SMOKtech makes a better kayfun?

[Btsmokincat]

Mine should be here today, so I currently look something like this ->


Andria

So how did your first build we work out? Any dry hits or issues? I may pick up some rayon to try if I can't get cotton to work right...

 

[AndriaD]

Oh I'm sorry I wasn't clear. I meant to say a picture of the wick hole with the chimney section on! Sorry!

In fact, it'll be even better if you could see what's the largest drill bit you can fit into the wick hole.

AND NOW THAT YOU HAZ IT, how's it vape?! How loose is the draw? Details details!

Ok here's another pic, chimney on -- the wick holes show better since I primed the silica wick that was already in there (figured I'd go on and try it since it's there). Once I've tried it with the existing coil/wick, I'll build a new coil for it and let you know about the largest drill bit size that sits easily in the wick holes.

Andria

 

[AndriaD]

Ok, first vape test -- even with the silica wick it came with, it's not a bad vape. It definitely is a bit more airy than a kayfun Lite Plus; with only 2 air holes exposed, the draw seems a bit airier the KFL+ at about halfway closed or open (which is about where I usually prefer the KFL+). With one air hole exposed, it's similar to my preferred setting on the KFL+, about halfway open/closed. So all y'all looking for good lung hits, this one will do that very well.

It seems to be a cooler vape than the KFL+; at 9w, my preferred setting on the KFL+, the RSBT seems very cool, really can't feel much warmth at all. So I turned it up to 9.5w, and now I'm feeling a bit of warmth.

The pyrex drip tip seems a mix; it's smooth, which is nice, but utterly flat on top, which feels odd; also, the bore seems quite narrow, so it may get watery inside with prolonged vaping.

So, now I'm getting a bit tired of the relative lack of taste from the silica, so it's time to drain and play with the coil/wick to my own preference. I'm going to try a 3/32 drillbit first; 29ga wire, aiming for 1.6Ω, so it should be 7/8 half-wraps. I'll be using rayon since I prefer that.

Andria

 

[AndriaD]

Ok, here's what I've discovered re: drillbit size: the 3/32 will not fit in the slots; the 5/64 will fit, but it goes all the way down into the bottom of the slot, which I don't think it's supposed to do. I'll try the 5/64 first and see how that works out; that will mean 9/8 half-wraps to get to the target 1.6Ω.

Andria

 

[AndriaD]

Well, I had to take a break. The build seems fine, though it came to 1.7Ω; that's just my novice-status showing, I never manage to get *exactly* where I'm aiming, or rarely anyway.

Wicking is giving me some problems. First off, I'm not used to using that small a diameter coil anymore, I usually use 3/32 or 7/64, and I may need to go back to that and nevermind the size of the slots. First try, apparently had too little wick (rayon) sticking out, or maybe it just wasn't enough rayon, since it compresses when it's soaked; I got a MASSIVE flood out of that, nearly got a mouthful of juice too, but managed to pull away and spit before it got past my lips. Whew! Wasted a few ml but at least I didn't actually get any into my mouth. That stuff burns even on the lips!

2nd try, I thought it might be ok, no flooding, but maybe it's too much wick for that small a diameter -- though it did fit, while tugging on both ends of it to slide it thru, and this time I left a bit more sticking out -- or I just didn't give it sufficient time to get saturated into that small a diameter. *Really bad* taste which I think is rayon's version of a dry hit. Which is why I'm taking a break; to give it time to saturate fully, and for my taste buds to get over that nastiness while vaping from my kayfun. But I won't know if the wick is actually burned unless I take it apart again. If I can't get any decent taste from it as it is, then when I take it apart again I think I'll try the organic cotton.

Ugh, phew, ptui! Dry-hit cotton is bad enough, but this was FOUL. Very chemical-tasting, which my ejuice never tastes like, which is why I think it's the dry-hit taste from rayon.

Andria

 

[autobiogphnation]

Build with deck filled. It was always a little gurggly, but it worked. Notice horizontal coil, so I pushed cotton more towards walls to allow for air flow.

 

[autobiogphnation]

New wick. Single piece of cotton. Tails tucked to walls/well. A little is set into channel. Working good thus far. Full open airflow at 12.5 watts. I'll report back as I use this more.

 

[AndriaD]

Well, success, at last! Using rayon! What I did change was that puny 5/64 coil; I went back to the smaller of my own preference, 3/32, and it works great! As far as I can tell, 5/64 ought to be kept for T3S and Protank coils, not for something as big as a kayfun or RSBT, though I even prefer 3/32 for T3S coils.

I did wrap it on a 3/32 drill bit, but obviously I had to remove that and slide it onto a 5/64 bit to get it mounted. Ohh, and the Kayfun mounting screws *do* work, and are much easier to work with than those damn thumbscrews, especially if you're already used to them -- just getting them into the holes was the hardest part, they're so tiny, but I finally managed it.

