My First Clapton

[DonBaldy]

So I built my first Clapton tonight. It’s a kanthal 24g core with a 26g wrap. Not ideal but I worked with what I had. Tomorrow I’ll be placing an order for much more wire.

It’s not a mind blowing vape but serviceable. Flavor is pretty good. It’s not as tight as I’d like but I suppose that will get better with much more practice and better setup.

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[ScReWbALL]

Not shabby at all for your first clapton...congrats! It’s actually pretty hard to clapton very tight at all when your wrap wire is so close in size to your core wire, so, be proud you didn’t end up with a rats nest like my first ones came out to be. Just curious...what brand of wire are you ordering?


You're not drinking water are you?! You realize that stuff is found in antifreeze!?!

 

[DonBaldy]

Yeah, it took my 2 1/2 hours, a lot of cussing, some walking away and coming back and the last of my 26g to get this.

For now and to practice, I'll be ordering the 10 piece Kanthal multi pack from Kbee Vapes. From what I've read it's not the best but it's decent and cheap which is what I need to practice. When I get more proficient I'll move on to Ni80 and SS. The ultimate goal is to make my own SS fused claptons instead of buying prebuilts (which I love) from AVS.

Oh yeah ramp up time is a bitch, but I'm guessing that's due to the mass with the larger wires.

 

[ScReWbALL]

Yeah, your outer wire being so thick is definitely causing the ramp up to be slowed, but using thicker gauges are better for finding a technique that works best for you...even if you don’t use the clapton wire you make with it to make a coil, it has its benefits of being a good aid for learning and practice to get your technique down pat. I’ve seen people get excited from making their first “perfect” clapton and rightfully so...it’s an awesome milestone to hit...but an even better milestone is when you can make many lengths of Clapton wire and line them all up next to each other and see that they’re identical. Once you get that kind of solid foundation down, the sky is the limit in all the awesome builds that will be available to you.
I’ve used KBee SS316L and Nichrome 80 but never their Kanthal...the SS316L was good, but the N80 was lacking a bit in the quality department. I was actually just trying to make sure you weren’t going with Lightning Vapes...I’ve had nothing but bad experiences with their wire (and have heard the same from many other sources) and would hate for someone trying to learn more advanced coil building techniques to use LV wire and think it was something they were doing wrong and losing confidence when things wouldn’t work out right when it’s the quality of wire that’s more than likely the issue instead.
Either way, congrats on the awesome clapton and welcome to the dark side!


You're not drinking water are you?! You realize that stuff is found in antifreeze!?!

 

[DonBaldy]

Thanks for the info about LV. I was going to get wire from them until I saw in another post someone suggest the Kbee multi pack. $30 is not to shabby for 1000' of wire ranging from 22g to 40g. Should be good for getting in a lit of practice without feeling like I'm wasting money. Now that I've found hardware I'm very satisfied with it's not time to take the next step. Other than juice all of my vape budget will now go towards wire.

 

[ScReWbALL]

Not wanting to sound like I’m trying to promote one wire company over another or anything...but I’ve used quite a few companies to supply the wire for my coil building addiction and the top three places that I, personally, go through to order wire are:

https://temcoindustrial.com

http://www.masterofclouds.com

https://store.coilsociety.com

TEMCo is my absolute favorite...great and consistent wire and awesome prices, but they can sometimes be backordered to hell and back with popular gauges and force me to use one of the other two companies I listed to get me through until I get my TEMCo order in


You're not drinking water are you?! You realize that stuff is found in antifreeze!?!

 

[DonBaldy]

Thanks for the links. I'm very intrigued by the selections and starter packs offered by Coil Society.

Is there really any reason to stick with Kanthal and not start with N80? I much prefer the vape with N80 or SS.

 

[mach1ne]

lol nice work i did the same thing when i was waiting for my first wire order. i had been studying/researching coil building for long enough that i was so hyped up i just wanted to get going but my wire wasnt herei think i used 30 gauge wrap, no swivels, awful drill...but it felt good to sit down and try to do it. i think that kbee pack is a good choice for starting out. if you grab some .3 and .4 ribbon youll have all the ingredients to try any build you want.

it will go a lot smoother and the coils will work a lot better with 36 or higher wrap. good luck. dont forget to post your builds, and maybe have a look at the official clapton thread when your wire arrives

 

[ScReWbALL]

Whenever I was researching the hell out of more advanced coil building and the horde of “How to” videos on YouTube and such, I noticed a running theme between most all of the big name builders (Squidoode, Twisted Messes, Ohm Boy OC, Ohm Boy Josh, M.Terk, etc) when it came to Clapton’s and beyond and that was they all used Nichrome 80, so of course, in trying to duplicate their videos I went with Nichrome 80 and never looked back. The only time I’ve used Kanthal is if I’m making a Series Build, so that my Ohms would get bumped up to a more comfortable (and safe) level for having that much juice going through them. I actually find it much harder to use Kanthal than N80 and SS316L, but that’s quite possibly because I never really used it when I started doing builds involving drills...the stiffness of the Kanthal is something that I learned that I had to take into account much later on in the progression of my building. So, skipping to N80 or SS316L didn’t hinder my abilities at all, but I could be the exception to the rule...who knows.


