Micro coils

[Mev]

I do this on my Kayfun lite, but use a small bolt for winding the coil as it is neater. Gives great vapour and flavour but with the Kayfun it's more prone to flooding then using silica if you don't position the wicks just right. Really worth trying in my opinion.
I'll be trying it with ribbon kanthal when I change it next.

[blakey]

You can do that with a kayfun lite too if you plug the drip tip hole
Trouble is for me, if I'm out and about, be it shopping or visiting or whatever then I really don't want to be re-wicking something because I burnt the wick with a dry hit. I just want to set something up and go out safe in the knowledge that its going to work fine & trouble free till I get home again.
The only reason I don't make micro coils anymore for my dripping atties is quite simply that I have a decent supply of eko wool & silica wick, I have no incentive
But I will not deny their performance when they are working right

[Greigster]

Jul 31, 2013 16:41:35 GMT Mev said:

I do this on my Kayfun lite, but use a small bolt for winding the coil as it is neater. Gives great vapour and flavour but with the Kayfun it's more prone to flooding then using silica if you don't position the wicks just right. Really worth trying in my opinion.
I'll be trying it with ribbon kanthal when I change it next.

Do the coils touch Mev as I think the idea of the Microcoil is to have all coils touching which gives a lower resistance with a larger amount of coils consequently giving a larger heating area, though with ribbon, perhaps that would do the same thing but you would not be able to pinch the ribbon together as it would ride up on itself.

[punisher]

well i just made my first micro coil easy as pie only had 0.2 kanthel so i used some i had made into piano wire for another mode )doubles and twisted 10 raps fused with blow torch dropped it in my phoenix dripper and yep it works 1.4 ohms looked about no cottenwool so i used a que tip vapes great
thanks for the great idea

[punisher]

i think i need to try this on the aga+t this should solve coils geting knocked

[Greigster]

Jul 31, 2013 18:14:55 GMT punisher said:

well i just made my first micro coil easy as pie only had 0.2 kanthel so i used some i had made into piano wire for another mode )doubles and twisted 10 raps fused with blow torch dropped it in my phoenix dripper and yep it works 1.4 ohms looked about no cottenwool so i used a que tip vapes great
thanks for the great idea

punisher
Hi Punisher, I am glad it worked and I had seen on some youtube vids where people were using the cotton from a Q-Tip.

It seems to be advisable to use the thicker wire to keep the resistance down, but of course I guess you would get to the point that the initial heat up time would become unacceptable cos the thicker the wire, the longer it takes to heat.

I think someone said that 28 gauge Kanthal is about the best which is .32mm. I have noticed that the wire and mesh company sell .30 Kanthal so may have to order some.

[Mev]

Jul 31, 2013 16:54:56 GMT Greigster said:

Jul 31, 2013 16:41:35 GMT Mev said:

I do this on my Kayfun lite, but use a small bolt for winding the coil as it is neater. Gives great vapour and flavour but with the Kayfun it's more prone to flooding then using silica if you don't position the wicks just right. Really worth trying in my opinion.
I'll be trying it with ribbon kanthal when I change it next.

Do the coils touch Mev as I think the idea of the Microcoil is to have all coils touching which gives a lower resistance with a larger amount of coils consequently giving a larger heating area, though with ribbon, perhaps that would do the same thing but you would not be able to pinch the ribbon together as it would ride up on itself.

I still heat them while squeezing together with tweezers but it's a lot better starting point than winding around anything else and is much neater I find.

[Greigster]

Mev
How many wraps Mev and what ohms are you getting. With cotton wool? May have to give this a try.

[Mev]

Can't remember how many wraps I did but the one in my Kayfun Lite now is reading 1.8 ohm.

[Dan]

So has anyone tried this with silica or even ekowool?

Very tempted to try this with the dream but want to use a wick that won't burn if it isn't totally saturated..

What would be the thickest wick this would work with?

Mev could you possibly take a photo of your kayfun with this setup when you next take it apart please?

[Mev]

Yes you can do this using silica too, you need to be using something that wicks quickly though I find as the wire heats up quicker.

