Sonics image illustrates how a little finesse priming and loading the cart goes a long way to help keep things maintained. If you jam it full, cap it and let her rip it is going to always end up a huge mess like that, all over the interior mouthpiece deflector face and running to the sidewalls and up to the first grommet interface point.
This is fine if you don't need to swap carts, or if you are sitting around your place and have all day to fox with it, but if not than everything gets cross contaminated and kind of frustrating really quickly. I have found a HE TI dabber works perfectly to manipulate the material as it transitions to a slightly viscous state, basically jogging it up and down onto the ceramic as you alternately pulse the power on and off every five seconds. In this way it seems that you can keep loading smaller fresh chunks until it reaches a certain point where it won't accept more. Scrape the sidewalls and everything not below the ceramic back out, then dab it after all that hard work, because technically it has been altered - although it's not scrap by any means you probably don't want it back in the same container
I have found this method vastly superior to loading a single chunk, capping the unit and blowing backwards through the core in short puffs as it heats up. This "works" but effectively every time I've tried, the material that has been heated the most is blown out the bottom of the cartridge as the new stuff is forced in, making it more of a waste and a hassle than a good technique for me.
Back to a freshly loaded, chilled or "relaxed" room temp core that is plugged solid, leading me to Jcats question and tying into to my experiential understanding of why the cap/interior gets so messy...
It plugs solid when not heated (no airflow) ... is this normal? (once preheated a little and vapor begins to flow airflow also opens a little ... a very small little) Before it unplugs there is ZERO airflow and once it unplugs it has extremely restricted airflow but works very well.
Yep, I have found that when fully or appropriately loaded to decent capacity you need to pull constantly and slightly enough to "force" an air hole during this initial warmup. If you don't the generated vapor has a harder time of escaping and I think basically stews in its own brew for too long, helping to spread a little bit of wasted heat all around before violently bubbling to the surface. At any point in time you can watch a loaded cart of shatter, wax, whatever consistency you can find - load it till the ceramic is saturated and covered - and without any "aid" to break the bubble it will rise through the entire core chamber until it pops against the surface of the interior mouthpiece face. You only have to take the cap off and watch this happen once to assume that it probably is likely to occur any time it "seals over" like that.
So, I always make sure the "first" hit from cold forces a little channel through there and I have found it helps immensely and can even be passed off to others who can draw without thought or negative consequence as its warmed up at that point. It still bubbles and spurts up the sides on its own but in very small chunks it seems, and it takes much, much longer to accumulate and basically never gets too gummy, although I am constantly cleaning the exposed surfaces of the core and mouthpieces every time I exchange with a little alcohol on a paper towel just because.
I'm also curious about storage ... I have it loaded with an oil that runs slowly at room temperature ... ie. if I was to lay a half full vial down sideways it would probably take a good 15+ minutes for it to spread down to the side from the bottom (to give you a picture of the consistency of the oil) ... Can I store the cart on it's side? Upside down? Will oil flow out of it or remained trapped in there? (Just curious what everyone's experience/recommendations are)
If the concentrate is that viscous at room temperature than I would not keep the cart at anything but vertical in the container it arrived in. Add some heat from your body or sitting in a hot car and it's going everywhere with the quickness.
I would still prefer another short sleeve and another mouthpiece, to keep the cores as their own separate "assemblies" that thread in and out, but alas at this point the reality is you might as well buy another SS body at full price for that functionality. I understand the mouthpiece machining must be a significantly higher defect rate relative to the other purely cylindrical parts, but without the cap sleeve I can't even consider buying another one at $50 regardless.
Also I need either my memory jogged or some refreshers on any ideas that have arrived for diversionary concealment like that flashlight head mentioned way back. Functional would be great but at the end of the day I think something is better than nothing and I've got a whole lot of nothing in that department.
Experimenting with some black non adhesive shrink tubing today
... it medicates really well and quickly but I have a few questions ....
