The "Project" DIY Herbal Vaporizer

[Pipes]

********************* The "Project" Takes Flight **********************
******************* Please Fasten Your Seat Belts *********************

Hey follow FCers. I'd like to introduce the "Project". The result of an endeavor I had started back in 2012 in a DIY thread called the DIY Bulli Vaporizer. A success story which hopefully offered some good research information for all enthusiasts to benefit from.

The Project is a portable vape on demand herbal vaporizer which is close to 100% convection. Ecig technology has recently upgraded with TC (Temperature Controlled) for use with e-juice atomizers, and in doing so, paved the way for this device. The current mod boxes out there are getting very suitable for this procedure. Some better than others which I'll get into shortly.Adapting this technology into my Bulli project was a marriage made in heaven. Once a suitable coil or element was established, all flew into place.
I often thought about how to make it without having to buy a Bulli, which are very expensive to buy. My goal is to pass on this great vaping methodology so all FCers' can enjoy. You can bet that once the clone makers get wind or how easy this is, the market will be flooded. Just like those concentrate vaporizers which is just a coil sitting in a bowl.

So what's this about? I have figured out a way to make "The Project" very simply and economical and with materials easy maintainable when you know where to look. The intent here is to keep it open source so the Vape enthusiasts, who also have the DIY syndrome, can make a few and pass on the cheap goodness to others. It's the kind of mod that if you order the materials for 1 unit you may as well make 10-15 type thing. Hopefully a pyramid effect will be the outcome..

Prerequisites to get on-board are:

-Must own a TC MOD box
-Willing to discuss opinions and ideas on improvements
-Active FC member

Although most TC boxes will likely work, at this point I'd recommend the JoyTec]EVic VTC Mini or Cuboid.

The benefits of the VTC Include:

-Small Form Factor
-Temperature is top menu
-Display is large for this old fart
-GUI is very user friendly
-Ohms atomizer measurement is lockable
-Temperature changes at 10 degree per press. (Originally though was a downfall but better then clicking 10 times)
-Firmware is upgradeable (latest upgrade makes it a 75watt unit and introduced TCR setting abilities)

For a higher wattage, 2 battery mod, the Cuboid is a good pick. Almost the same as the VTC but a couple mils bigger in height and width. Heavier as well of course. Advantage would be longer battery life and not as hard on the batteries. Same display.

For the coil or element, I found that both Titanium and Stainless Steel work very good. Some mod settings need modifying to get the temperatures we need. The workable constant temperature needs to be 600 - 650 degree F. Most mods stop at 600 F so the work around is to use a Titanium coil in Nickel mode. Doing this adds 100-150 degrees onto the calculation the device puts out. When using this mod the numbers do not mean anything except up or down. I found a setting of 460 in F and Nickel mode gives a good place to start.

I have been using stainless steel element. SS316 and found it is also very stable and functions very well. To use the SS316 I found a manual TCR setting of 145 works very well and a starting temperature of 520 F. Once this project gets rolling, I suspect this to be measured and scrutinized to no end. Fun stuff for many.

Current parts list for the materials I used:

510 to Ego Adapter
304 Stainless Steel Piping
Stainless steel bolt M2.5*25mm (Phillips head, replaces above hex head)
304 Stainless Steel Nut M2.5
304 Stainless Steel M3*12*1mm Washer
A2 Stainless Steel M3*9*1mm Washer
304 Stainless Steel M2.5 Spring washers
#10 High Heat O Ring
#113 High Heat O Ring
Teflon Insulating Bushings
Titanium Heating Wire
SS Heating Wire
3/4" SS Screens 1/2" SS Screen
Dowelling. Local hobby store. (Canadian Tire for me)

This is the heart of unit. It inserts into a SS tube which, in turn, goes into a larger wooden outer sleeve. The sleeve goes past the end of the SS tube and makes a holder to slip the bowl into. The bowl is held in with high temperature O rings. In fact O rings are used throughout the unit to hold together.







I have a couple units completed and starting to teach them to fly and leave the nest so they can spread the goodness around to forum members. Adopters willing to give one a good home, shoot me a PM. I think I'm going to start the pricing off at $30 + shipping. Considering the labour, a deal I think.



Remember, my hope is others will carry on with this and we'll have multiple providers.
There is a link to a picture gallery in my signature. I add to it as new developments happen. Shows the process in making these pups.

Cheers all and keep on DIYing!!!

 

[YungLeaner]

That's an insane deal! I absolutely need one for on the go vaping and at that price I don't think I can pass it up. Hopefully no one gets to all of them before me, though, I need to read a little bit about box mods and batteries to have an idea of what I'm getting into first.

 

[Buildozer]

That is so awesome Pipes!

 

[PPN]

I'll sent you a pm, too good to pass!

 

[nondarb]

Finally it's own thread! You're the man pipes.