Autobio, how exactly did you get some of the wick into the well? Because now I'm getting some gurgling/flooding, and I think it's because of rayon's propensity to shrink when soaked. Having some of the wick in the well might fix that, or I might really need to go back to cotton for the RSBT. I opened up another air hole so that two are open, and blew it out, and that seems to have fixed it for the moment, but I won't make any bets on it being fixed permanently, knowing how rayon shrinks. It might be the combo of having just one air hole open plus rayon's shrinking that's causing it.

Andria

 

[autobiogphnation]

Autobio, how exactly did you get some of the wick into the well? Because now I'm getting some gurgling/flooding, and I think it's because of rayon's propensity to shrink when soaked. Having some of the wick in the well might fix that, or I might really need to go back to cotton for the RSBT. I opened up another air hole so that two are open, and blew it out, and that seems to have fixed it for the moment, but I won't make any bets on it being fixed permanently, knowing how rayon shrinks. It might be the combo of having just one air hole open plus rayon's shrinking that's causing it.

Andria

Simple. The wick is long, almost 3/4" or maybe less on each side. Take the tail and please that down into the well. Mind the air hole. Then just fluff it by the channels and take up slack from the tails to fit some into the channels.

I put the chimney on and take the bottle and put some liquid on the channels/wick and check how it wicks. adjust as needed so that it wicks how you want.

 

[AndriaD]

Simple. The wick is long, almost 3/4" or maybe less on each side. Take the tail and please that down into the well. Mind the air hole. Then just fluff it by the channels and take up slack from the tails to fit some into the channels.

I put the chimney on and take the bottle and put some liquid on the channels/wick and check how it wicks. adjust as needed so that it wicks how you want.

Ok, I will definitely keep that in mind the next time I'm messing with it. For the moment it's vaping ok, so I don't want to get back into it just now, gotta make dinner pretty soon, and I just had the most ungodly mess on my kitchen counter to clean up, after 2+ hrs of coil building/wicking.

Also I think I know what caused that gurgling/flooding -- I'm such a doofus! -- I left the fill screw out when I put the metal sleeve back on it!

Andria

 

[Btsmokincat]

So I recoiled my RSBT. I was having dry hit issues with the first build which was a 9 wrap, 30 gauge, 2mm microcoil at 1.9 ohms wicked with way too much cotton...



My second build is a 7 wrap, 30 gauge, 2mm at 1.5 ohms wicked with much less cotton



So far it is hitting like a champ with no dry hits at 10 watts on a MVP2. I have the cotton just sitting in the wick holes, not sticking out at all.

Oh and the screws from my caterpiller do not fit

 

[AndriaD]

I'm thinking about rewicking my RSBT with cotton tomorrow. Even after I got it working ok, I could still taste a little of that really odd taste, and I think it was the rayon. Also it kept doing the gurgling/leaking thing, and I think it's because of rayon compressing as it saturates. It might take me a few tries to get it right with cotton, I haven't used it since before I got sick back in June, had just started using the rayon then, and cotton always seemed really finicky to me, but I think it's worth a shot. It wasn't bad with the silica, and I've still got a buttload of that stuff, plus all the bits that come with the different tanks, so if nothing else, I guess I could always use silica in it.

I never had this many issues with a kayfun; first build I ever put in one of those vaped like a champ -- and it was silica! It just got better as I went to organic cotton and then rayon -- and never any leaking unless I go nuts priming it, and that's easily and quickly dealt with, and then done.

*sigh*
Andria

 

[Btsmokincat]

I agree AndriaD, that the RSBT is a much more finicky tank than a Kayfun.

So far so good with the wick I put in yesterday. After a tank full it's still vaping like a champ with no gurgles or dry hits. I used about the same amount of cotton as I would use in my Kanger Duals turned into singles, less than I think should be in there. Once I put the chimney on I even pushed in the wicks just a tiny bit so they aren't flush with the opening but just inside by a mm or so.

I also top filled by removing the steel top that the fill screw is in and just dumping the juice in with the airflow control closed. No issues there either, screwing the top down with out flipping it over worked just fine!

My luck the next time I rewick, I won't be able to replicate these results... Despite all that I'm still happy I got a RSBT, the flavor is excellent, I love the airflow as well as building and top filling couldn't be easier. I think eventually I'll get the wicking down to a science with practice and time.

