volts or watts?

[Credo]

VW makes it simple. No matter what you screw on, the PV will automatically do what it takes try to achieve the power you set. The PV will check the resistance and do the math several times per second to maintain (at least theoretically) by bucking/boosting voltage for a constant coil temperature.

VV Just bucks/boosts to whatever voltage you set consistently.

Most of the time I'm more than happy with VW.

Occasionally I want to 'under-drive' a coil below the lowest setting on a PV (I.E. less than 5 watts) in VW mode. In this case I'd screw on something like a 3 Ohm atty, and start with the lowest voltage setting possible on the PV in VV mode. Quite a few PVs out there will let you go considerably lower than 5 watts (typically the lowest setting in VW mode for most mods out there) if you swap to VV mode and start with the lowest setting.

Occasionally I want to go higher than the highest wattage setting on a PV. Let's say your PV tops out at 12 Watts in VW mode. Provided you stay in your PV's amperage limit, you might be able to swap over to VV mode and get more power than is possible in the VW mode.
Example:
A 1.5 Ohm Atty set to 5v in VV mode could give you almost 17 watts of power at around 3.3 amps. So if your mod can handle the 3.3 amps (many these days top out somewhere between 3.5 and 4 amps), then you've gone well above the 12w top setting in VW mode.

For me, VV mode comes in handy with custom made multiple coil setups.

 

[GeorgeWachsmuth]

Well...all that being said...my MVP does .5 increments on watt settings. I can usually find a nice setting to vape at. But (being a perfectionist) if I realize it would be just that much better at 10.2 watts...I am halted....unless I switch over to volts...this is in .1 increments...between the two I can find an even better sweet spot. After a while? I just use volts....I know the atty, the juice, the resistance...I can hit the voltage pretty easily....My Buzz Pro?.....I just dial it in and tweak till good...

 

[Nightshard]

Do you prefer vaping on watts or volts? why? I prefer watts myself bc I feel I get better flavor and more vapor

You don't get better anything from watts or from volt it's how much of them yr using

 

[jwoode]

I prefer setting watts and forgetting about it.

But I don't analyze to the nnth degree or hold my mods with a pinkie out.

It's vapor.. it tastes good.. and I don't smoke anymore.

 

[edyle]

I stay in volts as well on my vamo (in RMS mode) because it seems I can go higher than 15 watts (maybe a glitch) but there is a deffinate difference between vaping at 6.0 volts as opposed to 15 watts (with 2x18350 batteries)

I do believe if you set 6 volts on the vamo you will get 6 volts dc flat output.
So there certainly is a difference because at 6 you're getting flat dc output, whereas, anywhere below 6 it's a choppy pulse that jumps between 0 and 6.

If you set 3 volts in 'mean' mode you will get 6 volts half the time and 0 the other half, at a 33 times a second pulse.
If you set 4.2 volts in 'rms' mode you will get 6 volts half the time and 0 the other half, at a 33 times a second pulse, as above.

 

[edyle]

VW makes it simple. No matter what you screw on, the PV will automatically do what it takes try to achieve the power you set. The PV will check the resistance and do the math several times per second to maintain (at least theoretically) by bucking/boosting voltage for a constant coil temperature.

VV Just bucks/boosts to whatever voltage you set consistently.

Most of the time I'm more than happy with VW.

Occasionally I want to 'under-drive' a coil below the lowest setting on a PV (I.E. less than 5 watts) in VW mode. In this case I'd screw on something like a 3 Ohm atty, and start with the lowest voltage setting possible on the PV in VV mode. Quite a few PVs out there will let you go considerably lower than 5 watts (typically the lowest setting in VW mode for most mods out there) if you swap to VV mode and start with the lowest setting.

Occasionally I want to go higher than the highest wattage setting on a PV. Let's say your PV tops out at 12 Watts in VW mode. Provided you stay in your PV's amperage limit, you might be able to swap over to VV mode and get more power than is possible in the VW mode.
Example:
A 1.5 Ohm Atty set to 5v in VV mode could give you almost 17 watts of power at around 3.3 amps. So if your mod can handle the 3.3 amps (many these days top out somewhere between 3.5 and 4 amps), then you've gone well above the 12w top setting in VW mode.

For me, VV mode comes in handy with custom made multiple coil setups.

I would imagine that when you press the fire button:
- the pv checks measures the ohms
- if it detects low ohms it displays error message
- if in VW mode, it calculates the voltage required.

It wouldn't keep checking resistance while you have the fire button pressed, it would only do that at the beginning once, not continuously or semicontinuously; it would check once everytime you press the fire button.

If you are using mesh, and the mesh is shorting out when the coil gets hot, then you can get a situation where the pv reads one ohms value, applies a voltage, and when the mesh gets hot the ohms changes and I suppose funny things can happen.

