SB no worky no more:(

[takedownjedi]

Hello, I just got a rsst atty and tried it on my SB. The SB worked fine before this with regular atty's. After I put the rsst on nothing will work now. I did not use a multimeter on my 4-5 coil and I thought I had shorted a battery. I ordered more batteries and still nothing with reg atty's. The hotspring is in good shape. I am waiting for a multimeter to come in the mail. I think I may have had the rsst contact point to low and pushed the post of the SB down. Now it is not making contact with the atty's anymore. If this is the case how would I go about fixing it? Or maybe there is something on the contacts? What should I use to clean it? Any suggestions on what else it might be? Thanks

 

[Mattnatti]

I usually just take a paper towel and twist up a corner of it and put into the 510 connector on the SB trying to get some of it on the outside of the center post, spin around in the connector and it gets most of the juice out. As far as the center post being pushed down......not sure on the SB as I haven't pushed any of mine down. I did do it once on a ego twist and the solution was to take a small screwdriver or paper clip then go around the outside of the post and gently pry upwards and work your way around the post.

Not sure if that is recommended on the SB's though. I am sure Halopunker will chime in later on tonight or tomorrow and he may have a better or recommended solution to a pushed center post on the SB.

 

[takedownjedi]

I usually just take a paper towel and twist up a corner of it and put into the 510 connector on the SB trying to get some of it on the outside of the center post, spin around in the connector and it gets most of the juice out. As far as the center post being pushed down......not sure on the SB as I haven't pushed any of mine down. I did do it once on a ego twist and the solution was to take a small screwdriver or paper clip then go around the outside of the post and gently pry upwards and work your way around the post. Not sure if that is recommended on the SB's though. I am sure Halopunker will chime in later on tonight or tomorrow and he may have a better or recommended solution to a pushed center post on the SB.

Hi Matt, I was just looking at your SB collection. Very nice! You have me putting together different options on a all silver SB, right now I just spent a bunch on new gear and juice..... So I will wait and see how this turns out. Do you drill an extra battery vent hole on yours? I am also wondering how the SB will react if a battery goes thermal. I am thinking these are tanks and almost indestructible, but the battery thread I was reading has me nervous:/

 

[Mattnatti]

I would never inflict damage on any of my SB's by drilling a vent hole in them. They vent through the switch/button and it is a very good design. Baditude and I were just talking about this today. If the ONLY vent hole were in the bottom like other mods then what would happen if the battery swells up under failure? It could possible block the vent hole from the swelling. I would say that as long as you are using recommended batteries ( IMR and preferably AW brand but I also run a couple Efest brand IMR's ) then you should be fine. If you bought it new then it has the updated hot spring in it and that is a second safety measure. all batteries are dangerous if not used properly. I don't know much about them but I will use exactly what the manufacturer recommends.
Thanks for compliment on my collection. I love every one of them. They are such a robust mod. I like to say they are simple, well built and made locally just like me. plus the maker stands behind every one of them. He should be proud of his product.

 

[takedownjedi]

I would never inflict damage on any of my SB's by drilling a vent hole in them. They vent through the switch/button and it is a very good design. Baditude and I were just talking about this today. If the ONLY vent hole were in the bottom like other mods then what would happen if the battery swells up under failure? It could possible block the vent hole from the swelling. I would say that as long as you are using recommended batteries ( IMR and preferably AW brand but I also run a couple Efest brand IMR's ) then you should be fine. If you bought it new then it has the updated hot spring in it and that is a second safety measure. all batteries are dangerous if not used properly. I don't know much about them but I will use exactly what the manufacturer recommends. Thanks for compliment on my collection. I love every one of them. They are such a robust mod. I like to say they are simple, well built and made locally just like me. plus the maker stands behind every one of them. He should be proud of his product.

It wouldn't hurt it to drill a vent hole? I have a drill press so it will still look pretty I bought the SB when it first came out. So they make a new spring for it? Might have to pick one up then. I am using the recommended batteries but I'm not really sure if they are knock off or not. And was just curious on what if it did go thermal. I wonder if altsmoke did any battery failure tests?

 

[Mattnatti]

I was just kidding ( mostly ) about inflicting damage. These are my babies and are a huge part in keeping me from tobacco.
Ah, you have one of the originals. Nice.
Yes, they make a updated I think hot spring for them. I was told about it but I forget. They do sell them at the website and if your close to a brick & mortar store. I bought all 16 of my batteries from AltSmoke and trust fully that they are genuine AW brand. That is one place I won't skimp on $ is when it comes to batteries even in my vehicles.
Not sure of battey failure test but with 20,000 ( from what I have heard ) SB's in circulation I would think they have done their homework.
Baditude was telling me today about a battery failure ( due to button being continually pushed by accident ) in his BB and it vented as it should through the button but the button eventually failed which the manufacturer replaced for free.

 

[takedownjedi]

I was just kidding ( mostly ) about inflicting damage. These are my babies and are a huge part in keeping me from tobacco. Ah, you have one of the originals. Nice. Yes, they make a updated I think hot spring for them. I was told about it but I forget. They do sell them at the website and if your close to a brick & mortar store. I bought all 16 of my batteries from AltSmoke and trust fully that they are genuine AW brand. That is one place I won't skimp on $ is when it comes to batteries even in my vehicles. Not sure of battey failure test but with 20,000 ( from what I have heard ) SB's in circulation I would think they have done their homework. Baditude was telling me today about a battery failure ( due to button being continually pushed by accident ) in his BB and it vented as it should through the button but the button eventually failed which the manufacturer replaced for free.

