Cleaning: alcohol, baking soda/vinegar, dry burn?

[KillFace]

Greetings, fellow vapers,

vaping for 4 days now and still loving it.

I'm doing a bit of research on cleaning this hardware.

After looking through the various maintenance forums and a few searches, it seems the main methods are high proof alcoho soakingl and baking soda/vinegar methods. (and a lot of disagreement on dry burns)

My question is, fellow Canadian vapers, what do you do? And how often?

Seems like it is hard to get high proof grain alcohol in Ontario (though seems to be at any SAQ, and i will be in Ottawa this weekend)

I have a dripping atty that will need to be cleaned, as well as the two 510 ego-T attys that came with my kit.

Cheers,

KillFace

 

[Toronto_Mike]

I toss carto's in trash after 5 days or 1st sign of dry/burnt taste. As far as attys, when they lose taste, I boil them water for 5mins & blow out water with air compressor. Taste comes back 90% & good for another 1 week to 10 days before next rince cycle. Just what works for me. Everyone will be different.

 

[Concat]

I only clean them when they start performing badly, or taste poorly. I don['t do it out of routine. Especially with Ego-T atomizers. Too much hassle drying them out and wasting juice trying to get it to work properly afterwards.

 

[Crazy Canuck]

Other than blowing an atty out as needed, I don't bother cleaning them. In the past I tried soaking in vodka, ultasonic cleaning, etc, but then realized that the effort required to clean versus the cost of a new atty really wasn't efficient

If blowing them out doesn't work for you, toss it and throw on a new one.

 

[Can_supplier]

After looking through the various maintenance forums and a few searches, it seems the main methods are high proof alcoho soakingl and baking soda/vinegar methods. (and a lot of disagreement on dry burns)

High Proof - forget it, you can't get pure alchol in Ontario unless its denature (rubbing alchol). Denatured means its posiened so it is not able to be consumed. If you want to risk vaping that, its your choice and besides it doesn't work anyhow.

Baking Soda - all round BAD idea. It will leave deposits on your atomizer. Deposits cause hot spots, which make the coils burn out.

Vinegar - Yes vapers like to practice witchcraft year round. Why wait until Halloween to mix up eye of newt to clean an atomizer? Wonder if that malt or regular? Forget it!!! PG and about everything in e-juice is water soluble, not vinegar soluble.

Dry burn - If you hate your atomizer and want to get back at it, so it will never see another day, go for it. Makes as much sense as trying to clean a pot by leaving it on the stove turned on full all day. However it is an excellent method to collect on house insurance, either of them actually. Tape the button down for a dry burn in a pile of papers. Forget you ever read that one.

 

[kanadiankat]

Adding to the above....

How you clean your atomizer depends entirely on which atomizer you're using.

I clean most of mine with the blow out method (tissue around the outside threads - blow into the atty and keep doing that until it comes clean) - followed with a drop of VG to condition the bridge (or if it's a pin - a drop of PG).

Sealed atomizers can be cleaned by pouring a bit of rubbing alcohol inside - swish and pour out - then condition with a drop of VG or PG.

Some of the other methods.... hmmm....

BY far the most neglected (and important) maintenance step is cleaning the threads on your battery, atomizer and charger. These all get liquid gunk in them and prevent proper connections. It's also the easiest step of all. Threads can be cleaned with a dry tissue or a rubbing alcohol pad - takes about 10 seconds and should be done every 3 or 4 days.

 

[KillFace]

Adding to the above....

How you clean your atomizer depends entirely on which atomizer you're using.

I clean most of mine with the blow out method (tissue around the outside threads - blow into the atty and keep doing that until it comes clean) - followed with a drop of VG to condition the bridge (or if it's a pin - a drop of PG).

Sealed atomizers can be cleaned by pouring a bit of rubbing alcohol inside - swish and pour out - then condition with a drop of VG or PG.

Some of the other methods.... hmmm....

BY far the most neglected (and important) maintenance step is cleaning the threads on your battery, atomizer and charger. These all get liquid gunk in them and prevent proper connections. It's also the easiest step of all. Threads can be cleaned with a dry tissue or a rubbing alcohol pad - takes about 10 seconds and should be done every 3 or 4 days.

Good idea about the battery connection. What do you mean by "condition with a drop"?

High Proof - forget it, you can't get pure alchol in Ontario unless its denature (rubbing alchol). Denatured means its posiened so it is not able to be consumed. If you want to risk vaping that, its your choice and besides it doesn't work anyhow.

Baking Soda - all round BAD idea. It will leave deposits on your atomizer. Deposits cause hot spots, which make the coils burn out.

Vinegar - Yes vapers like to practice witchcraft year round. Why wait until Halloween to mix up eye of newt to clean an atomizer? Wonder if that malt or regular? Forget it!!! PG and about everything in e-juice is water soluble, not vinegar soluble.