You're not drinking water are you?! You realize that stuff is found in antifreeze!?!

 

[DonBaldy]

Whenever I was researching the hell out of more advanced coil building and the horde of “How to” videos on YouTube and such, I noticed a running theme between most all of the big name builders (Squidoode, Twisted Messes, Ohm Boy OC, Ohm Boy Josh, M.Terk, etc) when it came to Clapton’s and beyond and that was they all used Nichrome 80, so of course, in trying to duplicate their videos I went with Nichrome 80 and never looked back. The only time I’ve used Kanthal is if I’m making a Series Build, so that my Ohms would get bumped up to a more comfortable (and safe) level for having that much juice going through them. I actually find it much harder to use Kanthal than N80 and SS316L, but that’s quite possibly because I never really used it when I started doing builds involving drills...the stiffness of the Kanthal is something that I learned that I had to take into account much later on in the progression of my building. So, skipping to N80 or SS316L didn’t hinder my abilities at all, but I could be the exception to the rule...who knows.


You're not drinking water are you?! You realize that stuff is found in antifreeze!?!

Again, thank you very much for the advice and passing on your experiences. I think I will skip the Kanthal also as I'm, not a fan and I've been watching videos from those builders you mentioned all freaking day.

 

[DonBaldy]

lol nice work i did the same thing when i was waiting for my first wire order. i had been studying/researching coil building for long enough that i was so hyped up i just wanted to get going but my wire wasnt herei think i used 30 gauge wrap, no swivels, awful drill...but it felt good to sit down and try to do it. i think that kbee pack is a good choice for starting out. if you grab some .3 and .4 ribbon youll have all the ingredients to try any build you want.

it will go a lot smoother and the coils will work a lot better with 36 or higher wrap. good luck. dont forget to post your builds, and maybe have a look at the official clapton thread when your wire arrives

Yeah I've been watching videos all dang day and was impatient about jumping into the fire. Used the wire I had. Just wire and drill. I'll get a swivel set up sometime before my wire arrives as I think it'll make the process a touch easier.

What would I use ribbon wire for?

 

[ScReWbALL]

Just be careful, if you get into it too much you might find yourself up at 12:45am on a coil building thread of some forums while sitting behind a table that looks like this

I wasn’t exactly exaggerating when I mentioned coil building being an addiction for me, lol.


You're not drinking water are you?! You realize that stuff is found in antifreeze!?!

 

[mach1ne]

ribbon wire is for staple coils (and variants), as well as some other techniques (tiger wire, tsuka wrap). its handy to have if you end up deciding you want to try something like that down the road.

a reason for ka1 is the resistance too. if you decide to get into making staples and aliens and stuff, its pretty hard to come in above .1 ohms using all n80 or 316 (for dual coil setups). depending on what device you use, you might not be able to even fire those builds. its also good for unregulated series builds (my favorite vape) like @ScReWbALL said.

 

[ScReWbALL]

ribbon wire is for staple coils (and variants), as well as some other techniques (tiger wire, tsuka wrap). its handy to have if you end up deciding you want to try something like that down the road.

a reason for ka1 is the resistance too. if you decide to get into making staples and aliens and stuff, its pretty hard to come in above .1 ohms using all n80 or 316 (for dual coil setups). depending on what device you use, you might not be able to even fire those builds. its also good for unregulated series builds (my favorite vape) like @ScReWbALL said.

Very good point on the resistance being an issue on some mods. I’ve been a mech junkie for so long that I forget about that. My favorite build is Alien Coils..particularly the triple core variety(26x3/36) and I had to throw in an extra wrap than what I saw most folks doing on YouTube (making my Nichrome 80 Aliens 6 wraps around a 3mm precision screwdriver rather than 5 wraps). Even then I had to work around resistance issues, because freshly mounted and unfired a dual setup with the 6-wrap N80 Aliens would Ohm out at .08 or .09. At that time I was using a regulated mod that wouldn’t fire below .10, so, I had to put the RDA I had mounted them in on a mech or my Twisted Messes Regulated Mod (that fires down to .05) to work out my hot spots and pinch/strum the coils to get them glowing evenly. After that process, the coils would Ohm out at .12 and I could move the RDA back over to the mod I was wanting to use.


