Protank MicroCoil Discussion!!

[scratchtheweasel]

These things are getting better, but not without a lot of swearing. I dug out the old protank v1 last night, and found some old heads to rebuild. Learned a few things in the process. First the old rubber grommets are awesome - so much more resilient than the silicon ones in the bdc heads, and they seemed to slide into the base with far less fiddling. Second - my previous wire trimming sucked tremendously. I kept getting shorts every other build and I believe it was the leads poking out.

On this last build I trimmed them before setting the grommet and pin. No short, but I think I'm jacking up the legs a bit when I set the grommet and pin now. More practice still needed, but this last coil is working pretty well despite some troubling resistance fluctuations. It's been reading all over the map. It has read as high as 2.0 and as low as 1.2 ohms.

When I fire it on a dna 30 clone it seems to start out around 1.4 then work it's way down to 1.2 after a few fires. On the MVP it's steadily reading 1.3 ohms. I think it's got about 11 wraps with 28 gauge kanthal A-1 - should be closer to 1.8 ohms I think. Not sure what's going on there, but it's hitting real nice so I am just enjoying it for now. Will give it another whirl when I'm up for the next fight.

 

[Monotremata]

Kanthal arrived this morning, first coil already vaping as I type! Got what I think was 5 or 6 wraps, reads 2.3ohms. Took about 15-20 mins but I was so shocked when I popped it on the MVP and got a reading on the first shot! I could NOT get the coils to stick like you guys, but its pretty close. Also forgot to torch it before I started so that may be it. Man at 32ga, it was kinda frustrating trying to squeeze that tiny coil AND see it! May try 30 or even 28 soon. Definitely need to make a jig. I used a hand drill from my tap set, stuck the cut end of my 5/64 bit in the chuck and twisted away. My drill bits are for a cordless screwdriver so there's limited bit space to use as well.. Now I got some pointers for the next one!

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[super_X_drifter]

^ don't overlook 29 ga. It's all I use. Perfect for 1 ohm to 1.5 ohm TMCs.

 

[Monotremata]

Just did my 2nd one now (only had 2 heads with dead coils to play with) and it was a little easier he he. This time it looked more like a micro (5 wraps/2.1ohms) but my hands were getting really shaky and I think the 32ga is cooled down already by the time I squeeze it. I'll test #2 when I finish this tank he he..
I think I was too fixated on hitting 1.8.. I liked em on my Evods but now that I have the MVP I've actually got vv vw control so I'm not so worried about hitting 2+. The first 2.3 is hitting pretty rad. Coupled with the fresh cotton, I got vapor galore and THERES that watermelon flavor again!!!

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[chanelvaps]

looks GREAT

These things are getting better, but not without a lot of swearing. I dug out the old protank v1 last night, and found some old heads to rebuild. Learned a few things in the process. First the old rubber grommets are awesome - so much more resilient than the silicon ones in the bdc heads, and they seemed to slide into the base with far less fiddling. Second - my previous wire trimming sucked tremendously. I kept getting shorts every other build and I believe it was the leads poking out.

On this last build I trimmed them before setting the grommet and pin. No short, but I think I'm jacking up the legs a bit when I set the grommet and pin now. More practice still needed, but this last coil is working pretty well despite some troubling resistance fluctuations. It's been reading all over the map. It has read as high as 2.0 and as low as 1.2 ohms.

When I fire it on a dna 30 clone it seems to start out around 1.4 then work it's way down to 1.2 after a few fires. On the MVP it's steadily reading 1.3 ohms. I think it's got about 11 wraps with 28 gauge kanthal A-1 - should be closer to 1.8 ohms I think. Not sure what's going on there, but it's hitting real nice so I am just enjoying it for now. Will give it another whirl when I'm up for the next fight.

View attachment 381472

 

[Monotremata]

Alright then! Third times a damn charm!!! Don't know if I can snap a macro pic of the coil like you guys do but I'll try before it goes in a tank hehe. This time switched to, what according to my drill gauge is, a 1/16 jewelers driver. Held the anchor leg on tight as I could and twisted that tension in there!! 5/4 came out ALMOST totally micro. Threw it on the MVP, I hit my 1.8 exact!! Fired it a couple times and got my super tweezers in there, stuck together nice, it almost looks like one of Macs and Cigs!!! Only took about 5 minutes this time too. I'm so tempted to sacrifice the other 5 in front of me but they're still new hehe..

