper coil are shorting on the lower coil. I know the manufacturer uses resistance no resistance wire for their coils and insulates the legs of the upper coil with some kind sleeve material. I've seen a few videos of people including Rip Tripper rebuild these heads and there appears to be no insulation between the upper and lower coil when they rebuild them. Am I missing something? The coils in my builds don't appear to be touching each other, any advice would be appreciated. I would really like to rebuild these with a dual coil if possible and not be limited to sticking a single coil in them. I rebuilt one with a single micro coil of 28ga Kanthal that came out to 1.5 ohms and it blew stock heads out of the water!. I don't want to stop there and would like to see what a GOOD dual coil build will do!

 

[PaulBHC]

I did a few single coil with A1 30ga over a 16ga needle 9 wraps. Twisted cotton. They came out around 2.2-2.5 assembled on my VV V3. Only one showed shorted and I discovered that I chopped off the rubber insulator lip by pressing on the pin to get the cap on.

On the old ones, some had insulated legs, some not.

 

[Festizious]

Also I'm sure some other inventive vaper ran across this problem but while rebuilding one of the heads I misplaced the gauze like wrap that goes around the head containing the coils going between the cap. Being a first responder I have lots of medical supplies laying around and found these to be a pretty suitable substitute for anyone looking to replace theirs that have been damaged/lost or worn out. They are 100% cotton to boot. I had the 1/2" strips on hand and had to cut them in half and they fit perfectly so the 1/4" strips should be perfect. I had no gurgling or flooding on my single coil build using this material and it seems to wick fantastically.

Amazon.com: CURITY Plain Packing Strip - 1/4 x 5 Yds - Plain - Bottle - Each: Health & Personal Care

 

[PaulBHC]

Thanks for that. I work in a medical supply store/DME rental company. I'll see if we have it.

Deleted post

See my blog for update method

http://www.e-cigarette-forum.com/forum/blogs/paulbhc/5937-need-help-rebuilding-aspire-bdc-heads.html

 

[Festizious]

I did a few single coil with A1 30ga over a 16ga needle 9 wraps. Twisted cotton. They came out around 2.2-2.5 assembled on my VV V3. Only one showed shorted and I discovered that I chopped off the rubber insulator lip by pressing on the pin to get the cap on.

On the old ones, some had insulated legs, some not.

Ya, if nobody has a good solution I guess I'll have to stick to single coils which is kind of a bummer. I'd REALLY like to throw a functional double coil back in these heads and see how they perform as the rebuilt coils seem to way outperform what Eigate puts in them. I know a lot of people have had a bad experience with this particular clearo but I've thoroughly enjoyed mine.

 

[Festizious]

Thanks for that. I work in a medical supply store/DME rental company. I'll see if we have it.

Here is my method for single coil rebuild:

Recoiling Aspire BDC with single coil

Watch Rip Tripper's videos on recoiling Aspire BDCs and Nautilus for ideas and a visual reference.
I will give you my experiences and realities after a few failed attempts, using common items.

Tools:
I recommend getting the cheapest Aspire ET ego style clearomizer. Dedicate the coil base to this project. It will get nicked and dinged in this process.
ego style battery that you don't care about in case the threads get damaged.
16 gauge needle on luer lock syringe or equivalent (inexpensive at DIY e-liquid suppliers or Tractor Supply for livestock.
Full size needle nose pliers. Smooth machined joint area on the side a plus for pushing the cap back on the coil housing.
Plastic or hard wood cutting board or other hard surface. A bench vise with smooth jaws would be better but not everyone has this.
Piece of thin flexible rubbery substance helps to remove coil assembly from base. Jar lid remover type thing.
3 inch or so tweezers

Make your coil replacement(s) They must be narrower than the cap. 8-9 wraps of 30 gauge. I use pieces of cotton ball twisted for wick. Trim wick to 5mm. (take a business card and mark 5mm from an edge. use that as a quick measure tool)

Screw the coil assembly in the base tight enough to hold it. Remove cap with pliers. Leveraging against base may help.
Remove coil assembly and remove the bottom pin. Remove rubber insulator.
If you drop it, good luck finding it. May be wise to do this over a cake pan or similar.
Use tweezers to remove old coils.
It is good time to remove housing liner and clean all the pieces. Don't drop the insulator or other parts down the drain.
After all has dried, place the liner inside the housing, lining up the long slots in both.
Place the coil legs down the hole and squeeze the coil so that it fits inside the liner, in the top slot.
Bend one leg over the outside to hold the coil in place.
Slide the insulator over the other leg and press into place.
Gently pull on the leg to see that the coil is still in the slot above.
Bend that leg over slightly. Press the pin in the insulator.
Trim the lead wires with nail clippers as close as possible to the housing.
Place the cap on the housing lining up the holes on the side with the long slots on the housing. Make sure there is no wick between the edge of the cap and the housing. If so, trim the wick.
Screw the coil assembly on to your base. Carefully press the cap on with the vise or place the cap side down on a firm surface, push on the base end with a firm object until the cap clicks into place.
Remove the coil assembly and pull the contact pin out slightly, then screw back into the base.
You are done except for testing the resistance.
Priming the new coil seems to flood it. I suspect that removing the filler is part of this and the cap holes are no longer restricted by the filler.

