So I got my first RBA today and went to work.

[chadsmo]

It's an IGO L that goes very nicely with the Natural that I got yesterday. Now, I've seen a ton of youtube videos where people quickly roll up a coil with silica and I was thinking that it can't be too hard. lol, well it looks a lot easier on youtube. My first coil was OK at best, kind of sloppy and a little lose here and there. After vaping it for a bit I decided that I could do better. Well, I tried various things I've seen people do.

A tight smaller coil with lots of wraps done around one piece of silica wrapped on something skinny like a needle or paper clip. Well that one actually caused the juice to start on fire lol. So obviously that wasn't going to work. Then I tried a drill bit and feeding the silica through, and the bit was too big and it was lose. Then I was running in to issues with it being too far away from the two poles, with long stretches of wire before the coil started. And whenever I tried to adjust it the coil would get all mangled. Suddenly I was thinking the meter of kanthal was going to go fast haha.

About 5-6 attempts later I was nearing frustration but I decided I'd try for one more before calling it quits for the day. I ended up wrapping a tight coil around a 5/64 drill bit with the coils fairly close together. Then I took my 2mm silica and folded it over in a bow shape so I had two lengths. A put a some wire from a tossed coil around the closed off end and tried to pull it through the coil, at first I didn't think it would go but then I slipped through. Not really tight, but not lose. All was good and the coil was looking nice. Then came the tricky part, getting it really close to the posts which I'd had trouble with before but this time i nailed it. It's really really close but not touching. It ended up looking like this.

Hopefully it's as nice as I think it is haha.

And I'm not sure if it's blocking air flow at all, I'd assume not enough to matter, but the end not in the juice well is directly below the dripping hole.

All in all I'm pretty glad I got it accomplished tonight. I'm just hoping I can do it again lol. Speaking off, about how often will I need to rebuild this ? This will more or less be my all day vape for a bit.

I also took a short video to show a friend, so I may as well link that too.
My first ( functioning ) coil. - YouTube

 

[KillTheNoise]

Pretty decent bud! Dripping rebuildables are far more forgiving than the tank styles in my opinion. I just got an Igo-L (first dripper rebuildable) and I haven't even TOUCHED my tank RBA since.

I'm quickly becoming a huge fan of these RDAs, and have an the idea of purchasing an expensive nice one here soon.

 

[chadsmo]

Should say its 32g kanthal and it apparently comes out at 1.3 ohms. The crazy part is this is my first nic rush since I started vaping a bit over a month ago. I've been rocking a boge carto tank and this is a million times better. Currently using my evic 18650, my EFEST IMR will be here tomorrow.

 

[hausmouse]

Oh yeah man if you can generally keep things upright rebuildables are it. I have an igo-l an aga t+ and for out and about some cartos. Honestly I prefer the aga to the igo but I really haven't given the igo a bunch of time (maybe 2-3 hours.) Maybe ill appreciate the igo a little more one day

 

[Suicidebob]

I just got my first AGA-T and been working out on some of the same issues. I ran through my wire pretty quickly- I need to order more.

 

[StaircaseWit]

Pretty nice build.

But you don't have to go through all that. Double up the silica and wrap directly on it. It's pretty hard to get the tightness wrong because silica is so forgiving. Don't worry about it being perfect; it'll generally vape just fine anyway. I prefer a bit more silica so that pretty much the entire juice well is covered (prevents leaking when the silica holds all the juice), but you did just fine.

 

[chadsmo]

Pretty nice build.

But you don't have to go through all that. Double up the silica and wrap directly on it. It's pretty hard to get the tightness wrong because silica is so forgiving. Don't worry about it being perfect; it'll generally vape just fine anyway. I prefer a bit more silica so that pretty much the entire juice well is covered (prevents leaking when the silica holds all the juice), but you did just fine.

Thanks I ended up using the drill bit cause I found trying to directly wrap on the silica made my coils get all crooked and what not. The drill bit wasn't that bad really.


About how often will I need to rebuild this ? Will I just sort of know cause it will taste off ?

 

[StaircaseWit]

Thanks I ended up using the drill bit cause I found trying to directly wrap on the silica made my coils get all crooked and what not. The drill bit wasn't that bad really.


About how often will I need to rebuild this ? Will I just sort of know cause it will taste off ?

It depends largely on the juice you're using. Darker or sweet juices will gunk up the coil much faster than clearer, less sweet juices.

You can dry-burn silica pretty easily though. I rinse the whole thing out with water first. Just give it a couple 5-10 second dry burns, brush off the coil with an old toothbrush or similar, drip on it and vape away. You'll know when it needs to be completely replaced by the vapor production.

 

[chadsmo]

Thanks, I figured as much but good to know.

 

[chadsmo]

I actually just tore it apart and did another great one on the first try, win! The other one was a little too vertical and the juice has issues wicking up to it. So I tried to get this one horizontal and close to the bottom. Then I took the two long tails of the wick and managed to wrap both around the negative post so the coil is touching the top of them, much better.

 

[StaircaseWit]

I actually just tore it apart and did another great one on the first try, win! The other one was a little too vertical and the juice has issues wicking up to it. So I tried to get this one horizontal and close to the bottom. Then I took the two long tails of the wick and managed to wrap both around the negative post so the coil is touching the top of them, much better.

Sounds good. It just gets easier.