 

[Credo]

I would imagine that when you press the fire button:
- the pv checks measures the ohms
- if it detects low ohms it displays error message
- if in VW mode, it calculates the voltage required.

It wouldn't keep checking resistance while you have the fire button pressed, it would only do that at the beginning once, not continuously or semicontinuously; it would check once everytime you press the fire button.

If you are using mesh, and the mesh is shorting out when the coil gets hot, then you can get a situation where the pv reads one ohms value, applies a voltage, and when the mesh gets hot the ohms changes and I suppose funny things can happen.

Most of the VW mods do check resistance, available voltage in the battery, and recalculate the target voltage several times per second. This does cycle over and over again for as long as you're holding the fire button (or it times out if the mod has a fire time-out safety).
Example: On my Darwin I can sometimes watch the resistance and voltage hop around slight amounts in real time while vaping. I used to get this alot with HV 801 type atties that would start out with something like 3 Ohms resistance, and gradually drop to around 2.7 Ohms as they got hot.

If a mesh wick is truly 'hard shorting' it would most likely give error messages. Just having spikes where resistance hops around a bit but stays within acceptable limits would simply lead to the output voltage being bucked and boosted around in real time as the resistance hops around.

 

[WarHawk-AVG]

I do believe if you set 6 volts on the vamo you will get 6 volts dc flat output.
So there certainly is a difference because at 6 you're getting flat dc output, whereas, anywhere below 6 it's a choppy pulse that jumps between 0 and 6.

If you set 3 volts in 'mean' mode you will get 6 volts half the time and 0 the other half, at a 33 times a second pulse.
If you set 4.2 volts in 'rms' mode you will get 6 volts half the time and 0 the other half, at a 33 times a second pulse, as above.

6 volts is the output of the boost circuit...with no regulation it's duty cycle is 100% so yes you would get a flat DC output, but that defeats the purpose of the PWM and controlling the duty cycle to vary the amount of power being delivered

Most of the VW mods do check resistance, available voltage in the battery, and recalculate the target voltage several times per second. This does cycle over and over again for as long as you're holding the fire button (or it times out if the mod has a fire time-out safety).

If mesh is truly 'hard shorting' it would most likely give error messages. Just having spikes where resistance hops around a bit but stays within acceptable limits would simply lead to the output voltage being bucked and boosted around in real time as the resistance hops around.

I know my Vamo and my kick's will stop firing if it detects shorts on my I-Atty's, I usually try to roll 2.0Ω when running on a APV...and I run them at 8 watts, 6.5watts on my protank style tanks

 

[edyle]

Most of the VW mods do check resistance, available voltage in the battery, and recalculate the target voltage several times per second. This does cycle over and over again for as long as you're holding the fire button (or it times out if the mod has a fire time-out safety).

If mesh is truly 'hard shorting' it would most likely give error messages. Just having spikes where resistance hops around a bit but stays within acceptable limits would simply lead to the output voltage being bucked and boosted around in real time as the resistance hops around.

Where are you getting this information from that most VW mods repeat resistance checking several times per second, recalculating the voltage?
Would be nice but I assume it would be cheaper to only do it once at the start.

I know for example that if I want to see my ohms, on my sigelei zmax I would have to fire the coil on power, but with my vamo, it uses a lower test voltage to check ohms when I press the + button, not the full power voltage so I know there's at least 2 different ways of checking ohms on the vamo.

 

[Credo]

Where are you getting this information from that most VW mods repeat resistance checking several times per second, recalculating the voltage?
Would be nice but I assume it would be cheaper to only do it once at the start.

I know for example that if I want to see my ohms, on my sigelei zmax I would have to fire the coil on power, but with my vamo, it uses a lower test voltage to check ohms when I press the + button, not the full power voltage so I know there's at least 2 different ways of checking ohms on the vamo.

Example: On my Darwin I can sometimes watch the resistance and voltage hop around slight amounts in real time while vaping. I used to get this alot with HV 801 type atties that would start out with something like 3 Ohms resistance, and gradually drop to around 2.7 Ohms as they got hot.

It just makes sense really, as sensors need to constantly grab voltage and amperage to deal with over-drain and current protection features. The hardware is there to do it in alot of todays APVs...so it's just a matter of programming the IC to make it happen.

Also, you can test the theory yourself.
Unscrew your atty while you're vaping but keep the fire button pressed. What happens on your APV's display? Does it still register an atty and continue to show it's putting out voltage? How did it suddenly know that you've got no load and 0 resistance, etc? It knows because it has an IC capable of monitoring all these things and sending instructions based on what various sensors tell it (I.E. Checking sensor readings and Cycling Ohms Law Calculations hundreds of times per second). Most ICs out there these days are capable of a few hundred megahertz of instructions at worst.

