Building a good stainless steel wick

I came across an article on the ECF forums about stainless steel wick and the nature of "wicking" and more specifically the "capillary" action that takes place!
I have a Mini DID and a DID, so my experience so far has been with these particular rebuildables!
I struggled to build a decent wick and constantly had trouble with both wicking and shorts!
I have to say that after reading through the posts, and then trying the suggested building process I am amazed by the results!

Here's the link to the posts, (from the beginning) #500 SS Mesh

I read all the way through and was impressed by the logic that was put forward, so all credit goes to BJ43!
As I write I have just finished a full tank on my Mini DID with absolutely no dry hits, flavour (flavor) that is so strong that I will have to mix another weaker mix, (I'm feeling ill from OD,ing on NIC)
And I used the tank full without having to tip over to wet the wick, and vaped until the tank was completely empty!

The Absolute LOGIC behind this mans thinking has made me a very happy camper!

 

And more!
I made my wick with #325 mesh (cos that's all I had) about 70mm by 40mm, used a paper clip to roll to as tight as possible, be.comse the mesh is still springy I oxidized the wick then rolled without the paper clip until about 2mm!
oxidized again twice, only until the wick glowed red, (I tried before this with too much heat and made the mesh brittle), I then wet and burned the wick in with juice three times!

Now lets say that the suggested winds be 3/4 turns, my logic suggests that if you have a piece of wire that is 70mm long and produces 1.8 ohms (or thereabout) and you have a wick that is 3mm the wire would wind around four times (maybe)
with a 2mm wick the same length of wire would wind maybe six times to produce the same 1.8 ohms!
Before I wind the wire I heat it with a flame (cigarette lighter left over from my smoking days) and then using my thumb nail I pull the wire through a couple of times until I don't have any kinks!
The most important part for me when winding the coils is to get them as tight as possible, (you will only get warm if you're close to the fire ) If the coils are loose there is more chance for hot spots and glowing red coils!
Then when I have the coils wound I flood them with juice and burn in, I do that around three times checking for hot spots, Voila, fill and vape!

I sometime have to repeat the process of oxidizing (only once) then burning the wick in with juice (three times) then wind, flood, burn in and check!

 

I've been talking to BJ43 a lot, he certainly knows his stuff when it comes to rebuildables.

 

Yea BJ43 is a really nice guy, I pm'd him for some help a little while back when I first started using SS mesh. I'm not surprised that his name came up.
Thanks for the link, read a few pages and will read on when I get some time.

 

Just one more thing!
I find that there is no need to cut the wick on an angle, just plonk it right to the bottom, be.comse the juice is being soaked INTO the wick as opposed to going UP the wick, much like the filter you would find in a fuel tank!
Not much of an analogy but close I think, or the wick in a lamp.
Any air that goes back into the tank is from the sides of the wick!

 

Great find...off to buy some #500 mesh

 

Great info! thanks. So much to learn.

 

Yeah that post was a good read..

I'm back on more solid wicks too atm; thin walled wicks seem to provide denser clouds for me (possibly due to the hotter surface area of a thin wick) but this is providing you are tilting perfectly to keep the wick just wet enough; usually I can feel it in the draw at the time - when there is a lot of vapour being created in the chamber it tightens the draw..

I have been doing mines with a single wall outer wick then an extra wick to fill the space in the middle to provide a juice resivour of sorts. Then when the wick is gunked and needs swapping I can just switch the outer wick (which is around .5cm of mesh) and keep the middle resivour for re-use..

 

#500 mesh is really expensive stuff!
#400 mesh is going to be plenty useful for most genesis users, unless you can chain vape faster than #400 mesh can wick, then there is no need to use #500.

 

According to this web site, #500 is the same price as #400. Where did you find your prices Noe?

 

i dont think noe even owns a gennie and hes giving advice lolololol

 

I read a thread on ECF that some people use a thin bolt or screw and wind the wire around the screw to get a perfectly spaced vertical coil, then unwind the screw out of the coil. Eureka and then tighten onto your atomizer.

View attachment 3652

 

Some people do ... and not only on ECF, but AVF as well

 

Yeah just ordered some cost A$20 delivered for A4 sheet. About the same price of what can be bought locally for half the size in #400...

 

The difficult part though is to get the SS wick through the coil where the inner diameter of the coil is the same size as the outer diameter of the wick without distorting the nicely wound coil

 

Got some #500 mesh, 28 and 30awg Kanthal on the way. Good looking out Dvietrod. BJ43's thread has been a really interesting read

 

Umm wrong, #400 is Price: £7.99, #500 is Price: £9.99, per A4 Sheet at time of this post, on that site.

 

I have a gennie & I have been reading a lot about them but hey if you don't want me giving you advice then don't read my posts

 

It is now, but it was the same price when I posted it a week ago (so not wrong, just outdated), and I can't help it if you're late to the party

 

Yea the buggers put the price up due to a rise in sales. It's meant to be the other way round as they're buying bigger quantities and are most likely getting a cheaper price.