Ohms Amps Watts Volts

[Ethangon]

First and foremost, I apologize if there is a previous thread explaining this well.

I understand how electronic cigarettes work, and i've familiarized myself with each part. I just can't seem to understand the relationship between Ohms, Amps, Watts, and Volts. I recently ordered some parts from e-leaf (iStick TC100W and Lemo 2) to quit cigarettes, but i'm not sure how I should configure the settings once it arrives.

iStick TC100W: https://www.eleafus.com/e-cigarette/istick-series/istick-tc100w/istick-tc100w-kit-no-cell.html

Lemo 2 Atomizer: https://www.eleafus.com/atomizer/lemo/lemo-2-atomizer.html

Correct me if i'm wrong, but I know ohms represent the resistance due to the size of the coils and how many wraps there are, and that Amps/Current is how much power is being released from the battery. I also know that Voltage is how much Amperage is being pushed through the coil. Wattage is the difficult part. From what i've read and heard, Wattage is like autopilot mode... I'm most likely going to lean towards Wattage, but i'd still like to understand everything.

How would I, or you, configure the mod once it arrives? For instance, if I want a lot of vapor, usually i'd crank up the Wattage. Does that automatically adjust the resistance and voltage?

Maybe I just need to play around with it, but i'd like to get a firm understanding of everything so I can enjoy my vape at its full potential.

Any information is helpful, Thanks!

PS: I'm also wondering what batteries I should be using with my mod. The website, E-leaf, from which i ordered the mod, is out of Sony 18650 VTC4 batteries that usually come with the mod in a bundle. My local vape shop apparently sells Sony A130 18650's. Would those work? How do I know which batteries to order? The information on the website says high rate 18650 cells are needed, so would that be any 18650 batteries, or is there a specific list of 18650 batteries that exceed the required 25 amps?

 

[jat009]

Resistance is based on the coil. Many of them will have recommended wattage ranges for Kanthal or temperature ranges for Ni and Ti. What I suggest once you get it is starting at a low wattage and working your way up gradually to find the vape that you like.

 

[JERUS]

Figured I'd sum it up at the top, so, Start at 25w and work your way up till you find what you enjoy. If you start to taste burnt or nasty stop and lower the wattage. As for batteries, Liionwholesale.com is kind of the VapingUnderground go to place, Illumn is another one. Grab some Samsung 25r's is my favorite, or LG HG2's if you want longer life but a less versatile battery (HG2s probably best for you right now though).

Ok so I'll start off with the math... I like it, many hate it but it's simple algebra.

Amperage = Voltage/Resistance (a=v/Ω), and Wattage = Voltage * Amperage (w=v*a)

This is mainly important for mech mods, I'd not suggest going there just yet. Stick to regulated mods till you understand everything going on.

For batteries, in a regulated mod I'd suggest 3 batteries either Samsung 25r's (Just quality batteries, able to push further than they're rated), LG HG2's (Long life, well trusted batteries), or Samsung Q30's (Just like the HG2's but newer so harder to find a supply). Any of those 3 will treat you very well. I like Samsung 25r's because they can work in mechs and regulated very well. For mechs though you'll want things like the VTC4's (30amps) or LG HB series (2's being the best, but these are lower on life so they won't last long before needing a recharge, why I reserve them for pushing a mech).

Anyways, get a regulated mod. If you're inclined to really push your tanks/drippers/whatever I'd suggest something at 100w or more, so 2 batteries. These are bulkier so that's a consideration but they'll be able to do whatever you need.

Like jat009 said your resistance is your coil. It's not just a bigger wire or more wraps, it's a lot of things. If I use say SS it'll give me about half the resistance that typical Kanthal A1 will give me (Kanthal A1 is your standard vape wire).

That's some background information, I don't want to sit here and type out an novel that will make your head overload, if you have more specific questions please ask and I'd be happy to answer or link pages that answer them for you.

For now, at a .5Ω coil with the setup you have I'd start at 25w, from there if you're not getting enough vapor, keep bumping it up until you're satisfied or it starts to taste a little burnt, once it tastes burnt stop immediately and drop the wattage or you'll kill the coil. Or more the cotton in the coilhead (burnt cotton tastes nasty). I don't have your tank/coilheads but on my Atlantis with prebuild heads at that resistance I found 40-50w the ideal settings, but like everything in vaping it's very subjective.

If you're worried about safety or what not, trust that your regulated mod can handle 100w. Your .5ohm coil however won't. 50-60w depending on it's juiceflow capabilities will likely cap it out. But, you might not need that to get a quality vape and it might be too much again depending on juice flow capabilies (holes in the coilhead and the juice y ou use will determine this).

