Temperature control coil building help required

[TallPaul70]

Hiya,

So, I've been building my own coils for a few weeks now, still a novice, but have wanted to try TC building.

I've got a Sigelei 75w TC and an XCube II.

I've got a shiny new Bellus (other tanks are available) and my 1st dripper (Youde Hunter, can be single or double coiled, though I'm assuming double coils are well off the menu for Ni due to the low reistance).

I've got a reel of 0.28mm (29AWG) Ni200 (tempered) and a reel of 0.50mm (24AWG) Ti wire.

Had a read, I know I've got to use spaced coils, and not to dry burn them on watt/volt modes (particularly titanium).

The problem comes when I start looking at steam engine, and trying to get the heat flux in (or near to) the green.

With the Ni, 12 wraps with 2.5mm id comes in at 0.19ohms, heat flux is 280, seems OK, any opinions? 12 wraps seems a lot but I could go to 10 wraps at 3mm id, any advantages or disadvantages in either course of action?

With the Ti, I can't seem to find a build that gets the heat flux out of the blue... am I worrying about this too much?

I'd like to use this to dual coil, but am I barking up the wrong tree, have I just bought the wrong diameter wire (it was all Stealthvape had in stock at the time...)?

I'd really appreciate a steer in the right direction, I'm feeling a bit fish out if water and just want to make some bloody coils

[Deleted]

Lol ... Never even heard of this heat flux thingy and I have been happily vaping TC for the past month. Too much info can cause more problems than it solves sometimes.

[VapingBad]

More wraps will generally work better, more vapour at lower temps with lower heat flux. Depending on the low res limit of your mods the wire you have may be a bit on the thick side, but again it depends on how much room you have in the atty to, 0.28 mm Ni should be good for single coils unless your short on room. Dual coiling makes it more of a challenge and on the DNA40 I have been using twisted 0.16 mm (34 AWG) Ni to be able to get enough wraps in and keep the heat flux sensible. I like to get the heat flux < 200 personally, but once I have found a good starter build for an atty I don't go back and recalc I just add or remove wraps.

[TallPaul70]

Hahaha, yeah @yinyang, I am aware that I may be thinking about the variables too much, I do that My concern is that I don't know enough about this to know what's important.

The heat flux is the bit on steam engine (the coil wrapping part) that changes colour, green is middle of the range, red hot, blue cooler... now how that actually translates to how it vapes is what I'm not really sure about.

Thanks VapingBad, I've been trying to steer away from using a minimal amount of wraps, good to know that holds true.

The Xcube II (my go to mod at home and the one I'm more likely to be experimenting with) is rated to fire down to 0.06 ohms in TC mode... I've knocked up a fairly rough and ready 1st attempt on the Bellus with the 0.28mm Ni (10 wraps, 3mm id), mod wouldn't read it at 1st but after a bit of adjustment I've got it working, vaping nicely for a 1st go so that's a starting point for me with single coils. There was just enough room for the coil, hence the need for some adjustment (well, that or my cack-handedness!)

As for the 0.5mm Ti, if I go for dual coils (which I'd like to for the dripper) 10 wraps @ 3mm id should give (according to steam engine) 0.15 ohms.

I've only just realised that in the heat flux section the figures it gives are at a specific wattage, so on that build if I go up to 70w it's in the green. That's a bit of a revelation, so (if I'm understanding it correctly) I can use this to give me an idea of the wattage that a specific build should be good at? I guess there'll be some margin according to personal preferences but it should give a ballpark figure? No use for my TC experiments but handy for normal builds.

Sorry for all this, I am a bit clueless here!

So, from what I can tell on the Xcube II in TC mode I don't set wattage at all... the one setting I don't understand when entering TC mode is 'coefficiency'... no idea...

Perhaps I should just stick in 2 10 wrap coils (of the Ti) and see how it vapes? It should we well within the mods limits and at least it will give me a starting point?

[robby]

Suck it and see TallPaul70

[TallPaul70]

Words of wisdom robby

[sydsut]

I find an old HI-FI adage helps here. Trust your ears, if it sounds good it is good. Trust your taste buds, if it tastes good it is good. Always remember what your trying to achieve and that's a good flavourful vape that satisfies long term.

