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Why macro coils?
- Thread starter mkhilario
- Start date
A few reasons. It will raise the resistance, as opposed to adding a wrap or two which may not work on a given atty. It also changes the way hear is dispersed over the coil. Also you can fit more wick through the coil itself, which is helpful for hotter builds that tend to go dry while vaping. For me it's just personal preference, i find that the amount of wick under the coil holds enough juice for me to vape the way i do. I get a nice even flow of juice to the coil. 2.5mm coils tend to run dry on me mid-hit while the cotton on the sides is still wet. Though i prefer them in smaller attys or where i want the same resistance but with an extra wrap or two. It really depends on your vaping style, but changing the inner diameter of your coils is an often overlooked way to change/improve performance.
I don't tend to go by thickness of the wire when choosing a diameter. I go by power level and wrap count.
If a coil is too wide, horizontally, the wicking won't be able to carry juice to the center... ...it instead bottlenecks at the outer wraps. This will give you dry hits even when the exposed cotton is saturated. A coil can only be so much wider than it is in diameter before this problem occurs. A larger diameter keeps the wrap count down and helps regulate the temperature of the coil, which is something that starts getting much more important with bigger, fatter coils, as they retain a lot of heat.
Anything approaching 90w or more is going to be a macro for me, as well. It doesn't matter if that means only doing 5 wraps. At that point, most coils will be heating up very quickly as it is, so dry hits are going to be a thing if there's not enough space inside of them for the heat to disperse through. It's not always a good thing to have a coil heating itself across its interior diameter.
Now, there is one slight exception. 4.2v mech mod builds. I find that smaller macro and even something in the micro range tends to perform better, even for low-gauge, low-resistance mech builds. Mechs have that natural delay and battery sag to them, which acts sort of like its own temperature control, so wicking isn't quite as important. I often run dual 24's in the rage of .17-.24 at diameters of 2mm or 2.5mm with no wicking problems and all around better performance. It helps bring the heat around a bit and takes some ramp-up out. Even dual 22's can benefit from being smallish on a mech. One of my favorites is a teeny little 6-wrap, 2.5mm dual 22.
Self-wicking coils such as claptons and twisted wire usually work better at slightly lower diameters as well. They benefit from the extra heat and the fact that they themselves are wicking allows you to get away with less wick inside of them.
If a coil is too wide, horizontally, the wicking won't be able to carry juice to the center... ...it instead bottlenecks at the outer wraps. This will give you dry hits even when the exposed cotton is saturated. A coil can only be so much wider than it is in diameter before this problem occurs. A larger diameter keeps the wrap count down and helps regulate the temperature of the coil, which is something that starts getting much more important with bigger, fatter coils, as they retain a lot of heat.
Anything approaching 90w or more is going to be a macro for me, as well. It doesn't matter if that means only doing 5 wraps. At that point, most coils will be heating up very quickly as it is, so dry hits are going to be a thing if there's not enough space inside of them for the heat to disperse through. It's not always a good thing to have a coil heating itself across its interior diameter.
Now, there is one slight exception. 4.2v mech mod builds. I find that smaller macro and even something in the micro range tends to perform better, even for low-gauge, low-resistance mech builds. Mechs have that natural delay and battery sag to them, which acts sort of like its own temperature control, so wicking isn't quite as important. I often run dual 24's in the rage of .17-.24 at diameters of 2mm or 2.5mm with no wicking problems and all around better performance. It helps bring the heat around a bit and takes some ramp-up out. Even dual 22's can benefit from being smallish on a mech. One of my favorites is a teeny little 6-wrap, 2.5mm dual 22.
Self-wicking coils such as claptons and twisted wire usually work better at slightly lower diameters as well. They benefit from the extra heat and the fact that they themselves are wicking allows you to get away with less wick inside of them.
Bucky205
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There are only two things that effect the resistance of a coil, the gauge wire, and the wire length. The reason larger coils have higher resistance is that they use more wire. 1 inch of 26 ga, A-1 Kanthal, is going to ohm right around .22 ohms, no matter the ID of your coil, or number of wraps. It is only the wire gauge, and length controlling your resistance. The only thing the coil calculators are calculating given a wire diameter, is how much wire you used. Then they are able to calculate the resistance.