Only thing I gotta get down now is to keep it straight when I put the insulator and pin in. No matter how hard I hold that bit down in the head and tension the legs, I skew something or slightly push a leg up and have to tweak it! Any tips for that short of growing another arm to hold the legs while I set the bit and close up the head???

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[chanelvaps]

you will not even like the new ones once you get a vape on a good rebuilt-I immediately disassemble mine and get it rebuilt. Do It!

 

[cigatron]

Alright then! Third times a damn charm!!! Don't know if I can snap a macro pic of the coil like you guys do but I'll try before it goes in a tank hehe. This time switched to, what according to my drill gauge is, a 1/16 jewelers driver. Held the anchor leg on tight as I could and twisted that tension in there!! 5/4 came out ALMOST totally micro. Threw it on the MVP, I hit my 1.8 exact!! Fired it a couple times and got my super tweezers in there, stuck together nice, it almost looks like one of Macs and Cigs!!! Only took about 5 minutes this time too. I'm so tempted to sacrifice the other 5 in front of me but they're still new hehe..

Only thing I gotta get down now is to keep it straight when I put the insulator and pin in. No matter how hard I hold that bit down in the head and tension the legs, I skew something or slightly push a leg up and have to tweak it! Any tips for that short of growing another arm to hold the legs while I set the bit and close up the head???

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Glad you're having fun and seeing results Mono. I love it when a plan comes together.

Mazziny's tip for holding BOTH legs when setting the grommet and pin is what I have always used. And don't worry about holding the mandrel tight against the flange when setting the grommet or pin; that can cause high end turns because the coil can't move even when the legs do.

After you get the grommet and pin set then you can tension the legs to pull the mandrel into full contact with the head flange. Perfect tension. Then you can tilt the mandrel a tiny bit on each side to free up the mandrel for easy removal. Perfect set.

Keep trying with that pile of coil heads sitn in front of you. When you get it right you got it forever.

"Be......Be the ball Danny" (Caddy Shack)

cig

 

[Monotremata]

Ugh man.. First one was going great all day.. Tank got down to the silver ring right before the base, and all of a sudden gurgle and leak city.. Put more juice in and think I torched the middle of my wick.. I guess cottons pickier than silica when the tank gets low???

I'll go look up Mazzinys tip now, maybe I'll try a couple more hehe..

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[MacTechVpr]

Ugh man.. First one was going great all day.. Tank got down to the silver ring right before the base, and all of a sudden gurgle and leak city.. Put more juice in and think I torched the middle of my wick.. I guess cottons pickier than silica when the tank gets low???

I'll go look up Mazzinys tip now, maybe I'll try a couple more hehe..

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Hi Mono, congraz. Sounds like you got the vape on alright. Get back to ya on the pin set. But I just want to say gurgles are the unfortunate calamity of the 510 universe. There's really no way to avoid them completely. You over chain or a bit too high a temp and the viscosity drops, game over. You're going to drip some from the wick or even bypass the coil threads to the bottom of the base or the 510 itself to the mod with a standard base. Compounding this, if you've done the blow out routine you know, some media is very saturated especially Nextel. An efficient coil is only going to cause more consistent saturation. So you got a soaked sponge sitting on a battery. Go figure.

Best strategy for a reliable vape is to try to do disciplined refills between half to a third full. Take that opportunity for your batt change (usually) and dry out base (blow out the wick if you use Nextel or Eko). The latter deters pigment buildup in the synthetics and prolongs the life of the build. This puts things back in a rather pristine condition with a t.m.c. and unless you're a mad vaper like me at least a couple good hours of relaxed vaping out of that half+ tank without fussin'.

Consistent and predictable. You can't get that with a standard silica wind.

What more can you ask of a clearo?



Good luck.

p.s. Also a good idea to develop the practice of keeping an eye open. If you run across a coil that seemed to bypass the base threading, throw that core out. The threading is off. No sense dealing with that as they're so cheap. Weird performance, toss it. Pretty soon you end up with a set of neat dependable assemblies and you've upped your game. Same thing applies to bases, silicone, etc.

 

[MacTechVpr]

Yes, I never use any type of vape calculators - be it coil or juice.

I build and mix by seat of the pants, an ohms meter, applied knowledge and common sense.

At the end of the day, what matters is that I'm vaping within the limits of my equipment / power source and that the vape is the best I can achieve using the simplest methods.