 

[bce22]

Awww thanks that me feel better. I don't feel like such dork lol! Some folks have pretty rude on here and I'm assuming it's bc I'm new and I have no idea what 98% of all these acronyms on here mean and it drives me nuts!

Just ask. Most people are here to help and learn themselves. For those that are rude... Ignore 'em. They probably don't know much that you would want to know anyway.

 

[beckdg]

personally, i think this should be mandatory reading... http://www.e-cigarette-forum.com/fo...-not-matter-its-all-about-wire-temp-read.html

though, when vaping with factory heads and coils, i don't care if it's watts or volts. i find my favored vape on each product individually and then decide whether it's sufficient for me from there.

 

[edyle]

Example: On my Darwin I can sometimes watch the resistance and voltage hop around slight amounts in real time while vaping. I used to get this alot with HV 801 type atties that would start out with something like 3 Ohms resistance, and gradually drop to around 2.7 Ohms as they got hot.

It just makes sense really, as sensors need to constantly grab voltage and amperage to deal with over-drain and current protection features. The hardware is there to do it in alot of todays APVs...so it's just a matter of programming the IC to make it happen.

Also, you can test the theory yourself.
Unscrew your atty while you're vaping but keep the fire button pressed. What happens on your APV's display? Does it still register an atty and continue to show it's putting out voltage? How did it suddenly know that you've got no load and 0 resistance, etc? It knows because it has an IC capable of monitoring all these things and sending instructions based on what various sensors tell it (I.E. Checking sensor readings and Cycling Ohms Law Calculations hundreds of times per second). Most ICs out there these days are capable of a few hundred megahertz of instructions at worst.

If I hold down my + button on my vamo with no topper it reads 9.9 ohm; if I screw on the topper while it says that with the button held down, it does not change; so certainly in that mode it is not measuring and displaying several times a second.

Just changed LCD display to show resistance and checked that too; same again. it showed 9.9 ohms and when I screwed the topper down it continued to show 9.9 and I heard the coil firing; I suppose it was firing at 6 volts.

So in the case of the vamo3, it only measures once upon button press, not several times a second;

So goody for you and your Darwin, but I don't think it applies to most mods; If I see different with my zmax I'll edit this post.

===
edit:
No difference with my sigelei zmax; showed 9.9 with no topper, and continued to show 9.9 and it fired when I screwed the topper on.

 

[Credo]

If I hold down my + button on my vamo with no topper it reads 9.9 ohm; if I screw on the topper while it says that with the button held down, it does not change; so certainly in that mode it is not measuring and displaying several times a second.

Just changed LCD display to show resistance and checked that too; same again. it showed 9.9 ohms and when I screwed the topper down it continued to show 9.9 and I heard the coil firing; I suppose it was firing at 6 volts.

So in the case of the vamo3, it only measures once upon button press, not several times a second;

So goody for you and your Darwin, but I don't think it applies to most mods; If I see different with my zmax I'll edit this post.

===
edit:
No difference with my sigelei zmax; showed 9.9 with no topper, and continued to show 9.9 and it fired when I screwed the topper on.

I could be wrong, but I'd wager a bottle of your favorite e-liquid that while it might not have updated the display, that when in VW mode it takes a resistance reading before it fires, and many more as it keeps firing. Getting the updated memory for the screen and refreshing/displaying it might be linked to pressing the button. If 9.9 means nothing is attached, how does it know it's safe to start firing when you tighten it down?

How did it react to pressing the button with the atty attached and unscrewing it while holding the button down?

Anyone have an under load meter or a scope and a Vamo to check it?

[Below I will add any docs on various mods or regulators that I can find documentation or videos as I find them]

Darwin from the Evolv website.
the Darwin reads the resistance of your atomizer/cartomizer and adjusts the voltage to attain the wattage you've chosen. The Darwin is constantly reading that resistance and adjusting the voltage appropriately, so you'll always have a consistent vape even as the resistance of your atomizer/cartomizer changes with age or while heating up as you vape.

Evolv Kick 1 from the Evolv Website.
The Kick detects the resistance of any atty/carto attached and automatically, and continuously, adjusts the volts and amps to deliver the user set watts level.

Evolv Kick 2 from the Evolv Website.
The Kick2 is a power regulated digital switch-mode DC-DC converter for personal vaporizers in the form of a drop in module. It features controlled power from 5 to 15 watts and runs from a single lithium battery. It works in exactly the same way as the original Kick but boasts a higher maximum power and employs synchronous rectification for superior efficiency. The Kick2 also boasts mod resistance compensation to ensure a more accurate power delivery.

