Protank 2 Rebuild Troubleshoot

[JohnQPublic]

Ok my friend. More troubles abound. I tried the micro wrap with cotton with a 30gauge kanthol. I was able to get 2.6ohms with about 7 or eight wraps. Here is where the problems arise!

I test fired a dry coil to make sure it was burning from the center out. It was. I added cotton, juiced the cotton (50/50 blend) and coil, added the post, test fired & it was smoking and popping like a champ (I was testing at 12v).

I screwed the tank on, pressed the button and nothing. Barely got a popping soud & I could barely get a pull from the tank, minimal vapor production and it was spitting juice in my mouth.

So I unscrewed the coil/wick and blew out the post to clear the juice out. Re attached everything and still was unable to get a good pull.

I tried to start from the beginning about 3 times and kept getting this result. Maybe the cotton wick was not thick enough? Perhaps I damaged the rubber grommet?

I followed the link above for the tutorial to a tee. Not sure what could be going wrong. And to add insult to injury, the stock backup coil/wick was giving me the same issue, that is when I screw the tank on all the way I can't get a pull. HELP!!!

Sounds like it's flooded to me. When I did the quickie cotton rewick on the standard coil I got insta-flood. Still trying to find the right amount of cotton.
And it looks so simple in the vid.

 

[Nataani]

Yarn huh? I've never though of trying that. I would assume it's a cotton yarn?

Yeah, cotton yarn. Ekru variety yarn is untreated, safer for the lungs, though to be honest, I have bought white as well when ekru wasnt available. I dont bother boiling.

For reference, the type I use with my 3/64th bit, single strand, is peaches n cream ekru from walmart.

I tried to use a minimal amount of cotton as to not pull on the coil, but enough to fill the coil up. Perhaps its just flooding???

Easy to know if its flooding, check your battery contact when you unscrew it. If its wet, then the atty is flooding.

With cotton balls less is usually more, but too little and your going to have issues as well. Cotton balls require finesse, nobody can tell you how much to use, practice, practice and more practice finally gets you to the point where you intuitively know how much to use. Its a pain. I have built more coils than I can count with cotton balls, and STILL end up with too much or too little sometimes, this is why I finally switched over to yarn for the purpose of protank coils (and also some RDA builds).

Yarn does not wick as well as a perfect cotton ball wick, but the difference is marginal and the perfect cotton ball wick is a masters art.

There is airflow for sure when it isn't screwed in all the way. I've had the issue before, and changing out the stock wick/coil usually works.

A couple things regarding airflow:

1. Make sure that the bottom pin has no gunk in it, with some juices that make a lot of gunk it sometimes gets clogged.

2. For some unfathomable reason, flipping the rubber grommet upside down helps. I have pondered over this a fair bit, and still have no answers as to why, but from experience I can tell you for sure that it does indeed help.

3. Consider drilling ONE of the airholes just above the 510 threads out to 1/16th, it makes a huge difference to the performance of a protank 2.

4. I have also had some attys that seem to have issues with air flow. I have tinkered around with them, rebuilt them, cleaned them, etc, and still they always seem to have issues. If you get a bad one, throw it out. Rebuild ones that you know work well.

5. Don't screw the atty in too tight. Go a little bit more than when you feel resistance. If your one of those who has vice grip hands, this is not the time to use them.

I just want a massive vape cloud!

If clouds are what your after, then once you break yourself in building these protank coils, consider moving to a rebuildable dripping atomiser (RDA). More research will be required, especially on battery safety and such, but they are by far the most rewarding vape you can get (imo) if your a cloud enthusiast.

Also, I have heard the advice tossed out at stores to use high vg juices to get your clouds. This is indeed true, IF your using a dripper. Using anything over 50% vg in a protank style clearo is just begging for trouble. Its doable, just not worth the effort.

 

[harlym]

Sorry i'm new here and this post is in the wrong place, i was trying tonrespond to an guy having tight draws from rebuilding with micro and cotton...I was having the same issue with micro and cotton and I replaced the cotton 3 or 4 times thinking I was rolling the cotton to tight but never got the tight draw fixed so I switched the coil to another tank wit a different juice and it worked fine so what it told me is my juice I had was to heavy in VG, my juice source doesn't tell me the mix but I know by looking at that juice it has more VG then my favorite juice has.

 

[harlym]

Just found a really nice profane tank at harbor freight for 7 bucks

 

[DoubleDecker]

YOU sir have been most helpful. Thank you dearly for taking the time to respond in such detail!

 

[JohnQPublic]

No need to drill airholes in a Protank any more.

Kanger Airflow Control Valve - Protank II, Protank 3, Aerotank

 

[DoubleDecker]

Ok. With a 30g Kanthol 7 wrap micro coil with cotton I was able to get a 3.0 ohm read out! FINALLY! Set my iTaste SVD at 11.5 volts and am blowing awesome clouds with great flavor! No leaks, no gurgling!

Thanks for all the help everyone!