I was just waiting for someone to reply to this and ventured into a battery warning thread. Kind of freaked me out a little...Ok a lot. I am still thinking of drilling a small hole in the bottom just to be safe. I have the original batteries from altsmoke. They still hold a charge!! I ordered these other batteries because I was in a hurry to get back to vaping and thought the old one was shorted. They seem good though. Is the spring on mine still good or do I have to get a new one? What went wrong with these?

 

[Mattnatti]

Not really sure about the old springs but from what I remember being told the new spring will collapse when a battery gets too hot or a certain temperature and that breaks the circuit because the battery will fall and break contact with the top contact. they are a bright copper colored spring. Not sure what the old springs looked like. They are inexpensive so if you aren't sure about your batteries and spring I would at least replace the spring. Just looked it up. The old springs are silver and the new are copper colored. Here is a link.....
Silver Bullet/Omega - Replacement Hot Spring - Silver Bullet - Starter Kits - AltSmoke

^^ that may make you feel more comfortable about putting a unwanted orifice in your SB

 

[takedownjedi]

Not really sure about the old springs but from what I remember being told the new spring will collapse when a battery gets too hot or a certain temperature and that breaks the circuit because the battery will fall and break contact with the top contact. they are a bright copper colored spring. Not sure what the old springs looked like. They are inexpensive so if you aren't sure about your batteries and spring I would at least replace the spring. Just looked it up. The old springs are silver and the new are copper colored. Here is a link..... Silver Bullet/Omega - Replacement Hot Spring - Silver Bullet - Starter Kits - AltSmoke ^^ that may make you feel more comfortable about putting a unwanted orifice in your SB

Thanks for the link. An extra orifice is never unwanted. The more orifices the merrier. Is what I always say Just make sure your drill press is big enough for the job. Doooph.....is this thing on?

 

[Baditude]

Above is the "protected" Li Ion battery that went into thermal runaway in my BB that Matt was talking about in the above post. I'm not sure if it vented flames, but it surely vented gas hot enough to scorch the pocket of my pants. Luckily I wasn't wearing the pants at the time this happened.

The precipitating factor causing the above battery incident was the fire button becoming compressed in the pants pocket. This caused a rapid discharge of the battery, causing the battery to stress, overheat, and vent. The protective circuit in this battery failed to stop this. This is why safe chemistry IMRs are now recommended over protected Li Ion batteries in mechanical mods. You lose battery capacity (mAh) using an IMR over a protected battery, but when all is said and done safety is more important than higher mAh's.

Ever since this incident occured, I've used nothing but AW IMRs (Li Mn safe chemistry) in all of my mods, regulated as well as my mechanicals. No type of battery is totally safe, but I feel safer with these than I would if using protected batteries.

As Matt was saying above. Drilling a hole in the bottom of the Silver Bullet may not accomplish much but put a hole in your PV. As seen in my pic above, a battery going haywire in thermal runaway can become distorted in shape and swell, blocking any access to a vent hole in the bottom of the mod. Batteries typically vent from the positive end of the battery, although both ends blew out in mine. The BB did what it was designed to do - vent the hot gases out the fire switch and the hot spring collapsed, probably preventing the mod from becoming a pipe bomb. The fire button continued to work for a couple of days after this event, but then stopped working. I had to send it in to Chad at AltSmoke to have the button and hot spring replaced.

If I were you, I'd leave your SB alone and not drill a hole in the bottom of it. If the mod designer (Chad) thought a vent hole was needed in the SB, I'm certain he would have designed it with one. Like the BB, the Silver Bullet's switch is designed to vent gas in the event of a thermal runaway.

Buy a new HOT SPRING, they're cheap and its wise to have a spare. Make sure you use a high quality IMR battery like the red AW IMRs. You might even consider using a Vape Safe Mod Fuse for a second layer of protection. These are a thin battery fuse that attaches to the negative end of the battery via a magnet, but some folks might consider this overkill - I'm not one of those.



Using a KICK in your Silver Bullet would offer short circuit protection, and also allow you to adjust your voltage like a regulated mod. This would go on top of your battery. These take up some room in the battery compartment, so you would need to drop down a battery size to an 18490 IMR, or purchase a Silver Bullet KICK sleeve in order to continue using the 18650 battery.

Silver Bullet with a Kick

Here's a blog that I've written on Battery Basics for Mods: IMR or Protected?

 

[takedownjedi]

I checked the spring. It is copper. So this is the newer one? I like the extra fuse idea. Going to look into that. ................................................. Could I just use a copper "spacer" to raise the post? Hold it in with some heatsink paste........................................................................... Could someone please tell me how to post in paragraph form? Its erasing the spaces in between sentences when I reply.

 

[Mattnatti]

If it a copper colored spring then yes, it is the new one. The website says the old style was silver in color.

 

[halopunker]

If you're Silver Bullet is still not functioning properly, I would contact our online support with the issue. If there was a short it could've collapsed the spring at the base, also RBA's like to crush connectors so that could be it as well. Checking to see if the Silica under the contact post in the head is 'mushroomed' (rubber piece around the center post of the 510 connection) would indicate that the center post has been 'crushed' and may be too far down to make contact with other atomizer/tanks.

As far as adding a vent hole, there is one under in the head of the unit under the switch itself.

 

[cddz]

If it a copper colored spring then yes, it is the new one. The website says the old style was silver in color.

I switched to the Phosphorous Bronze in early 2010. The Stainless added a bit too much resistance.