[johnners]

Jul 31, 2013 9:15:00 GMT Greigster said:

Yes johnners, that's what I thought. How dare she go away for a week to help look after our grandchildren whilst I am left at home where I can slob all day, go to bed at 3 am, get up at 10ish, eat fish and chips on the beach and ready meals from the freezer, doze, drink coffee, vape. leave the washing up then load the dishwasher just before she is due home...........how very dare she

Actually I will be very pleased when she does get home, there is a load of washing and ironing building up

lol! A man has to take his chances and look after his priorities

Tried this last night and it's fiddly but impressive. I need some heavier wire though as my resistence was very high with .25 kanthal..
I always love a new idea to play around with  Thanks!
j

[Dan]

Jul 31, 2013 22:17:01 GMT Mev said:

Yes you can do this using silica too, you need to be using something that wicks quickly though I find as the wire heats up quicker.

 Will have a go with 1mm ekowool and low volts then.. see how it goes!

[Greigster]

Jul 31, 2013 22:18:25 GMT johnners said:

Jul 31, 2013 9:15:00 GMT Greigster said:

Yes johnners, that's what I thought. How dare she go away for a week to help look after our grandchildren whilst I am left at home where I can slob all day, go to bed at 3 am, get up at 10ish, eat fish and chips on the beach and ready meals from the freezer, doze, drink coffee, vape. leave the washing up then load the dishwasher just before she is due home...........how very dare she

Actually I will be very pleased when she does get home, there is a load of washing and ironing building up

lol! A man has to take his chances and look after his priorities

Tried this last night and it's fiddly but impressive. I need some heavier wire though as my resistence was very high with .25 kanthal..
I always love a new idea to play around with  Thanks!
j

I got 2ohms with 7 wraps of .25 Kanthal but had 3.4ohms with 9 wraps ???

I think .30 Kanthal would be the optimum from what I have read.

The mesh company sell it for £2 for 10 mt. plus post.

[chrisde]

This method works great for bottom fed RBAs - I've been using bamboo thread and cotton on my Reos and Sunbox E7, as well as Kayfun and other RBA. I use a 1,5mm drill bit most of the time, you can do very neat coils.

Some key points:
- Use thick Kanthal or NiChrome  - upwards of 0.28mm. 0.20mm works to test the principle, but it doesn't work well. The pictures below are mostly 29AWG (0.30mm), but I also use 28AWG (0.35mm)
- Torch the Kanthal to a red or orange (I use a Bic lighter) before winding the coil. It loses some springiness
- The coils should actually touch their neighbors
- Place the coil right in front of the air hole, the closer the better. If you have to leave long legs on the coil to reach the posts, so be it. just cover the legs with the overhanging wick
- Less wick is more. Leave it room to expand and soak up the juice. Never stuff the wick into the coil. Use just enough wick material so that the wick doesn't fall out of the coil.
- On a dripper or bottom fed atty, cut the wick close to the coil, don't leave the sides long
- Try to get close to 8-11 coils. More is difficult, less is lacking oomph
- Bamboo and cotton are not dry burn safe - keep it wet. If you singed it, just rewick. Remove old wick, glow the coil for 3 seconds, insert new wick. I can do it in 20 seconds now.
- You CAN use something like 1mm Ekowool if you insist, but you are missing out
- A Qtip makes 4 fine wicks - two from each side. But make sure it's 100% untreated cotton - and unused =)
- The wick is only inside the coil to HOLD the liquid, not to actually WICK it from somewhere to somewhere, at least in drippers and BF atties. Kayfun and Orion are different, of course.
- You can use a 2mm drill bit as well as a 1.5mm, but you will have a shorter coil and thus - less oomph

Here's some pics:

Micro coils should start glowing at the center of the coil, moving outwards


Works with Genisis type atties too, this is an Orion 2.1 - Cotton wicks the last drop of juice up - but I prefer bottom fed atties now.


Micro coil on a Kayfun 


The same coil wicked with cotton


Insert the coil into the atomizer with the drill bit still inside it, this way it will be stable and solid


Ready to go on a VV Reo Grand with a Reomizer 2