Vaping is physics, but while a lot of it is simple physics, there are enough variables that it gets VERY complicated if you were to write it all out and try to figure it out on paper. Trial and error is where it's at. So again, start low, vape a few times, decide if you want to go up, vape a few times and see if you need to go up or back down. Find your sweet spot.

This is already getting long and like I said I don't want to write a novel for you, but your wattage will not affect your resistance, it will change your voltage on a regulated mod like you have though. Regulated mods perform those equations I put above and decide the best settings, it'll step down the voltage if needed (increasing the amps) or raise it up (decreasing amps needed) depending on how it feels best to give you the wattage you want for the coil you have.

Hope that helps start you. Again ask away, check out the various forum areas and ask there. Lots of folks far more well informed and smarter than I am, that'll surely chime in on any questions you have. GL

 

[Ethangon]

Figured I'd sum it up at the top, so, Start at 25w and work your way up till you find what you enjoy. If you start to taste burnt or nasty stop and lower the wattage. As for batteries, Liionwholesale.com is kind of the VapingUnderground go to place, Illumn is another one. Grab some Samsung 25r's is my favorite, or LG HG2's if you want longer life but a less versatile battery (HG2s probably best for you right now though).

Ok so I'll start off with the math... I like it, many hate it but it's simple algebra.

Amperage = Voltage/Resistance (a=v/Ω), and Wattage = Voltage * Amperage (w=v*a)

This is mainly important for mech mods, I'd not suggest going there just yet. Stick to regulated mods till you understand everything going on.

For batteries, in a regulated mod I'd suggest 3 batteries either Samsung 25r's (Just quality batteries, able to push further than they're rated), LG HG2's (Long life, well trusted batteries), or Samsung Q30's (Just like the HG2's but newer so harder to find a supply). Any of those 3 will treat you very well. I like Samsung 25r's because they can work in mechs and regulated very well. For mechs though you'll want things like the VTC4's (30amps) or LG HB series (2's being the best, but these are lower on life so they won't last long before needing a recharge, why I reserve them for pushing a mech).

Anyways, get a regulated mod. If you're inclined to really push your tanks/drippers/whatever I'd suggest something at 100w or more, so 2 batteries. These are bulkier so that's a consideration but they'll be able to do whatever you need.

Like jat009 said your resistance is your coil. It's not just a bigger wire or more wraps, it's a lot of things. If I use say SS it'll give me about half the resistance that typical Kanthal A1 will give me (Kanthal A1 is your standard vape wire).

That's some background information, I don't want to sit here and type out an novel that will make your head overload, if you have more specific questions please ask and I'd be happy to answer or link pages that answer them for you.

For now, at a .5Ω coil with the setup you have I'd start at 25w, from there if you're not getting enough vapor, keep bumping it up until you're satisfied or it starts to taste a little burnt, once it tastes burnt stop immediately and drop the wattage or you'll kill the coil. Or more the cotton in the coilhead (burnt cotton tastes nasty). I don't have your tank/coilheads but on my Atlantis with prebuild heads at that resistance I found 40-50w the ideal settings, but like everything in vaping it's very subjective.

If you're worried about safety or what not, trust that your regulated mod can handle 100w. Your .5ohm coil however won't. 50-60w depending on it's juiceflow capabilities will likely cap it out. But, you might not need that to get a quality vape and it might be too much again depending on juice flow capabilies (holes in the coilhead and the juice y ou use will determine this).

Vaping is physics, but while a lot of it is simple physics, there are enough variables that it gets VERY complicated if you were to write it all out and try to figure it out on paper. Trial and error is where it's at. So again, start low, vape a few times, decide if you want to go up, vape a few times and see if you need to go up or back down. Find your sweet spot.

This is already getting long and like I said I don't want to write a novel for you, but your wattage will not affect your resistance, it will change your voltage on a regulated mod like you have though. Regulated mods perform those equations I put above and decide the best settings, it'll step down the voltage if needed (increasing the amps) or raise it up (decreasing amps needed) depending on how it feels best to give you the wattage you want for the coil you have.

Hope that helps start you. Again ask away, check out the various forum areas and ask there. Lots of folks far more well informed and smarter than I am, that'll surely chime in on any questions you have. GL

Thanks for the informational reply! I've got one more question. The mod I ordered has temperature control settings as well for SS Ti and Ni. What exactly is temperature control?

