After a month what have I discovered?

[snow]

So having been vaping for a month now I have discovered a few things, firstly it was flipping easy to give up the stinkies but where the surprise came was that having been a tobacco addict for 35 years and being utterly convinced that I would need to find a vapour that tasted exactly like my "beloved" Lambert & Butler I have been vaping exclusively fruit, mint or sweet flavours. I was also convinced that I'd maybe need the first hit of the day to be via a stinky but that hasn't been the case, and even more shockingly for me, one afternoon last week just for curiosity sake and because I didn't take up vaping to necessarily never have a fag again, I lit up a stinky - barely 3 puffs later I was putting it out as it tasted horrible and rushing to grab my ecig loaded with mint to clean the taste out of my mouth.    Up until that point there had still been half a pack of stinkies and a lighter sitting on my desk in its usual place next to the ashtray, since that day they have gone into my handbag and stayed there - I suspect that it wont be long before I start going to work or going out without needing to have them around as a back up to the ecig "just in case".

I have also gone completely off the taste of tobacco - when I bought my starter kit I bought 2 x 10mls of juice Blueberry and Rye - the Blueberry has been replaced many times over but I hadn't even opened the Rye - until yesterday when I needed to test a new dual coil clearo on something that wasn't fruit or a tank cracker - whilst the Rye was OK for a couple of puffs I realised that actually it was leaving an horrible after taste - the taste of tobacco! Tobacco which a month ago I would have sworn up down and sideways was something I really enjoyed! But not any more! 

I also thought that at the first sign of me getting wound up or stressy I'd reach for a stinky - and indeed I had a couple of days of getting peed off and wound up Thursday & Friday over some IT problems and was so exasperated that I told my hubby I wanted a fag and was going to have one if it kept up - even when he wound me up even further by telling me he "understood" as he'd felt like that a couple of times out in Afghanistan but had still stayed off the fags - knowing full flipping well he was pushing my buttons and that I was quite likely to light one up there and then just to "show him" lol I STILL coped with just the vaping and didn't light a stinky! 

I have discovered that whilst recoiling is easier than I thought - having ended up dismantling a couple of coils unintentionally - it seems, from what I've read, to involve a blow torch and hot metal (wire) since I am a clutz of the highest order who shouldn't even be allowed to operate a pair of nail clippers unsupervised there is no way on this green plant that hubby would ever ever allow me and a blow torch to be in proximity ever! Trust me on this I used to own a soldering kit as I fancied trying pyrography and I burnt far more pieces of me, my clothing, the table, my husband etc. etc. etc. than I ever did the wood I was actually intending to burn.   

I've also discovered that I don't like top coils - I bought some iclear 16's from Pepperty whilst they didn't leak (yayyy) and were reallllly easy to fill and clean which I liked, they produced less vapour than my Smok Aro and the vapour is too warm for my tastes, fruit juice tasted of - well nothing really, just "plastic" or warm sweetness which didn't satisfy, so thats when I reached for the Rye tobacco flavour which did vape a good flavour and was far more like smoking a stinky as it was a warmer vapor but led to me discovering that actually I have gone right off tobacco! I haven't tried it with mint as a) I don't fancy warm mint and b) have a feeling mints are considered tank crackers (could be wrong). I also don't like the gurgling - now my Aro's crackle but the Iclear makes more of a filled up with liquid type of soggy gurgling and I did get a mouthful of juice a couple of times iiickkk I'm going to try it with some chocolate mint flavour I have a bit later today as that might give a nice hot chocolate taste and if so I'll use them for those kinds of flavours otherwise they'll be put to one side. 

So back to the Smok Aro - and another "discovery" - protank coils don't fit - well I don't think they do though I'm wondering if it was maybe my fault somehow. Before filling I popped it in to check the fit but the base of the bit that holds the coil and has the battery connector on the other side didn't seal tight against the bottom of the tank so I unscrewed it to see if maybe I needed to screw the coil in further only to find that the base came off leaving the coil stuck in the chimney of the tank. It was a heck of a bugger getting it out - I ended up pulling the coil itself out of the metal tube (leaving the tube still in the chimney) and having to faff about with my jewelry making needle nosed pliers which are rounded and smooth but did eventually pull it out. I then attempted to put it all back together but gave up after things went piiiiing and flew off in all directions whilst I was attempting to force the little white rubbery gromit thing holding the coil back into the tube (there was LOTS of swearing). To be honest I can't see why it shouldn't fit, its almost identical to the Smok coil with the only visible difference being that the metal post that goes into the chimney on the Smok coil is ridged and the protank ones are smooth. Hey ho have now ordered another 10 Smok ones and the protank ones can sit in the box until I end up with something they do fit. 

And so to the Aro tanks - they effing well leak like the leakiest leaky thing ever! This annoys me, it annoys me a lot, so I have been experimenting by rebuilding them in all kinds of ways I have been cannibalising old used coils and harvesting the seals and gromits and I tried Super-Shiny method of using 2 of the seals on top of each other with mixed success, it seemed to work at first but eventually the leak started again. So then I used to O ring and put it into the top of the battery connector that appears to have stopped any leaking around the button but didn't solve the leaks from where the clearo meets the base. So currently I have used a further O ring in the gap between the screw threads and the bottom of the base and so far this morning there has been no leaking! (Time will tell if this is going to work long term). 

