What am I doing wrong? Tugboat RDA underperforming

[stclairvoyant]

I just put together my first mechanical mod (Tugboat clone by Tobeco on a pegasus clone by VapeZoe) and I feel like it's underperforming. I've got dual parallel coils of 26g kanthal (8 wraps) at about .5 Ω, wicked with cotton. The battery is a Samsung 25R, rated at 25 amps. It fires up pretty evenly, but it looks like it takes a while to heat up. A good 3-4 second pull yields great flavor but not a lot of vapor (70 VG liquid). It's only vaguely more impressive than my Kanger Aerotank.

I'm not really sure what I'm doing wrong. Can someone give me some pointers as to what I might take a look at and correct?

 

[nyiddle]

Are the airholes properly lined up with the coils? You should essentially be able to see the coils through the airholes. Some people like to put their coils up a little bit, so that their holes are sort of "under" the coils.

 

[stclairvoyant]

As far as I can tell, yes. I did put the coils up a bit for that reason, it's just hard for me to tell. I've got em lined up as best I can get them.

 

[Warpigs]

Basically VG = vapor production, PV = flavor.

Someone correct me if I'm wrong.

 

[nyiddle]

Basically VG = vapor production, PV = flavor.

Someone correct me if I'm wrong.

PV = Personal Vaporizer

PG = Propylene Glycol

But yes, PG provides more flavor/throat hit than VG.

The trick to lining up the air holes with the coils is to pull the top cap off, line up the coils, then push it back on. Twisting after-the-fact usually doesn't work so great.

You're working with a fully charged battery, right? You know the basics of battery safety and stuff?

 

[edyle]

I just put together my first mechanical mod (Tugboat clone by Tobeco on a Pegasus clone by VapeZoe) and I feel like it's underperforming. I've got dual parallel coils of 26g kanthal (8 wraps) at about .5 Ω, wicked with cotton. The battery is a Samsung 25R, rated at 25 amps. It fires up pretty evenly, but it looks like it takes a while to heat up. A good 3-4 second pull yields great flavor but not a lot of vapor (70 VG liquid). It's only vaguely more impressive than my Kanger Aerotank.

I'm not really sure what I'm doing wrong. Can someone give me some pointers as to what I might take a look at and correct?

The problem is you don't know what ohms to use for 26 gauge kanthal on a mech

I think it's about 0.6 per coil.


What are you doing wrong:
1: Too much.
Do a single coil; once you get a single coil to work on a mech, you just add the next coil;

 

[nyiddle]

The problem is you don't know what ohms to use for 26 gauge kanthal on a mech

I think it's about 0.6 per coil.


What are you doing wrong:
1: Too much.
Do a single coil; once you get a single coil to work on a mech, you just add the next coil;

That was gonna be my final suggestion. I prefer .3 ohms on a mech, but .5 is still a decent performer.

The fact that it's parallel might be too many wraps though.

 

[stclairvoyant]

The problem is you don't know what ohms to use for 26 gauge kanthal on a mech

I think it's about 0.6 per coil.


What are you doing wrong:
1: Too much.
Do a single coil; once you get a single coil to work on a mech, you just add the next coil;

If I do a single parallel with 26g, how many wraps?

 

[sketchness]

I also have a Samsung 25r battery and while they offer a quality vape in my regulated device, their is a huge difference when I pop in a VTC4. I just haven't found it a very good battery for my mech.

And as stated above that is a large chunk of wire to heat up. Try single strand dual coils at around 6 wraps. And test with a meter! Should still be well within the amp limit for that battery.

edit - samsung 25r is a 20 amp battery

 

[edyle]

If I do a single parallel with 26g, how many wraps?

a single parallel boils down to being a dual coil for the purpose of figuring things out.

The number of wraps will depend on the diameter you are wrapping on.

use the steam engine calculator.

Use single coil first before attempting parallel.

I'd start with a thinner gauge if you want to do parallels and duals.

Based on a 0.6 ohm figure for 26 gauge; dual parallels will land you down to 0.15 ohms which will attempt to draw 28 amps from your 25 amp battery.

 

[cha6040]

I also have a Samsung 25r battery and while they offer a quality vape in my regulated device, their is a huge difference when I pop in a VTC4. I just haven't found it a very good battery for my mech.

And as stated above that is a large chunk of wire to heat up. Try single strand dual coils at around 6 wraps. And test with a meter! Should still be well within the amp limit for that battery.

VTC4 should perform great in a mech mod. That's what I use. Only problem is they drain pretty quick with sub-ohm builds

 

[sketchness]

VTC4 should perform great in a mech mod. That's what I use. Only problem is they drain pretty quick with sub-ohm builds

Yeah I guess my paragraph is confusing.

Samsung 25r = so so in mech ( and OP this is a 20 amp battery NOT 25)

vtc4= awesome in a mech

Sigelei 100w = far superior, .5 at 55 watts all day long. No need to change batteries

 

[RWClark]

Too much wire in your build. If you really want to run duel coils drop down to 28g.

 

[cha6040]

Yeah I guess my paragraph is confusing.

Samsung 25r = so so in mech ( and OP this is a 20 amp battery NOT 25)

vtc4= awesome in a mech

Sigelei 100w = far superior, .5 at 55 watts all day long. No need to change batteries

Yeah, regulated box mod will be my next purchase for sure. I'm tired of no flavor when the battery gets to about 30%