 

[DED420]

TC (Temperature Control) is a way of adjusting your coils temperatures. Different juices vape/taste differently at different temperatures, so TC allows you to fine tune your vaping experience. Although different types of wire provide different flavors, they also have different TCR values (Temperature Coefficient of Resistance) which means different wires need different settings (modes) to work properly. TC works by reading the wires base resistance, and using a mathematical algorithm to figure out the temperature. TC wires have linear resistance patterns, meaning that at a certain resistance, the wire will be this temperature, at another resistance the wire is another temperature, and so on. So as the resistance rises, the temperature will rise also. The mod then calculates what Temp the coil is at a certain resistance, and prevent the coils from exceeding the Temp you set.

Ni200 (Nickel) can only be used in TC Ni mode (No dry firing, will give off dioxides, and possibly melt)
Ti (Titanium) can only be used in TC Ti mode (No dry firing, will give off dioxides)
SS (Stainless Steel) can work in both Power/Wattage and TC SS modes (can be "pulse" dry fired)
Kanthal (Standard) can be used in Power/Wattage mode (can be dry fired normally)

If you use any of these wire types, make sure the mod is set to the right mode, and once a TC coil is installed in the Tank/RDA, let it rest to room temp before screwing it into the mod and locking resistance. This will make sure the mod reads the coil correctly and run the right TCR profile.

When using temp control, keep this in mind:
In TC, Wattage = Ramp Time. The longer the coil stays in the "ramp up" without hitting "Temp Protect" the more smooth and consistent the vape will be. Once it hits Temp Protect, the mod will "pulse" or "throttle" (firing the battery on/off rapidly) to maintain that Temp. Pulsing gives a wavy kind of vape (just like if you were to tap the button on your mod really fast, it wouldn't give you a very good hit). If the Wattage is too low, the coils won't reach the Temperature you set either. So the closer you can get to Temp Protect without actually exceeding it, the better.

So once the coils are installed and set, find the temp you like to vape at first, then bump up/fine tune the wattage so it stays in the ramp up, and you'll be good to go.

Sorry about the essay, but I hope it makes sense, and I hope it helps and answers your questions

 

[Ethangon]

TC (Temperature Control) is a way of adjusting your coils temperatures. Different juices vape/taste differently at different temperatures, so TC allows you to fine tune your vaping experience. Although different types of wire provide different flavors, they also have different TCR values (Temperature Coefficient of Resistance) which means different wires need different settings (modes) to work properly. TC works by reading the wires base resistance, and using a mathematical algorithm to figure out the temperature. TC wires have linear resistance patterns, meaning that at a certain resistance, the wire will be this temperature, at another resistance the wire is another temperature, and so on. So as the resistance rises, the temperature will rise also. The mod then calculates what Temp the coil is at a certain resistance, and prevent the coils from exceeding the Temp you set.

Ni200 (Nickel) can only be used in TC Ni mode (No dry firing, will give off dioxides, and possibly melt)
Ti (Titanium) can only be used in TC Ti mode (No dry firing, will give off dioxides)
SS (Stainless Steel) can work in both Power/Wattage and TC SS modes (can be "pulse" dry fired)
Kanthal (Standard) can be used in Power/Wattage mode (can be dry fired normally)

If you use any of these wire types, make sure the mod is set to the right mode, and once a TC coil is installed in the Tank/RDA, let it rest to room temp before screwing it into the mod and locking resistance. This will make sure the mod reads the coil correctly and run the right TCR profile.

When using temp control, keep this in mind:
In TC, Wattage = Ramp Time. The longer the coil stays in the "ramp up" without hitting "Temp Protect" the more smooth and consistent the vape will be. Once it hits Temp Protect, the mod will "pulse" or "throttle" (firing the battery on/off rapidly) to maintain that Temp. Pulsing gives a wavy kind of vape (just like if you were to tap the button on your mod really fast, it wouldn't give you a very good hit). If the Wattage is too low, the coils won't reach the Temperature you set either. So the closer you can get to Temp Protect without actually exceeding it, the better.

So once the coils are installed and set, find the temp you like to vape at first, then bump up/fine tune the wattage so it stays in the ramp up, and you'll be good to go.

Sorry about the essay, but I hope it makes sense, and I hope it helps and answers your questions

Thank you so much. That's extremely helpful, and I appreciate it! Better longer with more information than short with little information

 

[robot zombie]

ohms represent the resistance due to the size of the coils and how many wraps there are

Sort of. The thicker the wire (or LOWER the guage,) the lower the resistance per unit of length will be. Think of the wire as a highway. Electrons are the cars. At a given speed limit, a wider highway allows more cars to pass through. And naturally, the longer the road, the longer it takes for the cars to cross.

Most people think of it in terms of wraps, but it's actually the total length of the wire that determines resistance, though in practice, I suppose it doesn't matter if you prefer to think of it in terms of wraps/diameter. It's just that a straight length of wire will have the same resistance if you take it and coil it up. The whole wraps/diameter explanation is technically inaccurate, even if it is more practical and relevant to what we're doing.

