Silver Bullet M and Voltage Drop

[doofy666]

Not sure if this is a SB question or voltage drop.

I'm a noob with a freshly acquired used silver bullet. I have a cheap inline voltmeter to measure battery voltage and voltage drop. I got my first mech 6 weeks ago.

Voltage drop on SB feels excessive. On a 1.3 ohm coil I see .37, and on a 0.4 ohm coil I see a whopping 1 volt. Should I expect to see such a large drop on a .4 coil or should I be looking at the SB? All contacts look clean, can't get to base but spring and base look shiny. Battery is cheap efest purple 18650, 2500mah, from untrusted source

 

[State O' Flux]

I don't place much faith in most (cheap) inline volt meters... they frequently put an unwarranted scare into scare people.

Likely any drop you have will be in the mod, battery or a combination of both... it's not that common to see much more than a few hundredths of an ohm resistance in a decently made atomizer. You might have a coil touching the cap... but that's not very frequent either.

If you have a multimeter (DMM), you can bench test the atty and mod for resistance/continuity. You should see '0.00' (zero) ohms resistance in both (this would include subtracting any base resistance found in the DMM, if any.

If you don't have a DMM... try swapping your battery and atty on to a "known good"... aka high quality, mech mod. If everything works a treat, you've narrowed it to your mod.

The Efest purple 18650 is not a bad battery... but it's not a true 35a MCCD. That number isn't all that relevant anyway, considering you're only drawing 10.5 amps at 4.2V with a 0.4Ω load.

 

[doofy666]

My voltmeter feels moderately accurate but I don't know how to use a mulitmeter to test it's accuracy. I have one that seems moderately accurate. I don't understand what you say above:

If you have a multimeter (DMM), you can bench test the atty and mod for resistance/continuity. You should see '0.00' (zero) ohms resistance in both (this would include subtracting any base resistance found in the DMM, if any.

I've just gone on the fact that I know my Kayfun at various wattages and the voltage drop suggested by my meter roughly correlates to my "feel". And I can vape my Goblin (0.4 ohm) on my SB, but not on my Dingo.

Here are some numbers. All the drops seem large to me, considering what I've read here, but the SB is a bit big:

Fresh battery, Nitecore D4 reads it as 4.18. (Well, not quite fresh, been stood for a bit)

New Poldiac: voltmeter reads it as 4.15 and 3.68 under .4 load
Used Roller: voltmeter reads it as 4.14 and 3.58 under .4 load
SB: voltmeter reads it as 4.14 and 3.14 under .4 load

All the above voltage drops seem large to me, but the SB seems excessive. It has a load of grey grease on the only threaded part which I will clean off sometime.

The Efest purple 18650 is not a bad battery... but it's not a true 35a MCCD. That number isn't all that relevant anyway, considering you're only drawing 10.5 amps at 4.2V with a 0.4Ω load.

But I assume that if I have a 1v voltage drop I'm only drawing 3.2v max anyway...

Voltage drop question: is voltage drop a constant or does it change according to load?

 

[Thrasher]

Doesn't the bullet use a wire in the switch, I know in the old bolt we had to put in thicker wire

 

[doofy666]

Doesn't the bullet use a wire in the switch, I know in the old bolt we had to put in thicker wire

Not the "M"; it's purely mechanical.

 

[Baditude]

Agree with doofy666. The original version Silver Bullet (still available) has a wired switch. The newer fully mechanical Silver Bullet has no wiring.

Original Silver Bullet

Silver Bullet M

Being that the OP's Silver Bullet is pre-owned, it might benefit from a Noloxx antioxident cleaning of it's battery cap threads. Any dirt in the threads could increase the voltage drop. This can be found at most hardware stores in the electrical or plumbing department.

Apply a small amount to the threads, work in with an old toothbrush, and wipe clean with a soft cloth. Repeat as needed until the bare metal threads are shiny like new.

 

[doofy666]

Being that the OP's Silver Bullet is pre-owned, it might benefit from a Noloxx antioxident cleaning of it's battery cap threads. Any dirt in the threads could increase the voltage drop. This can be found at most hardware stores in the electrical or plumbing department.

Yes, thx, I think so. I was thinking the grey grease on the threads might be some sort of connectivity grease, but I assume there comes a point where connectivity suffers from over application of connectivity grease.

 

[Froth]

Yes, thx, I think so. I was thinking the grey grease on the threads might be some sort of connectivity grease, but I assume there comes a point where connectivity suffers from over application of connectivity grease.

Noalox itself is not a conductor, it is only meant to keep surfaces(Primarily Aluminum) from corroding and thus improving the conductivity through that route. Noalox itself will not increase conductivity, it is an anti oxidant and anti-sieze compound for aluminum, the zinc which is suspended in it helps prevent aluminum oxide from forming on aluminum surfaces, it was designed for pressure type connections and service entrance boxes, the very small current flowing through the mod will not be drawn towards the noaloax to "conduct" at all as the surface area of the applied noalox is incredibly small when compared to the body of the mod it is applied to. All Noalox does is delay oxidation caused by atmospheric conditions.