I am going to try some other ideas such as a cotton wick draped across the lower slot, and a thin cotton wrap to replace the filler.
Works well for me with 50/50 on 7-8 watts.

Wow, thanks for taking the time give me your build details! Very similar to how I've been going about it. I've been using an 18ga. needle and forceps but otherwise for all intents and purposes the same. I probably do a lot more fiddling and cursing than you do though. I watched Rip Trippers builds over and over before attempting my builds along with AndrewWvids, Opdee mist and Vape Quits builds all VERY helpfull! Glad there is such a big community out here to give us beginners a hand at this as it can be a bit frustrating out of the gate. All in good fun though! It wouldn't be a hobby if everything went perfectly the first time around!

 

[Festizious]

Hhhhmmmm, now you've got me thinking. I think I might try taking a thin piece of the packing strip maybe 3/16" and draping it over the bottom coil so it covers its width and hangs down the sides slightly inside the barrel. It is 100% cotton so should act as a wick and as an insulator to the coil above it.

 

[PaulBHC]

I have one of those things with arms and gator clips and a magnifier that hobbiest and fly fishermen use, I'm old and need something to hold the leads while I try to thread the cotton through the coil. I use 16ga needle so that the hole is big enough to easily get the cotton through. 2.1-2.3 ohms seems to be common with single coil clearos and gives me good vapor with normal battery life on egos and a cheap mod.

 

[Festizious]

Well I'm breaking out the recoiling gear now and I'm going to give it another go with the packing strip laid over the lower coil. FYI the Packing strip material boiled just fine but frayed on the ends and a little on the side in a few small spots, I may stitch it next time on the ends before boiling. I boiled it through 5 cycles as its going directly over the coil, who knows what they treat it with being a medical product but I don't want to vape Honestly I would have used a 16ga needle but the only one I had was for IV catheters and I prefer not to waste those. I have little use for 18ga. Terumo hypo's anyway. I considered wrapping a nano coils around a 22ga needle but I figured I would really be diving into the deep end of the pool trying to figure out how to make that work. Having enough trouble as is. I'll take some pics of the build as I go along and post them when I'm done. Really appreciate your help!

 

[PaulBHC]

If you have a Tractor Supply store near you, they sell syringes and needles for livestock at cheap prices. Also PG for cows around $20/gallon. I'm using non sterile cotton balls and hoping the pg cleans it out, lol. After years of smoking and breathing asbestos and chemicals, I'm not worried about the cotton.

I made a few BCC and top coils today. BDCs tomorrow with a bottom coil and cotton on the top. Maybe some paper towel filler.

 

[PaulBHC]

I updated my blog with new info. I received my 32ga A1 and tried again. 7 wraps on a 16ga needle. Twister cotton ball pulled through. Placed the coil in the bottom slot and put a piece of twisted cotton on top in the upper slot. Left enough wick sticking out to drape down over the housing but not to the base ring. You can now see the cotton through the cap holes. Much better. Tests 2.7 ohm.

http://www.e-cigarette-forum.com/forum/blogs/paulbhc/5937-need-help-rebuilding-aspire-bdc-heads.html

 

[Festizious]

Well after burning through a few feet of Kanthal I had some mixed results. Thanks for pointing me to your Blog! Lots of great info there, also would have never thought of looking at a co-op for PG we have a Cenex in town I'll have to see if they carry it. So I tried draping the Kendall Packing Strip over the lower coil on the first build and left to much hanging down the barrel, it cut off the air flow something awefull and burnt the strip resulting some wonderfull flavor The Pin must have wadded the excess material up when it was pushed in. I had three heads to work with so built another this time draping just enough to cover the coil and let maybe 2mm or so hang over the coil. Each coil was 8 wraps of 32ga Kanthal with a cotton wick. The picture included is what the coil looked like with the material draped over. This head tested out at 1.3 ohms and vaped like a champion! for about an hour. I have a tendency to chain vape and started to get the burnt flavor again. I pulled the head apart and the packing strip materiel was discolored. I figured it wasn't getting enough juice wicked to it fast enough when I would chain vape. The next head I built exactly the same but put a VERY thin strand of cotton wick over the lower coil to serve as a wick for the strip material. This head also tested out at 1.3 ohms and vaped GREAT! No shorts! very good flavor and excellent vapor production far better than the stock heads. I'm going to rebuild the rest of my heads this way maybe tinker a little more but thus far pretty happy with the results, just be sure to boil the packing material first. I tried it with a piece that had just been rinsed out just for giggles and lets just say the flavor was not fantastic. I took lots of photos along the way and think I'll put the build into blog format later when I have the time.