I don't need any spreadsheets / formulas / calculators to tell me that my vape kicks AYuss

Hey supe thanks for joining us and your video. The purpose for targeting resistance for new builders is as you say to gain that sense of what those fly be the seat preferences are for them. But most importantly…so they can duplicate the experience! It's an exercise in gaining muscle memory. It works. But if what we like varies by a .3Ω spread or more for that same device and it may fall as it may, I guess it don't matter.

I vape six different juice types and they like their bath water drawn at different temperatures. Who am I to tell them?

To each his own.

Take care and good luck.

 

[chanelvaps]

Well I for one was happy to see that my builds were somewhat accurate with what Steam Engine says (once I changed to 16mm for leg) BECAUSE if you do not have a natural understanding of OHMS and drill bits and 'how to short out a battery 101' you just never really know if you are on the right track.
I check in here, I devour the words of the pros (hope and pray some of it makes sense) I watch more video's and then I continue to fly by seat of pants. Nobody taught me, I have only a few other vapors around me and I know more than them so it was encouraging to see that I am, in fact, doing it right (almost) always more to learn

 

[clnire]

I am a "seat of the pants" coil builder too. I have no other vapers around and when I do meet one they are basicallly happy with their egos and CE4s (or similar). I did teach one person how to clean and dry burn an evod head . I taught myself with reading and videos but didn't really get it down til I found this thread and all the helpful people here.

Thanks everyone!

 

[Jaime Bates]

These things are getting better, but not without a lot of swearing. I dug out the old protank v1 last night, and found some old heads to rebuild. Learned a few things in the process. First the old rubber grommets are awesome - so much more resilient than the silicon ones in the bdc heads, and they seemed to slide into the base with far less fiddling. Second - my previous wire trimming sucked tremendously. I kept getting shorts every other build and I believe it was the leads poking out.

On this last build I trimmed them before setting the grommet and pin. No short, but I think I'm jacking up the legs a bit when I set the grommet and pin now. More practice still needed, but this last coil is working pretty well despite some troubling resistance fluctuations. It's been reading all over the map. It has read as high as 2.0 and as low as 1.2 ohms.


When I fire it on a dna 30 clone it seems to start out around 1.4 then work it's way down to 1.2 after a few fires. On the MVP it's steadily reading 1.3 ohms. I think it's got about 11 wraps with 28 gauge kanthal A-1 - should be closer to 1.8 ohms I think. Not sure what's going on there, but it's hitting real nice so I am just enjoying it for now. Will give it another whirl when I'm up for the next fight.

View attachment 381472

Look at that?!! Wow great job Scratch looks good keep up the great work! That looks much better.

To address your ohm levels it really depends on what siz you are wrapping it on as well. But i personally know that 10 wraps for t.m.c on 1.778mm drill blank and it will come out to 1.5 every time. Again this is using a pin vise and winding with tension not torching before install, and i install in the cup tension the legs before inserting the grommet and the pin. Fire with the mvp make sure we are heating from the inside out adjust with tweezers if nessecary wick up and go.

But from the looks of your pic you are getting it keep it up dont give up.

 

[MacTechVpr]

^ don't overlook 29 ga. It's all I use. Perfect for 1 ohm to 1.5 ohm TMCs.

That's the ticket. Perfect balance of coverage, res for the sweet zone for the KPT 1t 1.8-2.0Ω and for durability/stability. A bit faster fire time too than 28 AWG. Really nice wire for small devices and tanks.

Once you get used to the thicker wire >30 it's hard to look back.

Good luck.

 

[MacTechVpr]

These things are getting better, but not without a lot of swearing. I dug out the old protank v1 last night, and found some old heads to rebuild. Learned a few things in the process. First the old rubber grommets are awesome - so much more resilient than the silicon ones in the bdc heads, and they seemed to slide into the base with far less fiddling. Second - my previous wire trimming sucked tremendously. I kept getting shorts every other build and I believe it was the leads poking out.

On this last build I trimmed them before setting the grommet and pin. No short, but I think I'm jacking up the legs a bit when I set the grommet and pin now. More practice still needed, but this last coil is working pretty well despite some troubling resistance fluctuations. It's been reading all over the map. It has read as high as 2.0 and as low as 1.2 ohms.

When I fire it on a dna 30 clone it seems to start out around 1.4 then work it's way down to 1.2 after a few fires. On the MVP it's steadily reading 1.3 ohms. I think it's got about 11 wraps with 28 gauge kanthal A-1 - should be closer to 1.8 ohms I think. Not sure what's going on there, but it's hitting real nice so I am just enjoying it for now. Will give it another whirl when I'm up for the next fight.