Evolv DNA12/20/30
While I can't find yet in official specs or technical documents where Evolv specifically states that it continuously monitors everything in real time, I'm pretty certain that all three models do. There are pBusardo videos showing how these things ping when firing them without a load. It makes all the sense in the world that they'll continue to ping for sensor readings and adjust things in real time when/if needed. Otherwise, how do you come up with over-drain, short circuit, and thermal protection?

Artisan Crown 2.0 from the Artisan Vaping Website:
The output of the Crown is regulated by a miniature buck-boost switching power supply which measures and re-calibrates the output 10 times per second. The output produced by the Crown is Direct Current (DC); that is, it is constant, not pulsed and has a 100% duty cycle.

Artisan SuperMax
[searching]

Nivel Chips
[searching for specifics]
Variable wattage. Masures your Ohms and gives the voltage needed. Regulated from 5 to 14 Watts;

eVic
[searching]

33.1 Chips (VAMO, ZMAX, ETC.)
Still searching for documented evidence that it pings and adjusts many times per second while firing. While the descriptions of these mods don't specifically say it pings and adjusts cyclically, it does say it keeps consistent power in quite a few descriptions. Note is says power, which is synonymous with watts. It just makes sense that it'd do it for a VW mode...all the hardware should be there to do it, it's pinging sensors for the safety features and PWM calculations/instructions anyway, so why not?
The VAMO can operate either in Voltage Mode or Power Mode. We find that Power Mode is generally easier for users that switch between different cartomizers and atomizers at different resistances as the VAMO will adjust for that resistance and deliver consistent power to the device.

 

[edyle]

....

How did it react to pressing the button with the atty attached and unscrewing it while holding the button down?

Sorry I did not make it clear; but that is what I did.
When I had the toppers on top buy not screwed all the way in, the reading was 9.9, then I screwed the topper in while holding the button down and the display did not change. That is what I was saying.

 

[Credo]

Sorry I did not make it clear; but that is what I did.
When I had the toppers on top buy not screwed all the way in, the reading was 9.9, then I screwed the topper in while holding the button down and the display did not change. That is what I was saying.

No problem. Again, I could be wrong and given the way the 33.1 chip mods are documented it's hard for me to prove one way or the other without having one in my hands and putting it on a scope and varying resistance in real time to find out. It just makes sense to me that most if not all of the mods touting VW ping sensors and adjust constantly and cyclically while firing...even if they aren't updating the visual display live.

Oh well....

 

[edyle]

.....

If 9.9 means nothing is attached, how does it know it's safe to start firing when you tighten it down?

If nothing is attached, both my vamo and zmax show 9.9

What does it really mean?
Well on my zmax in VW mode it meant - I am checking: it fires at 3 volts on my multimeter.
On my vamo it's firing at 5 volts on my multimeter.
The volts it fired at seems to vary with the VW setting; at 8watts my vamo was firing at 6volts on the multimeter.
The zmax is set at 3watts.


It's not like they wouldn't put out a voltage just because there is nothing attached

 

[edyle]

33.1 Chips (VAMO, ZMAX, ETC.)
Still searching for documented evidence that it pings and adjusts many times per second while firing. While the descriptions of these mods don't specifically say it pings and adjusts cyclically, it does say it keeps consistent power in quite a few descriptions. Note is says power, which is synonymous with watts. It just makes sense that it'd do it for a VW mode...all the hardware should be there to do it, it's pinging sensors for the safety features and PWM calculations/instructions anyway, so why not?
The VAMO can operate either in Voltage Mode or Power Mode. We find that Power Mode is generally easier for users that switch between different cartomizers and atomizers at different resistances as the VAMO will adjust for that resistance and deliver consistent power to the device.

And I'm quite sure you won't find any documented evidence, much less, experimental evidence that the vamo pings and adjusts many times per second.

I'd love it if a simple vamo did that, or if it gave flat dc output instead of a pulse, but that's just what a vamo is - a middle class APV at a middle class price.

 

[Credo]

If nothing is attached, both my vamo and zmax show 9.9

What does it really mean?
Well on my zmax in VW mode it meant - I am checking: it fires at 3 volts on my multimeter.
On my vamo it's firing at 5 volts on my multimeter.
The volts it fired at seems to vary with the VW setting; at 8watts my vamo was firing at 6volts on the multimeter.
The zmax is set at 3watts.


It's not like they wouldn't put out a voltage just because there is nothing attached

If nothing is attached it most likely pings over and over looking for a load.

The test I'd try would be using a scope that can see the PWM waves, and put an adjustable resistance pot in-line and turn it while firing. If the voltage moves about accordingly, then that's confirmation that resistance is constantly monitored and adjusted in real time. In contrast, if it stuck on one voltage all the way through the burn then you'd be correct.

 

[Minnaz]

LOL, yup and fitting 4,700 car batteries into your PV is not trivial

Thats not a problem when your using a flux capacitor