 

[Festizious]

Well I'm all out of juice so off to the local B&M to grab some bottles. As long as I'm there I'm going to see if they have any 36ga. Kanthal wire. Maybe my vape hands will get grabby and I'll snatch up a Kick2 and a Nautilus tank while I'm there. With the 32ga. wire even with 10-12 wraps I'm having trouble getting the resistance near 2 ohms with dual coils which is where I would prefer it for running it on my eGo. The 1.3 ohm heads I made yesterday run great on my mech mod though A 14 or more wrap micro coil with 32ga. wire is just going to be to big to fit in the barrel. I see why Eigate uses such thin wire. I unwound one of their coils and it was something like 18-20 wraps if memory serves. It was kind difficult to tell because the coil was gunked up and falling apart as I was uncoiling it. If not I'll just have to buy some more 32ga. (I've got like 1ft left, lol) and make it work.

 

[PaulBHC]

When I say 2.7 or whatever in the 2-3.5 range I am talking about completely assembled and placed on an MVP or VV V3. Just the coil and wick seem to test very low with a multimeter.

Or make larger diameter coils to increase the length of wire.

 

[Festizious]

Likewise here, all the resistance figures I've quoted have all been for fully assembled coils on the ohm meter. I may have to start wrapping larger coils. I think that's going to be the next step in dialing these heads in now that We've got the short issue squared away. I need to get the resistance higher if I want to be using it on my eGo. I'd like to see it at around 1.8-2 ohms preferably. I don't have any hypo needles larger than 18ga. but I do have an extensive set of jewelers screwdrivers that I'm sure will fit the bill. I'm just not sure how much larger I can go. The coils I've built are pretty close together as is but I with packing material insulating the lower coil I'm sure I can wrap larger diameter coils now as the two can literally be pushing against each other in the barrel as long as they aren't jammed together I suppose. I image though if the coils are too large there is going to be wicking issues in such a small head. I picked up more wire today and when I have more free time tomorrow I'll try rebuilding a few more heads with larger diameter coils and see what happens. I'll keep the thread posted with results.

 

[Festizious]

I haven't tried testing the individual coils out of the head before instillation yet. If I switch coil diameters though or wire gauge might have to brake out the fluke meter. Just out of curiosity, having never tried it, when you say they were testing very low, how low were they testing? For instance. My final coil head came out two 1.3 so logic would dictate metering an individual coil before instillation the resistance would have to be higher than 2.6 not really being able to estimate for the length of the legs before installation. However, I'm usually terribly wrong about such things until I try them

 

[PaulBHC]

I'm too old to remember the numbers and did not know that you had to touch the leads to get a number and subtract that from your reading.

 

[PaulBHC]

Don't know if you are still around.

Made a batch of wires with 30ga, 5/64 drill, 7 wraps, 5/8 legs (based on used coils) and got consistent ~2.0 Ω.

Tried cotton twine. Looked good, filled a tank, couldn't get the juice to flow I think. Wanted to use that twine but may have to stay with cotton ball.

The original coils don't have any material on top of the top coil. I'm rethinking my cotton draped over the top wick. Wish it was easy to keep the filler material between the inner and outer tubes.

 

[Festizious]

Sorry for not watching the thread. Due to a move and a new job I haven't had the time to keep my eye on it or much time for vaping projects other than wrapping a quick coil here and there to keep my attys vaping. I've been thinking about going down to 36ga wire for the dual coils, if I can find any. 32ga has been working ok though but I have to go 10 wraps each coil at least to get the resistance high enough. Even then they come out at 1.5 ohms and my ego twist can't keep up with a res that low. I'm going to buy a VTR which should solve that issue. 10 wraps is about all I can fit width wise in the barrel. For my single coils I've been using 8 wraps of 28ga and they are working well and also come out to 1.5 ohms. I've given up on the filler material between the cap and barrel, it's a pain in the .... Half the time it just bunches up in the end of the cap and you cant really tell. I just leave cotton wick in the bottom coil long enough to bend down to where the cap mates into the barrel. This way when you put the cap back on the cotton wick is bent over the barrel and covers the holes on the cap. It's A fine balance but if you do it right it works great! No flooding and wicks like a dream. I wrap the lower coil larger so I will have more cotton wick to cover the holes as the up coil doesn't feed directly from them. I can't remember which size screwdriver I use I'll have to look at it when I get home. Thanks for the update!

 

[PaulBHC]

I made a few single coils this weekend. I agree with the lower coil wick observation. Without a top coil, I need that drape over the top to stop the leaking. Don't quite understand why it works but it does. This time I half filled an ET-S with plain VG and made sure every one worked before I tossed it in the "good" tin.

Updated my blog.