The Pyrex SS hybrid Wick

[Big Screen D]

Yes, teeny tiny tubes. .2mm wall 1.5-1.8 OD. Nope not sealed, though that is the plan once I play around with it more.

Made a another one, but this time with the 500 mesh on the tube. Roughly 4-5 layers wrapped around the tube making the wick around 2mm. Still fits with room to spare in a 2.5mm dud hole. No China Syndrome with mesh&juice.

Hey I'm impressed. Plenty of vapor, and quick. Wicks amazingly well for such a small amount of mesh. 1.6ohm coil at 3.3v

The coil is higher up in the tube than what I plan on, but after melting the last tube, I got lazy and didn't tie in NR wire at the top, so I put the coil higher up than it will be just to get it going.

 

[Scubabatdan]

Damn! Thats with those tiny capillary tubs right? Whats the wall thickness on them like .5mm

-update with enamel-
I cant seem to get an even coat on a coil, admittedly i dont have any real experience enamel to begin with. It does a nice job of insulating the wire from the mesh in the spots i do get enameled and the wire is still semi flexible (mostly because i dont think i put a thick enough coat on it). I have been making the coils on a small bolt, using the threads as a guide to make a nice even spaced coil. Its tricky to heat the coil with a torch enough to do the enameling but not to much to ruin the wire. Ill move on to trying to do the OD of a mesh wick tomorrow

Why not fire the coil until it is red hot, then dip it into the powder, then continue firing until the enamel power melts to the wire?
That is what I planned on when I get some of the powder.
Dan

 

[mre777]

Why not fire the coil until it is red hot, then dip it into the powder, then continue firing until the enamel power melts to the wire?
That is what I planned on when I get some of the powder.
Dan

Thats what i did basically. Made the coil to shape then heated till read hot. Dipped in the powder like i saw in the videos then reheated until red hot and repeated. Did it about 10-12 times. I did get a fine powder the 80 mesh, not the the 6/20 mesh on the Thompson webpage that said for torch firing. maybe i should try to get the recommended stuff next time Ill play with it some more tomorrow. Ive been making my coils out of 30g NiChrom and they hold up to the heating pretty well, I did hold the torch on one spot to long and it deformed the coil so now im a little more careful
probably going to pick up some of the stuff they sell to help the first layer stick

 

[Big Screen D]

Inner coil:

 

[Cloud Wizard]

Inner coil:

Cool vid!

How's it taste? With open ends are you getting burnt juice in the tube? Does the #500 wick fast enough (sure looks like it's making a lot of vapor).

Sorry for a ton of questions, but that's the same design I've been working with. I ordered Nickel NR wire so that I can close the ends of the tube by softening the glass without melting (currently tried Silver and it immediately melts). I'm also going to try capping with Silver solder (need to get some) as someone suggested by heating a blob on a flat surface and then simply sticking the end of the glass tube into it.

 

[Big Screen D]

Wicking is not a problem at all. I only used 20mm of mesh, and as you can see in the video, wicks quite well. Plenty of room to add more, but I wanted to start with what I thought would be the minimum amount needed to minimize heat sink.

Definitely needs to sealed. I see no need to seal the bottom, but we are going to want to seal the top. Definitely had a distinct metal taste that was reduced with use. Though much of this may be attributed to me short cutting the build, and not using NR wire for the positive leg. Got aggravated with the melted tube thing, and just kind of slapped one together.

Taste taste was not helped by use of some fail DIY juice. I couldn't find my NR wire, so I used copper. Needless to say, that is a very temporary rig, and didn't want to waste good juice.

All in all, I'm quite sure this variant is worth exploring now.

 

[JPoodles]

Inner coil:

I can't link the video for some reason- Oh well. Congrats on the inner coil working with wick. I'm waiting to get into a fused quartz coop to try this. Gotta make sure it stays wet, sounds like. Hopefully FQ doesn't melt as easily. I was curious about the firing time til vapor production. Pretty quick?

here it is
http://www.facebook.com/photo.php?v=105916546243734&set=vb.100004761664613&type=2&theater
that is quick

 

[Big Screen D]

Firing time till vape production is almost immediate. And that's at 3.3v.

Keep in mind, the coil is compact. 32g nichrome wrapped around a pin around 15x as close together as possible.

