Glad to hear you got your DiD up and runnin, I finally got some flavor out of mine for about an hour then it quit. I'll look at it some other time, for now it's sittin on the bench ridin the pine.
Really sad to hear you're not there yet with the DID. But believe me if I can get this going, anyone can. I realize a number of people have attempted to help you with this and although this might seem repetetive here's what I found useful:
Oxidize like there's no tomorrow. Also quench the wick in juice. Get it red hot with your torch, drip juice on it, light it and let the juice burn away naturally. Repeat 3x.
The cigarette paper trick.
Pay particular attention to your coil tension between the posts and wick. Not too tight, not too loose. Play with this.
1/10mm of movement of the coil on the wicks or the wick itself can have profound effect in ensuring no shorts or hot spots. The hot spots particularly affected flavour I found.
Try suspending your wick so it's not touching any part of the tank.
I've found that a few dry pulls in the horizontal position here and there (with the wick positioned under the center axis of the tank) really helps with the wicking until it's fully broken in.
Lower your voltage.
Try firing the vmax twice during a draw. Fire, let go, fire again during the same draw.
By no means am I an expert but the above helped me find my particular sweet spot. Some might seem like overkill, I know, but at this point...what have you got to lose?
Surely you're not gonna let this lil' thing wup ya like that
