Safety questions

[jrholls]

I've been a pack a day smoker for about 15 years. I set Christmas day as my last day smoking (gift for my wife). I bought a mech mod and RDA a few weeks ago, because I wanted something to be excited about to help me quit. So far so good, as I haven't had a cig in 1.5 days, but I do have some concerns about the safety of my equipment. Please keep in mind that I've really had no problems with it, but I have seen other threads where the veterans here seem to be strongly warning new vapers away from sub-ohm vaping. I wanted to post what I am doing / using to get your opinions and advice.

I bought my mod/atty at a vape shop nearby, and the guy who sold it to me spent about an hour and a half showing me how to build coils, wicks, and went over the functions of the equipment that I bought:

Ohm tester
Asmodus Fat Snow Wolf mech mod
Asmodus 26650 RDA
2 Efest 26650 batteries (3500 mAh, 3.7V, Li-Mn)
26 g Kanthal wire
Cotton
Nitecore battery charger

Whole thing cost around $330.

The sales guy built coils for me at .52 ohm. In the past few weeks I have rebuilt the coils 4 times, and am currently using a parallel coil set up at .24 ohms. I am so far liking this set up a lot, but the only problem I'm having is that I can barely use the thing in the morning when I first wake up. Took me a couple hours today to be able to take a decent hit from this without coughing and choking. I am hoping this will stop after my lungs recover from all the cigarrettes.

I have been using this very heavily over the last few days. I am using a 70VG/30PG liquid at 6mg Nic. I absolutely love vaping, and so far haven't experienced dry mouth, sore throat, or any other ill effects.

I also have just a couple questions. First, is my current set up safe? Next, as my coils get a bit dirty, I have been removing the wick and heating them to red hot to kind of self clean them. Is this ok, and if so, how long can I keep the same coils, if I clean them like that once every two days or so?

Thanks for your time and help.

 

[Xaiver]

I don't personally sub-ohm, because I don't like unregulated mods. My first mod was unregulated, and I found out very quickly that I didn't like that it would go from full power down to sort of weak over a few minutes....and then I was constantly changing batteries. That's what lead me to regulated mods (Which were fairly rare when I started).

0.5 ohms isn't an unsafe number, as long as you're testing it first and making certain that it's .5 ohms. It gets dangerous at about 0.2ohms, because that's considered the error range for most ohm meters that are affordable.

Since you're new to it, I would honestly recommend that you use single coils to get used to building them, and some people like them better. If you were to make the same coil and just hook up 1 coil instead of 2, you would have ~ 1 ohms.

There's nothing that I see about that that looks unsafe. I'm glad that the salesman took the time to explain it to you and didn't just shove you out the door with a bunch of stuff.

You probably won't get used to it first thing in the morning for quite a while. A sub-ohm coil on a mech is designed to pump out the vapor, and your lungs aren't really ready for that right away in the morning. The best advice I can give you for that is to not start with a fresh battery right away in the morning. Use the battery from the night before for a while, it might help lessen the clouds a bit too.

 

[rolygate]

You can have a go at building a coil or coil group that measures 1.5 ohms, and try using that in the morning.

Your current set-up is about 2,000 times more powerful than the usual ecig a smoker tries out first off, which is often a mini.
If so, next they go to an eGo (a mid-size unit) when they're ready.
Then, if they need more, they get a VV unit and a tank head.
If they like tinkering they get a mechmod, almost always using 18650 cells. They build coils at 1.5 ohms, or maybe 1 ohm.
Then if they can't get a fierce enough hit that there is a risk of relapse to smoking, they build coils that ohm out around 0.6 or 0.8.
If they get into cloud chasing as against just needing a vape and wanting to avoid smoking, they build coils at 0.4 or 0.3 ohms.
Then if they get into cloud contests and need to fog up an entire room, they do 0.2 coils and even 0.1 if they like to live dangerously.
Then they get a big 26650 mechmod so it can handle the power, otherwise the tube gets nearly as hot as the coil, and the battery can be used as a handwarmer at the North Pole at minus 40 degrees, and it may allow them to dispense with the welding gloves they needed to hold the rig.

This is the rig you've currently got. I wouldn't go so far as to say the guy in the store saw you coming; just that you are extremely unlikely to really need that rig, at least set up as it is.

You'd be able to get away with a VV unit and a Protank or whatever. Or an 18650 mech and an RTA set to burn at 1 to 1.5 ohms. Your current rig is about where you might get to after a year's experience, and a desire to get into cloud chasing. It's obviously way, way too strong for your lungs.

Luckily you won't have to spend much for a year or two Just build your coils at a much higher resistance, somewhere between 1 and 1.5 ohms is a good starting point. If you want to keep the dense clouds of fog you get with your current head set-up, then you'll need another RBA - one for higher-resistance coils, one for low-res.

Be aware that your current set-up is not 'vaping' as such, it is extreme vaping. That's OK if you understand the consequences (no way are you going to be breathing in the same type of vapour as an eGo owner). It's bad practice for vape shops to supply this stuff to newbies, in my opinion (or at least, when it's set up as yours is), but there you go. Guess it's hard for them to say no to $330, which would be their best sale that week (maybe that month).