 

[JPoodles]

Firing time till vape production is almost immediate. And that's at 3.3v.

Keep in mind, the coil is compact. 32g nichrome wrapped around a pin around 15x as close together as possible.

I see- It definitely seems fragile but works well. Makes alot of noise huh. Good job

 

[VapRon]

Just Found this and all I can say is WOW.
Read the whole thing in one session.
Dan, and all the others..... You just amaze me.
Bookmarking this thread.

 

[Cloud Wizard]

Wicking is not a problem at all. I only used 20mm of mesh, and as you can see in the video, wicks quite well. Plenty of room to add more, but I wanted to start with what I thought would be the minimum amount needed to minimize heat sink.

Definitely needs to sealed. I see no need to seal the bottom, but we are going to want to seal the top. Definitely had a distinct metal taste that was reduced with use. Though much of this may be attributed to me short cutting the build, and not using NR wire for the positive leg. Got aggravated with the melted tube thing, and just kind of slapped one together.

Taste taste was not helped by use of some fail DIY juice. I couldn't find my NR wire, so I used copper. Needless to say, that is a very temporary rig, and didn't want to waste good juice.

All in all, I'm quite sure this variant is worth exploring now.

I'm using slightly bigger thin walled tubing (2.5mmOD/2.2mmID) with fewer wraps of Kanthal A1 32awg (@ ~2.0ohms) and haven't melted a tube dry burning yet. I wrapped my coil on the shaft of a #1 Jeweler's flathead screwdriver.

 

[Killjoy1]

So wait, you guys are doing coil inside the tube with no wick, right? Hard to keep up, there's so many different things going on in this thread

 

[mre777]

Definitely needs to sealed. I see no need to seal the bottom, but we are going to want to seal the top. Definitely had a distinct metal taste that was reduced with use. Though much of this may be attributed to me short cutting the build, and not using NR wire for the positive leg. Got aggravated with the melted tube thing, and just kind of slapped one together.

Taste taste was not helped by use of some fail DIY juice. I couldn't find my NR wire, so I used copper. Needless to say, that is a very temporary rig, and didn't want to waste good juice.

All in all, I'm quite sure this variant is worth exploring now.

That taste may be coming from the fresh ss mesh wick. I noticed it on one of my proto builds too. Try burning the wick with a torch before you wrap it and see if that helps the brake in process

 

[MikeE3]

Inner coil:

FYI for Safari users.

odd / strange - the link to the video doesn't show up in the Safari browser. I can see it when I do a reply with quote though.

 

[Big Screen D]

The mesh was torched. In fact, torched and quenched to give stiffness to the mesh since I was having trouble keeping the mesh from unrolling and loosing good contact with the tube. But being new mesh, I agree, breaking it in is part of the off taste and in fact is much improved this AM.

I do think sealing the top is an absolute must for two reasons. One, it is a capillary tube, and any juice that finds it's way in from either end is going to burn on the coil. Two, to change out the wick requires the positive wire to be disconnected and straightened to slide the wick up and out. Both the coil and tubing is quite fragile so plugging the top will help protect the tubing from cracking when moving the wire around, and disturbing the connection point to the resistance wire.

 

[Cloud Wizard]

So wait, you guys are doing coil inside the tube with no wick, right? Hard to keep up, there's so many different things going on in this thread

Wick is wrapped around the outside of the tube.

 

[Big Screen D]

So wait, you guys are doing coil inside the tube with no wick, right? Hard to keep up, there's so many different things going on in this thread

Wick is outside the tube rather than inside.

 

[Big Screen D]

Cloud Wizard. Have you had any luck melting the tube shut?

Trying to decide what to seal it up with in between looking for my NR wire

 

[Cloud Wizard]

Cloud Wizard. Have you had any luck melting the tube shut?

Trying to decide what to seal it up with in between looking for my NR wire

Waiting for Nickel NR wire. Should be here early this week (already shipped)

But have been practicing softening the ends of scraps and using a twirling motion to allow gravity to "round" it closed.

 

[Big Screen D]

Waiting for Nickel NR wire. Should be here early this week (already shipped)

But have been practicing softening the ends of scraps and using a twirling motion to allow gravity to "round" it closed.

LOL, I just got my propane torch working, and yes it's pretty easy. Now let me go see what electronic device I can destroy to salvage some NR wire from.