Weird taste?

[xMackx]

I just recently bought some Kanthal here A-1 33 awg resistance heating wire 100 ft, | eBay

I have rebuilt my mini vivi nova a few times and using 100% cheese cloth cotton. I'm getting a weird taste, is it the cotton or the kanthal? Any suggestions?

 

[jon5212]

What kind of taste?

 

[Lance_Wallen]

try removing the cotton and tasting it? if it still tastes weird, it's not the cotton

 

[xMackx]

What kind of taste?

Like a burnt flavor, I'm hoping the wire isn't galvanized or something.

 

[anavidfan]

usually its the kanthal, its common to get the new coil taste till it oxidizes. Next time season the coil with a lighter. Just run the wire along the flame till it just glows. This will help to get rid of the new coil taste and make the wire a bit more pliable. If it isnt that then maybe your wire is touching something. Make sure your coil in the heads are not touching each other inside the head or the wires are not touching the sides of the cup or each other any where. Make sure you use a multimeter so protect your mod. I keep a spare ego type battery to get it going, just in case of a short.

 

[xMackx]

usually its the kanthal, its common to get the new coil taste till it oxidizes. Next time season the coil with a lighter. Just run the wire along the flame till it just glows. This will help to get rid of the new coil taste and make the wire a bit more pliable. If it isnt that then maybe your wire is touching something. Make sure your coil in the heads are not touching each other inside the head or the wires are not touching the sides of the cup or each other any where. Make sure you use a multimeter so protect your mod. I keep a spare ego type battery to get it going, just in case of a short.

Thank you for the quick reply, and a good answer. Now it makes sense when I seen videos of ppl burning the coil before insertion.

 

[anavidfan]

i just recently started making my own coil and wicks, my first one was right on. My next half dozen big fails. I am doing the twisted leg method. It seems to be working really well. You take a bit of kanthal a bit longer than usual, and you take the legs and double them up and twist them. That way you dont ( supposedly) get hot spots around the little rubber stopper.

 

[xMackx]

Yeah I just boiled the cotton cheesecloth in water, and took a lighter to season the kanthal making it glow red. The taste got worse, the ohms are correct at 2.4 - .6 base reading. My batteryless ego passthrough has a short circuit cut off switch that works really well. It's got to be the wire, gotta season it right I guess.

 

[xMackx]

I'm thinking After seasoning the wire maybe I should boil that as well.

 

[yuttynutt]

I got this with my dud i just kept adding juice and firing it without using it kinda like dry firing it but with juice so I guess wet firing it lol but after half a tank of juice the taste was gone. I thought maybe it was the mesh.

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[xMackx]

Well I just seasoned the wire getting it red hot, then washed it with rubbing alcohol then hot water. Still that funky flavor, I don't see anything wrong. The weird thing is, the higher ohm 2.2 I made with it tasted pretty good. I'd like to hear from others using cotton and kanthal as well.

Edit: I'm making 1.8ohm, I just noticed turning the voltage down from 4 to 3.2 made it taste better.

 

[anavidfan]

I'm thinking After seasoning the wire maybe I should boil that as well.

not necessary, I just run my finger down the wire and it wipes off the oxidation. Great taste from the beginning.

 

[xMackx]

Yeah I am starting to think that cotton can't handle higher voltage with low ohm. My 1.8 ohm kanthal and cotton at 3.2 volts produces the same vapor as the vivi nova's origonal atomizer at 4 volts. So i guess if you plan on vaping cotton at higher volts you have to wrap a higher ohm coil. (just my conclusion after a lot of tinkering)

 

[xMackx]

Ok I think I figured it out, after making about a dozen different coils and wicks from 1.8-2.8ohm with cotton cheesecloth and A-1 33 awg kanthal. After installing the wick and coil putting a chunk of cotton over the coil helped alot, and I noticed that it's either the cotton or kanthal that is really sensitive to the voltage. The 1.8ohm cotton/kanthal preferred around 3.2 voltage and 2.2ohm preferred around 4 volts. I only get the bad flavor with low ohm coils and higher voltage.

Anyone else come to a similar conclusion using cotton/kanthal?

 

[st0nedpenguin]

You may be wrapping your coils too tight, if you do they'll choke the wick and it'll taste pretty horrible.

 

[cricque]

Well I had this issue also, and at first i was thinking, what am I doing wrong, I've seen all this videos etc. How is it possible

SO it might have been the silica, i boiled it, still the same. Then I tried cotton, still the same. I was also thinking about the rubber cap. Nopes not that either (this was my initial thought). I tried twisting the legs, not that either, coils arent touching. I made the coil glow and still got that funky taste. Some people say it all has to break in for a while ... I ordered some other kanthal wire, perhaps its just the kanthal, but I am out of ideas. I also get the taste but less if I use the kanthal on a SS mesh wick. I'm going to give it another try tonight with making the entire kanthal wire glow or burn it with a torch

 

[Lance_Wallen]

You can't really "choke" a wick. either stainless or cotton. You'd have to wrap it tighter than the human hand 'can' wrap it. The only real risk to over tightening your coil is breaking through your oxidized layer and shorting.

Wicking is a function of porosity, and actually, a tighter pore will wick 'better' so a really tightly bound wick won't stop wicking, it'll wick higher. Check the "500 stainless steel mesh" thread in the modding forums, theres a TON of detail there regarding this.

You'd have to choke the wick down so hard that the 'holes' in the wicking were smaller than a molecule of our e-juice.

 

[xMackx]

Yeah my wicks aren't being choked, they produce a lot of vapor. This funky taste did help me learn how to make coils and wicks like a pro though lol. After seasoning with a lighter getting the wire red hot then wipe off any soot, adding a chunk of cotton on top of the coil and wick and not using high volts (don't need too) it taste fine. I am curious about nichrome now though.

Does anyone know what type of wire comes stock in the viv nova atomizers?