When I made my first post here I said I wanted to be a "faff free" vaper I've now discovered that I will actually tolerate a bit of faffing about and just have to allow a bit of time for faff when refilling my tanks but I'm still on the look out for less faffy ways to vape lol 

Oh and I'm eyeing up an MVP and trying to decide whether to skip the VV spinner and just go straight to MVP. 

[Super-Shiny]

Jun 8, 2014 10:48:24 GMT snow said:

I burnt far more pieces of me, my clothing, the table, my husband

See here regarding the fitting of heads for the Smok Aro: allaboute-cigarettes.proboards.com/thread/29102/smok-pyrex-aro-kanger-evod?page=1&scrollTo=524932

[snow]

Jun 8, 2014 11:53:32 GMT Super-Shiny said:

Jun 8, 2014 10:48:24 GMT snow said:

I burnt far more pieces of me, my clothing, the table, my husband

See here regarding the fitting of heads for the Smok Aro: allaboute-cigarettes.proboards.com/thread/29102/smok-pyrex-aro-kanger-evod?page=1&scrollTo=524932

AHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHH buggeritttttt why didn't I see that before I tried the protank coils? LOL ah well live and learn I do really like the Aro tanks apart from the leaking, the vape is great its just the battery getting all sticky in my hand that I don't like. 

I'm back on the iclear16 at the moment loaded with mint chocolate - still not getting a lot of vapor but the flavour definitely works warm. 

[ionian]

Congrats on your first month snow - no mean feat, and worth celebrating. Nice write-up as well.

Don't be put off making coils because of the blowtorch - don't tell Super-Shiny but I never use one when making my coils, and I use RBAs and RDAs exclusively, so I make a fair few! Something for the future, not something to worry about now. Just keep doing what you're doing and enjoy it.

[Clivia]

nice one snow - now why does this sound so familiar - specially the no to tobacco flavours

[misst]

What a smashing read! Thanks snow

[cHooBeyDoo]

Well done snow especially staying off them nasties.
Vaping won't be totally faff free IMO but that little bit of faff IS worth it in the end.

[chykensa]

Well done snow, that's a considerable achievement to stay off the stinkies with all that RL going on!!
There is a bit of faffing required at times, and we all have times when our gear just doesn't play ball, but it's well worth it in the end. I have also just suffered a couple of days when my Russian and Kayfun were both delivering dry hits for no apparent reason, but they both seemed to have settled down a bit now, so some new wicks in tonight and I'll be ready to face the new week!
Stay with it, vaping is much better that the alternative, even with a bit of fiddling around!

[Cousin Itt]

Well done on the fag free month

[willy9b]

Jun 8, 2014 12:19:20 GMT ionian said:

Congrats on your first month snow - no mean feat, and worth celebrating. Nice write-up as well.

Don't be put off making coils because of the blowtorch - don't tell Super-Shiny but I never use one when making my coils, and I use RBAs and RDAs exclusively, so I make a fair few! Something for the future, not something to worry about now. Just keep doing what you're doing and enjoy it.

Agreed - I only use my torch when making 'compressed' coils. (My new ceramic-tipped tweezers from FT are the canine's testes for this job, BTW)

Normally I just heat the wire red-hot with a common or garden cig lighter ( left over from my stinky days ) before starting the coil. It takes most of the springiness out of it and encourages it to stay wrapped close to the wick.

[mcallister687]

Great job! definitely +1 for the mvp I just got one a few weeks back after my svd fell to bits. Also +1 for the svd if it takes your fancy the look, great mod.

[Pepperty]

You're doing sterling work there snow !!!
Early on in my vaping history I bought a 'bag of tat' = various lightly used clearomisers --to try out and confirm that I'm a glass and stainless steel/bottom coil tank kinda girl, but least I know and am now content!!

Basically once you have gear you trust and like -THEN you can test out new stuff same goes for recoiling..I'm ever happy with my 'ye olde' protank 1's so am OK meddling with my divers and killers and spheroids..............as if I f*ck up I have guaranteed working gear hence I wont lose my sanity

I too say -- move up a gear 'on gear' and try out an MVP the battery lasts yonks and you still have small batteries for when out and about and wanting low key

[Pepperty]

p.s I've found that I love vaping aniseed, absinthe and anise ---which is miraculous as when I last drank the stuff (35 years back - I was as sick as a dog) the smell of it -as a drink - still makes me dry heave!!

As a juice? I'm mad for it!!

[Ripshod]

Jun 8, 2014 18:39:39 GMT Pepperty said:

p.s I've found that I love vaping aniseed, absinthe and anise ---which is miraculous as when I last drank the stuff (35 years back - I was as sick as a dog) the smell of it -as a drink - still makes me dry heave!!

As a juice? I'm mad for it!!

With you on that pep. Pernod & Black was the loopy juice of the 80s, but i preferred pernod & lemonade. Anything anise, aniseed, absinthe even licorice and I'm hooked. Had nothing else since my second week vaping, tho I do still add a little citrus now and then.

We're bad bad peeps pep 

snow congrats on one month well spent, and here's to the vaping months to come 

[Clivia]

that's funny Pepperty cause I can't stand the anise drinks - like pernot and uso - and snake oil and Afro Dizziac are still to strong - but right now I absolutely love the absynthe and black currant mix - vaping through it in now time