Objectively Comparing Vapes

[cybrguy]

i don't see how to relate power level to temp ... if i know my heater is at 385F (which i do know) ... well, is that what the chart is meant to record? i.e. the session characteristics at each temperature level, say in 5F increments ... i'm not so sure that is useful.

I would probably suggest using clock positions on the dial. With few exceptions most vapes don't show actual temps anyway.

The idea as I see it is to try and make inherently subjective judgements as objective as possible so we can compare different devices. It will never be perfect, especially between classes of vapes, but there should be ways to measure performance in more objective ways.
There are a lot of criteria, for example, that one could use to compare a Lotus to a Daisy to a Lily, and similar. It would be harder to compare those to a different class, like one that included a Crafty and a Mighty, and a MiniVape, for example, though they could more easily be compared to each other. But just because it would be hard doesn't mean we shouldn't try. We certainly wouldn't have gotten to the moon that way.

I certainly don't have the answer, and @thekarmawhore 's session map may only be a starting point, but I would be stunned if between us we couldn't come up with a way to do this. And again, we can't let the perfect... yadda yadda yadda

 

[thekarmawhore]

Since we at RBT are soon to have a fleet of beta units, the “session map” spreadsheet was developed for internal purposes to help capture what we felt to be chart-worthy, performance related data parameters, and intended to help us compare data with other units across the beta unit fleet, not necessarily with other makes and models.

None of the numbers are intended to be a preference rating, rather, they are the testers “best guess” as to where along a continuum of choices a particular cycle (hit) aligns.

I’m sure most of us can agree that there is a “beginning” flavor and an “ending” flavor (flavor, bouquet, essence, vibe, mouth, pick a word), so where was that one, approximately? That kind of thing. Doesn’t matter which end you prefer. Same with exhaust, it ranges from none visible to “OMG, I just wasted a lot there!”, so where was that one, approximately? These are coarse measurements by design, meant to roughly capture the trend of the data parameter, nothing more. Interestingly though, it’s forming into a nice session “cookbook” of sorts.

Perhaps this concept can be configured into something more appropriate for the intended purpose of this thread, but that is up to the good community here at FC, @cybrguy just felt like this might be a good place to start.

i don't see how to relate power level to temp ...~snip~

Our unit by design has no temperature settings, it is an open loop device. The voltage control knob is used to set the amount of power that goes into the heater. Conditions such as initial starting temperature, Pre-Heat time, time between draws, length of draw, air flow, pressure drop of the load, proximity of the load to the dispersion screen, load material characteristics (moisture content, consistency, density, etc,) will all affect the temperature. As such, "power level" was chosen for this parameter. Maybe this parameter in a "universal" session map would be better labeled power/temperature and one could fill in either. I dunno...

Hopefully this clears up any confusion regarding some of the seemingly cryptic notes and data shown in the example.

your pal,
thekarmawhore

 

[HD Springer]

You had me with your very first sentence @thekarmawhore.

 

[Hippie Dickie]

Our unit by design has no temperature settings, it is an open loop device.

yes, i get that your power limit knob is meant to be an approximation of the resulting temperature when all the confounding factors are managed through user technique ... i just find the temp to be the simplest/most useful user control and i let the processor take care of managing the environmental factors, so no technique is required -- what i see is what i get.

 

[HD Springer]

How about temp rating be more of % of units total power put into session.Every session on a vape is ran with a certain % of heat thats possible with the certain vape.Even with my ascent that has a digital temp read out I can figure I'm running it at 75%-100% of it's possible out put.The only dif. would be like the firefly would always be 100% becaus thats all you have.Just a thought.