You're not drinking water are you?! You realize that stuff is found in antifreeze!?!

 

[mach1ne]

yeah, not all my mods are good at .1 either, especially when i was just starting out. some of these fancy builds get pretty wide too, so adding a wrap or two to bring them up in resistance will make them too big to fit some atomizers, or add too much mass to be a good vape. its an interesting balancing act

 

[ScReWbALL]

yeah, not all my mods are good at .1 either, especially when i was just starting out. some of these fancy builds get pretty wide too, so adding a wrap or two to bring them up in resistance will make them too big to fit some atomizers, or add too much mass to be a good vape. its an interesting balancing act

Yeah, thats why I’ve been so happy to see the recent influx of 25mm atty’s and 25mm tube mechs hitting the market recently. My gf just shakes her head and calls me “such a nerd” when I’m reading specs on a new RDA or RDTA coming out and break out into my happy dance when I see that it’s 25mm instead of the industry standard 24mm. I can only hope that it’s another shift in the industry like we saw when atty’s went from 22mm to 24mm rather than it being a fluke to fit my fatty coils, lol. The only other saving grace to utilize to help that is sticking with a true 2-post build decks (not two blocks with 2 post holes each...just 2 posts with 1 post hole each).


You're not drinking water are you?! You realize that stuff is found in antifreeze!?!

 

[WhiteAce]

I have noticed nichrome is easier than Kanthal to wrap unless you torch the Kanthal before hand. Nichrome is softer and less springy.
I use a tube mech and nichrome is my choice wire because if you use standard micro, or macro coils it is 7 or 8 wraps per coil rather than 4 or 5 with the Kanthal.
With Kanthal you need a parallel or twisted setup to get the same surface but the ramp up is ridiculous.

 

[gbalkam]

Yeah, it took my 2 1/2 hours, a lot of cussing, some walking away and coming back and the last of my 26g to get this.

For now and to practice, I'll be ordering the 10 piece Kanthal multi pack from Kbee Vapes. From what I've read it's not the best but it's decent and cheap which is what I need to practice. When I get more proficient I'll move on to Ni80 and SS. The ultimate goal is to make my own SS fused claptons instead of buying prebuilts (which I love) from AVS.

Oh yeah ramp up time is a bitch, but I'm guessing that's due to the mass with the larger wires.

Yeah, that 26ga wrap will take a lot to heat. Next step is to try 32ga wrapping wire (kanthal, nichrome or SS... SS will heat faster, just like a SS fry pan heats faster than a cast iron one)

 

[Zohmbiebuilds]

Not wanting to sound like I’m trying to promote one wire company over another or anything...but I’ve used quite a few companies to supply the wire for my coil building addiction and the top three places that I, personally, go through to order wire are:

https://temcoindustrial.com

http://www.masterofclouds.com

https://store.coilsociety.com

TEMCo is my absolute favorite...great and consistent wire and awesome prices, but they can sometimes be backordered to hell and back with popular gauges and force me to use one of the other two companies I listed to get me through until I get my TEMCo order in


You're not drinking water are you?! You realize that stuff is found in antifreeze!?!

I used LV 38g and honestly it was not too bad. I don't know about what goes into the wire, but it honestly wasn't too bad. Great flavor. But it's the first I've used.

I started of using TEMCo for everything because I was able to get locally. Thing is, everything local is so expensive. They call it a deal for 4 dollar 30' spools. Shits crazy. I can only order 25 dollar minimum, but use eBay. I like eBay because if I'm not satisfied I get compensated for that.

Master of clouds I have been using for my core wire and honestly like it better than TEMCo.

Have a great day. Like I've been told, practice practice practice. Hopefully by the end of the week I can get some ribbon wire and more wrapping wire.

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[Zohmbiebuilds]

Just be careful, if you get into it too much you might find yourself up at 12:45am on a coil building thread of some forums while sitting behind a table that looks like this

I wasn’t exactly exaggerating when I mentioned coil building being an addiction for me, lol.


You're not drinking water are you?! You realize that stuff is found in antifreeze!?!

I know how you feel I've replaced my addiction to dope and alcohol with coil building. This is my addiction now and I love it, I gotta wait a little while and try to find some work so I can get more wire. I might try to advertise my fused Claptons and just make enough profit to continue learning.

God has helped bring me this far, and when it comes down to it my higher power always sets what I need in front of me. It's my choice to take what I need, and leave what I don't.

Day six of my ninety AA meetings in 90 days. This 90n90 is for my brother who passed over Christmas. 5 and A half months sober, here's to my new addiction and a wonderful year. What a great way to start off my new year. Fused Claptons blindfolded whoop whooooop love you my VU homies thanks for everything.

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