 

[AndriaD]

I didn't do anything with the RSBT today; I was lazy all day and just vaped from my reliable Kayfuns. Actually my asthma was giving me some trouble this morning, and I noticed yesterday while trying out the RSBT that I started having some issues, so I've actually been trying to vape as little as I could manage, all day today. But there's a "tank cracker" I've been meaning to mix up, some Oak Barrel Cider mixed with cinnamon redhot, and the RSBT would be a good choice for that, so tomorrow if my asthma is less troublesome, I probably will go ahead and re-wick the RSBT with cotton. I may even go ahead and make a new coil; the one I finally was able to get to work somewhat with rayon was 3/32, but I really prefer 7/64 with cotton, it's so much fatter that it's not so difficult to get that very small amount of cotton that's needed, and with 29ga wire, it would only need 6 wraps, so it wouldn't be too wide, and thus much easier to thread the cotton into. I also probably won't compress it, as compressed coils seem to concentrate heat extremely, not a really good thing for cotton.

Andria

 

[autobiogphnation]

I didn't get a chance to really use my recent build today much due to a memorial gathering for my mom today, I didn't think it'd be appropriate at all to vape during it all. But after sitting in my pocket all day, no leaks and it hit well after while out with some friends, so far so good.

 

[AndriaD]

I didn't get a chance to really use my recent build today much due to a memorial gathering for my mom today, I didn't think it'd be appropriate at all to vape during it all. But after sitting in my pocket all day, no leaks and it hit well after while out with some friends, so far so good.

Sorry to hear about your mom; condolences. But nice to hear that the tank didn't leak! I *have* been seeing some leaks with mine, just sitting there on the counter; I finally had to close off the air flow holes so it would stop, so I'll have a mess to clean up tomorrow when I redo the coil+wick. I think it's just that rayon, how it shrinks when it's saturated, and it seems to cause more problems in this RSBT than in the kayfun. Figures; it's sort of like a blown-up protank head, so it leaks like a protank.

Andria

 

[autobiogphnation]

Sorry to hear about your mom; condolences. But nice to hear that the tank didn't leak! I *have* been seeing some leaks with mine, just sitting there on the counter; I finally had to close off the air flow holes so it would stop, so I'll have a mess to clean up tomorrow when I redo the coil+wick. I think it's just that rayon, how it shrinks when it's saturated, and it seems to cause more problems in this RSBT than in the kayfun. Figures; it's sort of like a blown-up protank head, so it leaks like a protank.

Andria

Thank you. And yes my concern as well was it being in my pocket all day at an awkward angle (on vapor shark rDNA) would lead to a leak so I closed it for a few but then said screw it after a quick vape in the bathroom and it stayed good. I think tucking those tails of the wick helps a lot to prevent a flood, provided the channels are blocked enough by cotton.

 

[AndriaD]

Thank you. And yes my concern as well was it being in my pocket all day at an awkward angle (on vapor shark rDNA) would lead to a leak so I closed it for a few but then said screw it after a quick vape in the bathroom and it stayed good. I think tucking those tails of the wick helps a lot to prevent a flood, provided the channels are blocked enough by cotton.

I actually woke up this morning thinking of that wick, the way to do it... as it exits the coil, I'll tuck it in and run it around to go out the slot opposite from the side it exits the coil... on each side. That seems the best way to do that neatly. If my asthma hadn't been such a bother today, I'd probably have already done that, but I figured as little vaping as I could get away with was the order of business today, dang it. It's so damn weird how I feel so breathless now that I'm vaping again, but didn't when I was smoking. I don't get it. I could tell I was getting all the crud in my lungs again within a week of starting back to smoking, but I didn't feel asthmatic. Maybe it's because of those anesthetics that BT puts in the tobacco; my lungs were distressed, but I didn't feel it. Now that those are wearing off, I can actually *feel* the distress.

Andria

 

[AndriaD]

Well, my idea, as described, didn't exactly work; there's just not enough room in the head to run the wick around as I had visualized. But, I just tucked it down and then back up to exit the slot. It works better if the wick is already juiced. And cotton really does seem to work much better than rayon in these RSBTs; granted, I just started vaping on this one I just finished, but so far no leaking, no gurgling, and getting a really terrific vape at 8w, considerably lower than I normally vape with rayon on a kayfun. I think a cotton-wicked RSBT is a real winner! Yeah I'll probably always prefer the kayfun, but for tank-crackers, this RSBT will probably be my go-to, rather than the quartz kit in the kayfun; it's just too hard to fill and drain when the quartz kit is on, the fill hole is partially blocked and I don't yet have any 20ga needles, 18ga is the smallest I have and it won't fit fully inside, when the quartz tank in on the kayfun.


Andria

 

[2legsshrt]

As far as I'm concerned the Kayfun Lite second edition and a full size Provari is the way to go. IMO. I don't like the idea of the Chinese copying something just because they can and I will stick to the real thing. I know the Chinese can build almost the same thing and since they pay their employees 14 cents an hour and they have to put 1000 together each a day, they can sell them cheaper but you get what you pay for. I'm sure this will tick a few off but I don't care. They work for me. Even the title p's me off. Smoktech doesn't make a Kayfun Svoe Mesto does.