sooting of silica wicks?

[telegraph]

I am making a coil for a phoenix rba clone using 2.5 mm silica wick and 32 ga kanthal wire. The rba, wick and wire were all bought and recommended by the vendor. They have a video of heating the wire and silica to burn off chemicals. i don't have a torch as they used in the video, but a do have a bic lighter which i used. The lighter turned the wire red hot as expected, but the burning discolored the wick, which I don't think is supposed to happen.
Should I not be using the bic lighter for this purpose? Is something wrong with the silica wick?
Any ideas appreciated. And yes this is my first rba and probably don't know what I'm doing. I did get it set up with a resistance of ~1.8 ohms, but it doesn't give much vapor at all.

 

[Lex0r]

As far as cleaning silica and/or wire: To clean new silica before applying wire, a torch is necessary. You don't have to torch it before use but some people do. A bic lighter simply wont produce enough heat for the silica to glow hot white like it needs to. However, you can use a lighter on your resistance wire prior to wrapping it around the silica. Just apply flame until the wire glows. Additionally, if your wick/coil has been in use and you want to clean it instead of building a new one, leave everything assembled (removed from the battery end) and rinse the wick under running water. Then reapply to your mod and do a dry burn until the wick is dry again.

 

[telegraph]

Thanks for the cleaning tip. If burning the silica is not necessary, I think I'll forego that step since I don't own a tank.

 

[gjshaw29]

Hey there I also saw someone do this with silica. I've never done it and don't get weird flavor at all, so I to forego that step as well.