I received my Sense Herakles Hydra tank last night. A day earlier than expected, along with a separate shipment of new 6mg nic juice, so I was excited. I love vape mail. The tank looks nice. The top fill system is dead simple. I think the juice fill holes should be a little bigger. That's not a problem if you use a needle-nosed bottle or syringe though, so it's not a big deal. The only way to widen the fill holes would be to widen the tank itself a millimeter or two, and that wouldn't necessarily be a bad thing. The tank is small. It is very similar in size to a Nautilus Mini, though a bit shorter with the stock drip tip, but also a bit heavier. I tried 3 different 510 drip tips, including the wide bore one that came with the tank. All the drip tips I used fit tight without any wobble issues. The drip tip that comes with the tank is way too wide bore for MTL vaping, but I guess it is a nice tip of its type for direct lung hits.
6mg nic juice was the lowest nicotine level juice I had to use in this tank. Even at lower wattage settings I think that was a bit too much throat hit for the Hydra. At lower wattage settings flavor was still actually not bad - though a bit sharply one note without much complexity, and vapor production was okay - but nothing spectacular. When using narrower drip tips with the lowest airflow setting, I found the draw on the Hydra to still be too loose for a decent feeling mouth-to-lung hit. Blocking one of the air intake holes with a finger helped, but I can't see doing that regularly, and the tank quickly gets too hot for that to be comfortable for long anyway. With airflow reduced to the lowest setting, at just 15 watts, the vapor already quickly gets fairly warm - and then flat out hot when chain vaping. Despite that, the coil kept up easily with no dry hit issues - even when the tank was very low on juice. I had no leak issues.
On wider open air intake settings, using a wider bore drip tip, at higher wattages, vapor production gradually increases, and flavor becomes more refined, but flavor then also becomes more muted somehow, losing some of its pop - until you increase the wattage even more. The vape is still warm, and the tank still gets hot, but not as quickly. For mouth-to-lung hits, the vapor, throat hit and warmth just became too much for me to be enjoyable at all by about 25 watts, so I did not go any higher. I also started getting much dryer vapor at about that wattage, which I did not really like - though the coil still wasn't dry hitting, even though I was still just taking MTL hits. I honestly wouldn't even know how to take a decent direct lung hit - even if I was forced to at gunpoint. My lungs and larynx just fail to cooperate when I try, or I end up choking like a teenager trying their first cigarette. A much lower nicotine level juice would probably help with that, some.
I honestly don't see what people enjoy about doing the direct lung hit thing - other than the fairly massive clouds. It just isn't pleasant to me, but to each their own.
In conclusion, the Sense Herakles Hydra is a nicely made, easy to use, great looking, small and lightweight sub ohm tank that is completely inappropriate for mouth-to-lung vaping in any way, shape or form - unless you are some kind of masochist. Its tightest draw, even with a narrow bore Kayfun drip tip on it, is still not even remotely "tight". But even if you do that, with the reduced airflow everything becomes way too warm anyway, so the whole exercise becomes increasingly pointless. The Nautilus Mini, as imperfect a clearomizer as it is, is still a much nicer device to mouth-to-lung hit on than any sub ohm tank with higher ohm coils I've tried (3 so far).
As they are cheap, despite their own set of imperfections, I think I will try the 1.5 ohm dual-coil eLeaf GS Air M or MS tanks next, and also the new 1.8 ohm Clapton coils for the Nautilus and Triton Mini in the Nautilus Minis I already have. The Innokin iSub Apex with 2 ohm coils sounded potentially interesting, but those recommending it for MTL use all seem to be direct lung hit types - who have maybe completely forgotten how a pleasant and satisfying mouth-to-lung hit is supposed to feel, so I think I will take a pass on trying that tank.
