21 is the lower limit for me. I find that guages below that just take so much power to get going that they're just too hot to vape on by the time they get there. There is a point where heat will kill vapor production.
I quite like dual 22's, myself. Plenty of flavor and vapor on the right atty. You really need to have fast wicking, maximum chamber space above the coils, and lots of direct airflow to tame the heat retention. It's usually a better idea to keep them on the smallish side, unless you're running something like a Troll wide open with a chuff, which will laugh at a .15 dual 22g like "Is that all you've got?"
Underpowered monster coils can surprise you, though. You'd be surprised at how low you can actually go in voltage for coils with a lot of heat capacity. They don't always need as much power as you'd think because of how well they can hold onto heat.
I actually do believe that. I've been shocked at the vapor coming off of tiny little 26g coils. My theory there is that because they're so small and they heat/cool so fast, they don't need a lot of surface area to quickly displace a lot of juice. They have the advantage when it comes to wicking efficiency, which I find tends to be the biggest obstacle to overcome with huge cloud builds.
That's where self-wicking coils really shine. Fused claptons and their more elaborate friends can chuck some really, thick, serious clouds when you're pumping 4.5+ volts to them. Wicking is never an issue and the flavor is off of the charts with all of that surface area. Might want to look into those.
And then there are staged parallels. You can do stuff like parallel 28 with 26 or maybe even 28 with 24 for a big coil that heats up quickly, but doesn't hold onto as much heat and wicks a bit more readily. You can do some mean, tasty stuff with those simple staged coils.
There's a million different ways to get easy clouds. And they all have sort of a different character to them. It really just comes down to what you like most in terms of the little nuances.
Robot Zombie, I always look forward to your replies. They are very precise, and make a lot of sense. I must praise you on that.
You mentioned lots of airflow-would my El cabron or velocity be ideal candidates? I haven't tried the 22G in these yet-the El cabron comes with a small (still bit) drip tip and adapter, a delrin chuff cap, then a HUGE metal chuff.
Ok, so Should I try say a 3MM build, low resistance, 22G with loads of airflow in the El cabron or velocity? I have only tried the 22G once as the heat it retained put me off-but if I can get them cooling faster, I will use it for my 'madness' moments-which come a few times a week-where I like to spend an hour going insane, and much to my mums pleasure, filling the entire house with vapour. Yep, I am 25 and still live at home. I love my mum and granddad, and have no plans on leaving anytime soon. My granddad is sick and she is his main carer, I am the second, so I need to be there, or it would be carers coming in, and having worked as a carer-I am NOT having that for my granddad.
For wicking-what would you recommend? I have that Koh gen doh japanese cotton-the stuff wicks fast, but I find my organic cotton balls are more tightly packed-for instance they are a similar density to the 'scottish roll' wicking method-so can hold a lot of juice. Not as fast at wicking though.
Ok, I will remember that they don't need as much power as I necessarily think due to the heat they hold onto.
I am glad you believe me, because it is honestly the truth. I currently have micro coils in the el cabron, dual 26 gauge, I think around .44, and that actually produces fairly beastly clouds. They are quite flavoursome too.
I have ordered lots of gauges this week-as my supply of standard, non tc wire was low. I have all gauges of kanthal on the way up to 30, I have some 32 but found that to be too thin-even for my claptons I thought it was a bit too thin/fragile.
So self wicking coils-Ok, this does sound like the potential way forward robot zombie, (Sorry, do you mind me asking your name? I'm Conan BTW, I just feel more personal reffering by name. If you like to stay anonymous on the net though, no worries, I will call you your user name if thats cool?
).
So-fused claptons. I can make standard claptons, but I don't really understand the way the resistance change works when you have made it. Add an extra wire into the Mix-I will have no idea.
I will be willing to try fused Claptons though-as soon as I have 30 gauge and all other gauges. For now though-its either 22, 24, or 26 gauge for cloud builds.
I will need to learn about these simple staged coils-as I must admit, they do confuse me lol.
If I am honest-I probably already AM using a build that is ideal for clouds-I just want to experiment with the various ways to achieve the clouds, and see for myself the small differences you mention.
Plus-just because I am not using ultra high wattage-if the cloud is big, the cloud is big, right? I will likely try some 22G now for my velocity, see how I get on
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Thanks man, Conan.