Another way you could go is to think of the wire as a hose and the current as the amount of water. At a given pressure, a wider hose will allow more water to pass through, while it will take longer for the water to make it out of a longer hose than it would a shorter one.

Amps/Current is how much power is being released from the battery

It's a part of the equation. Wattage is actually the unit for power, which I'll get to later. Amps can be considered a unit of measurement for the amount of electrons passing through. It represents the rate at which electrons flow. Think of current as the volume of water flowing through the hose. Amperage is the amount of charge that your power supply is giving.

I also know that Voltage is how much Amperage is being pushed through the coil

Well, sort of. It's a unit of potential energy... ...specifically, it is the charge difference between two points in a circuit. You are correct in saying that the higher your voltage, the more current there will be moving through the coil at any point in time. To go back to the hose analogy, voltage is the amount of pressure that the pump is pushing the water through the hose with. The higher the voltage, the more charge passes through, but that's not the only thing that happens. The electrons are being pushed through with, shall we say, more force. They're packing that much more oomph.

Say you double the voltage pushing on the same resistor. Not only will your current flow double because it's pushing twice as hard against that resistant force, but your wattage will quadruple because not only are there twice as many electrons passing through, but each one is doing twice as much work - each unit of charge carries twice as much potential energy.

Wattage is the difficult part. From what i've read and heard, Wattage is like autopilot mode... I'm most likely going to lean towards Wattage, but i'd still like to understand everything.

Wattage = power. It's the total amount of work done by the circuit. There are different ways to get the same amount of work done. In high-current situations, there are more electrons carrying less energy. In high-voltage situations, fewer electrons are flowing, but each one has more energy moving it.

At the end of the day, watts are watts. Lets say we have two coils with the same mass and composition, but different resistances. This is physically impossible, but bear with me. One is .1 and one is 1 ohm. Both are running at 100w. The .1 will take a substantial ~31 amps at a piddly 3.16v. The 1 ohm coil will take a measly 10 amps at a whopping 10 volts.

What does this mean? Not much. In actuality, both coils would heat up to the same temperature at the same rate. The deciding factor in how a coil heats up is the amount of wattage per unit of surface area. When it comes to performance, it doesn't matter how the power gets there, though it matters quite a lot when it comes to what your power source is (which I can also talk about, if you're more interested in the applications for what I'm talking about here.)

If resistance is the length/width of the hose, current is the amount of water moving through the hose, and voltage is the water pressure, then wattage is the rate at which water comes out of the hose. It's the culmination of those three factors. If you decrease or increase the amount of water coming out of the hose by whatever means, then the amount of time it takes to fill a bucket will reflect that, but different combinations of hoses/pumps can fill that bucket at the same rate.

Hopefully these analogies help you get a better handle on how the four relate to one another. It doesn't really explain how electricity works, but if this made any sense to you, then you now have a working understanding of the mechanics... ...enough to understand the hows and whys of full vape setups, at least. You don't need to be a physicist or engineer to conceptualize their inner workings.

How would I, or you, configure the mod once it arrives? For instance, if I want a lot of vapor, usually i'd crank up the Wattage. Does that automatically adjust the resistance and voltage?

Resistance is fixed. As mentioned before, it's determined by the length, width, and composition of the wire (temperature as well, but only significantly so with TC wires such as nickel, titanium, and SS.)

The mod provides the amount of voltage that will facilitate the current flow needed to hit the set wattage for resistance of the coil, as per ohm's law. A coil at x resistance will always need y current at z voltage in order to hit a given wattage. There is only one possible configuration that will give you the desired wattage at a fixed resistance.

The wattage you choose is largely a matter of taste, but it all comes down to the mass of your coil. Don't worry so much about the resistance or voltage when using regulated boxes. The mod will take care of figuring out how the power needs to get there. A watt running through kanthal will always provide the same amount of heat per unit of mass, so as the mass increases, the wattage will need to increase in order to bring the entire coil up to the same temperature at the same rate.

 

[JERUS]

Mind if i save this and link it Robot Zombie? Thinking about tossing it to my quick guide on mechs, just good analogies for further understanding.

 

[robot zombie]

Mind if i save this and link it Robot Zombie? Thinking about tossing it to my quick guide on mechs, just good analogies for further understanding.

Not at all. I wish I could say that I was the first to come up with them, but they've been in use for a long, long time. The water hose/tank and highway analogies are classic textbook primers.

 

[JERUS]

Not at all. I wish I could say that I was the first to come up with them, but they've been in use for a long, long time. The water hose/tank and highway analogies are classic textbook primers.

True, just haven't seen it taken all the way before