Dry burn - If you hate your atomizer and want to get back at it, so it will never see another day, go for it. Makes as much sense as trying to clean a pot by leaving it on the stove turned on full all day. However it is an excellent method to collect on house insurance, either of them actually. Tape the button down for a dry burn in a pile of papers. Forget you ever read that one.

Good points. I was wondering why they thought vinegar would dissolve it better than water.

Other than blowing an atty out as needed, I don't bother cleaning them. In the past I tried soaking in vodka, ultasonic cleaning, etc, but then realized that the effort required to clean versus the cost of a new atty really wasn't efficient

If blowing them out doesn't work for you, toss it and throw on a new one.

Yeah, after looking up the cost of high proof and whatnot, screw that.

 

[kanadiankat]

Good idea about the battery connection. What do you mean by "condition with a drop"?

After cleaning - put a drop of either PG or VG on the atomizer bridge (or PG if it's a pin). This keeps the atty element from drying out. Keeps it moist.

If you have a bit of time connect the atomizer and give it a couple puffs - on that drop of conditioning - to work it into the element better.

If it's really dry air where you are - use 2 drops on bridged attys when you're going to leave them sit for any length of time.

 

[siupes]

Today I steamed my 306 with espresso machine and that works great, tomorrow I'll try that on the rest of my stuff.
Thanks goes to Dusty_D for sharing this secret

 

[Switched]

We clean them?

 

[KillFace]

After cleaning - put a drop of either PG or VG on the atomizer bridge (or PG if it's a pin). This keeps the atty element from drying out. Keeps it moist.

If you have a bit of time connect the atomizer and give it a couple puffs - on that drop of conditioning - to work it into the element better.

If it's really dry air where you are - use 2 drops on bridged attys when you're going to leave them sit for any length of time.

Ok, makes sense.

What is a pin? I have one of these: 510 Bridgeless Low Resistance Atomizer. Not a pin?

Also, could someone tell me what "bridgeless" means?

 

[Chime]

I just drop em in a small glass of vodka and let em soak for an hour or two, then let em dry over night. Atties of course, cartos are disposable you sick freak.

 

[VIPOD]

Daily Blow of course.

atty's: vodka soak (1hr),blow, and let dry.

carto's: same as atty's, but only non-burnt tasting atty's, simply to remove the existing flavor.

BTW...I use the cheapest 100% Vodka available...McCormick from Weston, Missouri.

 

[siupes]

Today I steamed my xxl dc carto and peach smell is completely gone.
It is super fast, easy and mess free

 

[albertbert]

Killface, if you look at this 306 Low Resistance Atomizer V2

The bridge is that mesh thing sticking out of it, normally you would see it inside an atty. It soaks up eliquid, and it has wick inside of it to pull the liquid to the coil. Bridgeless, simply doesn't have that stuff. Looking at a bridgeless atty, it has 3 holes, im not really sure how they work, does it just drip down to the coil? But yeah, thats what bridgeless is.

 

[kingcobra]

I've tried several methods and after all this time what I've found is that if you blow them out once or twice a day you get a decent amount of life out of them, and beyond that it's not worth the trouble to try to squeeze some more life out of them. While you can do this, what you end up with isn't the same as a fresh atty. It depends on how cheap you are I guess. Atties are pretty inexpensive though and they are disposable so whenever you're not getting a good vape out of one you can just toss it and you'll be happy with the quality of your vaping as well as the convenience of it all. Keeping the threads clean is a must, that can be the source of your problem right there. So blow it out and clean it and then toss it as needed is the way I've found to be best.

 

[KillFace]

got it, thanks

Killface, if you look at this 306 Low Resistance Atomizer V2

The bridge is that mesh thing sticking out of it, normally you would see it inside an atty. It soaks up eliquid, and it has wick inside of it to pull the liquid to the coil. Bridgeless, simply doesn't have that stuff. Looking at a bridgeless atty, it has 3 holes, im not really sure how they work, does it just drip down to the coil? But yeah, thats what bridgeless is.

 

[TrueNorthist]

I would only add that I have found boiling with a 75% white vinegar and 25% filtered water for 5 mins then rinse, rinse and rinse again until no smell works best. Dry burning ruined two of my attys and I will never do that again. It cannot be said enough, however, that new attys are relatively cheap and are superior to anything if prepared properly when used for the first time. Simply blow the liquid out after each use and slip them into something a little more... Comfortable. Like two condoms. (The kind cartos are shipped in) If you run out of new and are desparate, the vinegar/filtered water thing works extremely well, but as with anything being used beyond its expected life, it will be somewhat less than perfect.

Just my two bits FWIW.