[TallPaul70]

Cheers sydsut, I think that advice (and others) has paid dividends with the Bellus build, been using that last night and today and it's working a treat, really flavourful, lots of vapour... it's my 1st build on that tank so haven't got anything to compare it too, but presuming it's an indication of how TC works with an Ni single coil build I'm impressed.

I whacked a dual coil build in the dripper last night using the titanium wire, but the next problem I've come up against is that the Xcube II doesn't have an option to set it to Ti coils, or rather it's something that has to be unlocked through the app, and whenever I try to log into the app it crashes... grrrr, much frustration!

Can I just run under the Ni settings, start low with the temperature settings and raise them cautiously?

[robby]

Oct 23, 2015 14:43:05 GMT TallPaul70 said:

Cheers sydsut, I think that advice (and others) has paid dividends with the Bellus build, been using that last night and today and it's working a treat, really flavourful, lots of vapour... it's my 1st build on that tank so haven't got anything to compare it too, but presuming it's an indication of how TC works with an Ni single coil build I'm impressed.

I whacked a dual coil build in the dripper last night using the titanium wire, but the next problem I've come up against is that the Xcube II doesn't have an option to set it to Ti coils, or rather it's something that has to be unlocked through the app, and whenever I try to log into the app it crashes... grrrr, much frustration!

Can I just run under the Ni settings, start low with the temperature settings and raise them cautiously?

Yes you can do that and it will taste just the same. I`m doing that with SS coils at the moment. You may only be at just above 260/270 F But dont hold me to that. Just start at the bottom and work up till you like the taste

[TallPaul70]

OK cool, cheers robby, I'll give it a try.

[VapingBad]

Oct 23, 2015 14:43:05 GMT TallPaul70 said:

Cheers sydsut, I think that advice (and others) has paid dividends with the Bellus build, been using that last night and today and it's working a treat, really flavourful, lots of vapour... it's my 1st build on that tank so haven't got anything to compare it too, but presuming it's an indication of how TC works with an Ni single coil build I'm impressed.

I whacked a dual coil build in the dripper last night using the titanium wire, but the next problem I've come up against is that the Xcube II doesn't have an option to set it to Ti coils, or rather it's something that has to be unlocked through the app, and whenever I try to log into the app it crashes... grrrr, much frustration!

Can I just run under the Ni settings, start low with the temperature settings and raise them cautiously?

You can try running 90-100 F under the temp you would in NI, 310 F would be right for 400 F.

[TallPaul70]

Ah OK, cheers VapingBad, that gives me a ballpark to play in

[TallPaul70]

Right, I'm properly confused now...

After my first attempts the other day, I've been vaping happily enough using my Sigelei 75 TC and X Cube II, good flavour, plenty of vapour, but, if I'm honest, the vape seemed pretty chilly no matter what temperature I set them at, the Sig slightly less so than the X Cube II.

So today I've rebuilt my Bellus, using .28mm Nickel again, wrapped around a machine screw this time producing a spaced coil that was much tidier than the last attempts, really happy with how this looked.

I decided to try a cotton test to check everything was working OK, and this is where the confusion comes in.

On the Sig the cotton scorches at every temperture setting, right down to 200F.

On the X Cube II it doesn't scorch, right the way up to 600F.

What's that all about!? Same build on 2 devices, neither producing the effect I'm expecting (I though cotton should scorch at 410F?)

Any ideas??

[VapingBad]

Have you put the atty on cool and locked the res if required by the mod TallPaul70?

[TallPaul70]

Hi VapingBad, yes, it was room temperature when checked on both. The X Cube I made sure it recognised it as a new coil and read the resistance (it dones't specifically ask you to fix it but I presume that's what happens on the original read in TC mode), the Sig you manually lock it in and I did.

The X Cube is showing the TC kicking in, but just seem over active if it won't scorch at 600F.

The Sig doesn't actively update with temperature or show it activated, but the voltage readout gets to a certain point and stays there, isn't showing any modulation that would indicate TC is active.