Rixter Posted December 29, 2012 Share Posted December 29, 2012 (edited) Prior to the late 'sixties, musicians used tube amplifiers...it's what they had, and they worked just fine. Then the 'seventies came around, and with it, the birth of the solid state amplifier. No tubes = nothing to break...sounds good & lasts forever. Win - win. Fast forward to now. After all the years of development, it would seem that the tube amp is again (and has been for quite some time now) the most highly sought after type of musical amplifier in the business. Solid state has its place, too, but it just doesn't offer the same "nastiness" that a cranked tube amp does. Fact. Sometimes, the basics are the best. Why did I go there when this is supposed to be my take on juice tanks? (could be too much coffee and free time) Because the same thing appears to be happening with juice tanks. In the beginning, there was the DCT (dual-coil carto) tank (tube amp). It was cool. It held a lot of juice and produced tons of vapor and flavor...but it leaked. Yeah, you might get away without getting a leak for a little while, but it was gonna happen, and it was gonna suck. Along came the (solid state) wick-style tanks with a newly-designed engine (in all sorts of pretty colors and options) and vapers fell in love. Rebuildable, toss-able, less prone to leaking, easily fill-able. Seemed like somebody had actually come up with a "better mousetrap". But they, too, had their ups and downs. Although a great improvement over those leaking DCTs, they just didn't seem to give the same sort of vaping experience as the DCTs did. Flavors were somewhat muted, and its hit-to-hit consistency left a little to be desired. Sometimes, they leaked, too. I sort of missed the boat on DCTs and clearos, and had my first real tank experience with a Vision ViVi Nova. I really liked it a lot, and it remains active. The Nova, by the way, is kind of like a "hybrid" amplifier, having both tube and solid state components...meh. Just old school tanking with a modern engine...still had the same flavor-muting qualities, and "stiff draw" & "burnt taste" were becoming just things you had to deal with in your pursuit of convenience. In the very recent past, there has been a resurgence of the lowly DCT, but this time, there may actually be hope. Personally, I have always used Smoktech 3Ω double punched tank cartos, simply because that's what my carto vendor carried. I like them because they produce more vapor, taste, and throat hit than anything else I've tried, but sometimes they leak, too. I usually have to toss at least one leaking carto from each box. Now, there are so many available options for tanks cartos...flanged, unflanged, single-coil, dual-coil, triple-coil, low Ω, medium Ω, high Ω, single or double punched, long or short... ...or the (new?) CE2 "wick-style" tank carto replacements. I've got a couple of 2Ω single-coil versions, and they really seem to be "the answer" to good tank performance without any leaking. On the outside, they look just like a regular punched, poly-filled tank carto, but on the inside, they have a a wick and coil in a sealed cup that seems leak- and gurgle-proof (so far). Like any other CE2 system, it took about 1 ml of e-juice running through the wicks to get them to break in and perform, but once they did, they really performed well, and for some reason, there was no detectable flavor-muting going on, either. (7 watts is where this setup likes to be, it seems...8 watts is just a little bit too much for the wicks to handle my 80PG/20VG juices efficiently and I get a mildly harsh vape). There's really no learning curve to these things, either. If you know how to install a carto in a tank, this is the same exact thing, with the only real difference being in the priming of the carto for initial use. With poly-filled cartos, it takes about 30 drop to prime the carto. With CE2 cartos, you just fill the tank, drop a few drops through the drip tip onto the exposed coil inside the carto's shell, let it soak in thoroughly, and start vaping. If you haven't tried CE2 tank cartos out yet, you should. I haven't used them long enough to know about their longevity yet, but I can say this...I don't plan on using any poly-filled cartos in my tanks for the foreseeable future. I got mine here fast and cheap. Rixter Edited December 29, 2012 by Rixter Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Rixter Posted December 29, 2012 Author Share Posted December 29, 2012 (edited) Boge EGo 700 MAh 3.7v Pass-Through Battery With Flange, Artemas Locking Tank And 2Ω Single-Coil CE2 Carto Edited December 29, 2012 by Rixter Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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