View attachment 381472

Well done scratch, congrats. Still scrapin' for time but thought I'd pop in for the res issue.

First par, you're dead on with those observations. Hangers, protruding leads, are 90% of the problem on clearo's. It's the 510 interface that we have to accommodate along with the other requirements of the device. We need to see what it wants to get what we want.

Here's what's happening with the res scratch…you're still vaping a short. A microcoil is a continuous short. If you wound it to adhesion you're almost 100%. Pulsed it good until you got the effect and your right at the finish line. But the finish doesn't come quite often because there are minute imperfections in the wire and the wind. You can't see them but they're there. And as long as you have any electrons significantly jumping the turns, you will see res fluctuation. The coil itself will continue building oxide layers for quite some time. But usually after firing a few draws you will see res drop in steps from the high side to your actual wind wire length value.

Often the additional strain of either torquing to much or little if you removed the tank will very slightly affect the effective wire length. This can cause wild fluctuations. Try slightly unscrewing the tank to relieve lead pressure. Or adding pressure to the connection between the tank and the mod for a better connection. There baby steps can help better seat the coil itself and connection it sees. Pretty soon you'll be firing the right res. Once that happens and you finish burning in you'll have a lock on that res for the duration, unless you over torque at some point.

Low res we've come back full circle. Check the grommet compression. Hangers are very hard to see at times as the light can play tricks on your eyes. Even if you can't feel them low res means contact somewhere. Examine the inside of the bowl to be sure no lead is bowed and you have good leads into the grommet. Then double check for hangers.

Good luck scratch.



p.s. Very purdy wind there.

p.s.s. 11 turns 28 is right on the edge for a Protank for risk of side wall contact. Leads must be taught, perpendicular and terminated in direction of turn exit.

 

[MacTechVpr]

Kanthal arrived this morning, first coil already vaping as I type! Got what I think was 5 or 6 wraps, reads 2.3ohms. Took about 15-20 mins but I was so shocked when I popped it on the MVP and got a reading on the first shot! I could NOT get the coils to stick like you guys, but its pretty close. Also forgot to torch it before I started so that may be it. Man at 32ga, it was kinda frustrating trying to squeeze that tiny coil AND see it! May try 30 or even 28 soon. Definitely need to make a jig. I used a hand drill from my tap set, stuck the cut end of my 5/64 bit in the chuck and twisted away. My drill bits are for a cordless screwdriver so there's limited bit space to use as well.. Now I got some pointers for the next one!

Sent from my SGH-I777 using Tapatalk

Keep the wire taught to the bit as you turn as slowly as possible. You will see the tension forcing position of the wire. It may take a couple of times. You won't feel the uniformity of tension as you're using forearm strength. But you'll definitely observe it. Try to keep the wire perpendicular as you wind with that kind of force or you can actually overcome the strain pressure that's forcing the wires separate and cross-wind (overlap). Hand held power devices are a bit of a challenge.

Don't torch. Just handicaps the wire's potential. Pulse when you have adhesion and practically 100% of the time you'll fire micro except for minute variations in wire thickness and…deviations in tension applied.

Super_X's recommendation on (29 AWG) wire gauge is right on the money. A happy center for most of us campers.

Good luck mono.

 

[scratchtheweasel]

Thanks for the feedback folks. This is actually all starting to make sense. You my friends are awesome.

I think I may pick up a spool of 29 gauge as well to see how that works for me.

 

[chanelvaps]

30 is my fav
I have only tried 26 and 28 and love 30

That's the ticket. Perfect balance of coverage, res for the sweet zone for the KPT 1t 1.8-2.0Ω and for durability/stability. A bit faster fire time too than 28 AWG. Really nice wire for small devices and tanks.

Once you get used to the thicker wire >30 it's hard to look back.

Good luck.

 

[cigatron]

And as long as you have any electrons significantly jumping the turns, you will see res fluctuation. The coil itself will continue building oxide layers for quite some time. But usually after firing a few draws you will see res drop in steps from the high side to your actual wind wire length value.

Backwards actually Mac. As the coil developes alumina the shorts(wire touching wire) are removed therefore your res will INCREASE until you reach your final res. Fact

If your res is DECREASING during the first vapes it's happening somewhere in the grommet area. Probably because you torched your wire before install or winding or you didn't get your parts clean enough.

cig