There are people who vape, and then there are people who are into vaping—the cloud-chasers, the juice makers, and of course, the engineers and tinkerers who build their own vapes.
These are the hobbyists who brought our industry to what it is today—without them, we wouldn’t even have cig-a-likes.
We want more people to experience the joy of building their own vape. There’s an art to it—and it offers a level of customization that you can’t get from an out-of-the-box mod or a disposable. Here’s what you need to know:
Knowing What You Want in a Vape
Before building a vape, you’ve got to ask yourself some questions:
- Do you want a sub-ohm vape?
- Are you looking for big clouds?
- Do you want a small, discreet vape?
- What juices are you going to be vaping most often? What’s their PG/VG ratio?
- Do you want advanced features like temperature control (TC)?
- Do you prefer mouth-to-lung (MTL) or direct-to-lung (DTL)?
These questions—and others—will guide you toward the best combination of batteries, tanks, coils, cotton, and more.
Choosing Your Mod
There are several different mods available on the market—they contain both the batteries and the circuitry for your vape. You can find several different features on a mod, including:
- LED screens to select between various options
- Temperature control, variable wattage, and variable voltage
- Preheat functions
- Power curves
- And more
Depending on the style of vaping you want to do, you’ll select between different mods. A high-wattage mod is best, and most mods built for sub-ohm vaping will feature 2 or more large removable batteries.
For stealthy vaping, on the other hand, a smaller mod with lower-wattage built-in batteries are usually best.
Choosing Your Atomizer
Broadly speaking, there are two different types of atomizers—the place where you put your e-liquid. The most popular are tanks (rebuildable tank atomizers, known as RTAs). These are vessels that hold your e-liquid, then drip it onto the coil.
Alternatively, you can choose a rebuildable drip atomizer (RDA)—with these, you drip the e-liquid directly onto the coil.
Tank atomizers are easier to use and need to be rebuilt less often. RDAs, on the other hand, offer greater control over how much liquid makes its way onto the coil and allow for stronger hits.
Choosing Your Coil
The type of coil you’ll choose depends largely on the tank you’ve opted to purchase. There are different features that only work with specific coil materials. Here are a few examples:
Kanthal: One of the most commonly used vape coil materials, it offers excellent consistency and can be used in coils of a wide variety of different sizes. Best for wattage vaping.
Stainless steel: Can be used for both wattage vaping and temperature control (TC). Widely available, it heats up fairly quickly.
Nickel: With a fast heat-up time, it’s great for TC vaping—but some users are allergic to it.
These are just a few of the metals available for coils. From there, you can choose coils of different sizes—some vapes even use multiple coils in order to offer the best sub-ohm experience possible.
Different resistances lead to different hits—the lower the resistance, the larger and warmer the hit will be. Building a stealthy device? Opt for higher Ohms—you’ll get a cool hit with little vapour. Want to show off with massive clouds? Go sub-Ohm.
Choosing Your Wick
Wicks are generally made of cotton, and proper wicking can have a very positive impact on the flavour of your hit. All natural Japanese cotton has a particularly clean flavour profile, and it’s great at absorbing e-liquids.
Want To Master the Art of Customizing Your Vape? Cold Turkey Can Help!
We’ve just shown you the tip of the iceberg when it comes to vape customization—we haven’t even delved into how different vape juice interacts with different mods. Don’t worry—we can always write an article on any of the elements you want us to expand on. Just let us know!
Don’t want to wait for our next blog to come out? Visit our Winnipeg vape shop in person—we’ll be happy to answer any questions you might have.