 

[u bwade wunner]

Thanks for sharing and involving the community in you're design Pipes.

This ticks a lot of boxes For me already

Edit: Just found the Bulli thread.

 

[Gator]

Great work! You deserve much more for your efforts then 30$! I have been working on my own version, with the guidence of the bulli thread, but I will be grabing yours anyways. I can imagine in a few years it will become a collectible .

 

[Pipes]

Thanks all. Response has been awesome. Please PM with requests as can get confusing tracking requests from the thread. It's a good job I have next week off work, so I can put more units together. So far I think I can cover the requests but getting close to having to go past a week wait time.
Also, getting some folks involved in the manufacturing of this puppy. An on board member in Australia, one in Europe as well as one in the US. Not bad for a days work. I'm sure many more will come forward and suppliers will be continue to climb. To what end, who knows but we all benefit.
Thanks again all for the nice words. Much appreciated.
Now get back to what you were doing....

 

[Tristin708]

Wow this is great pipes! You're going to go down as a legend in the vaping community. I've been lurking fc and specifically your bulli thread for the last few months since i discovered it. I better start contributing to meet the "active user" requirement I've been trying to learn about ecigs, ohms, building coils, and all that jazz but it does seem pretty confusing. I would love to pick up an official pipes model to get my feet in the door in this diy game. The goal is to get this thing to replace my arizer air as a daily driver and I think it can definitely do it. I'm interested in adapting this thing to fit an air/solo stem and given the various builds in the bulli thread I know it will. Keep up the good work pipes, expect me in your PM's soon!

 

[legalcloud]

Nice. Super stoked to see this thread.

Open Source.

I have high hopes that this is exactly what this community needs. Glad your putting something out there, that can get people to try it out. Hope it rounds out to the best vape out there.

 

[KeroZen]

Does your coil get red hot when in use? Can it work with a simpler regulated mod (ie. just VV/VW)?

I'm really not a fan of Teflon in general, and I recenty read some controversy about using titanium for coils on some ecig forum (and for nails on this very forum) Can those parts be substituted with equivalents?

 

[nondarb]

Does your coil get red hot when in use? Can it work with a simpler regulated mod (ie. just VV/VW)?

I'm really not a fan of Teflon in general, and I recenty read some controversy about using titanium for coils on some ecig forum (and for nails on this very forum) Can those parts be substituted with equivalents?

Coil doesn't get red hot anymore, the wire can be swapped for SS if you choose. It can be done with a VV mod but from my observations (in the bulli thread) a TC mod is much much easier to get consistent result with.

I'm sure the Teflon could be subbed pretty easily, but I'm personally not worried about it. Mine should be here pretty quick, quicker than the rest of my diy 510 stuff.

I'm excited!

 

[legalcloud]

Hey was wondering if that is a Arizer Air stem that your using on the official roll out?

 

[KeroZen]

@nondarb : I read the entire Bulli thread meanwhile, that answered most of my questions but thank you for your answer too. I know it's not glowing red anymore but some of the Ti coils pics I saw sure looked like oxydation was taking place. Many people also reported that Ti could impact taste for some reason, independently of health concerns. Thankfully we can use various types of SS instead, and at the end of the thread @Pipes seemed to begin enjoying it even.

Oxydation is also a problem with other metals. IIRC this is why @Hippie Dickie recommended using a thicker gauge in his excellend bud toaster thread: it's harder to work with but if you don't, over time your coil will get eaten away somehow (and its resistance will increase, reducing performance in our TC case but less in his closed loop case, as the PWM should be able to cope) This can be acceptable maybe in a rebuildable atty, but definitely not in a commercial vape where heater servicing is not an option. Also it raises the question: where does the metal oxyde go? I'm not sure I like the answer hehe.

Ideally we would want some heating material that doesn't even glow. It's the case in the (patent pending) Zion/Milaana heater for instance (unless maybe if you leave it on for several minutes?) If the element doesn't get as hot, then you need to increase the heat exchange surface area, and that's precisely the subject of his patent. Being under NDA, I unfortunately cannot discuss this topic further.

I know that peak power output doesn't tell the whole story but so far whatever the heater and the heating method (conduction/convection/radiant) from what I've seen there is a strong correlation between that figure and how much vapor a device can output. For a portable without any large heatsink, I think anything under 20W will feel very wispy. The Mighty is 38W and the Zion is about 50W. I saw this 50W figure (and more!) cited often in the Bulli thread and to me this sounds about right. For info, our iron-lung tester @IAmKrazy2 is able on some occasions to overwhelm the Zion heater, but overall he compares it positively to the EVO (which cannot really be overwhelmed unless you are from another planet!)

I enjoyed the discussions about air flow, hot spots and turbulences and I think improvements could be made in that area. The very last post in the Bulli thread to date (about the Aromamizer RDA and its vortex) is pretty interesting. IIRC the Herbalaire has a patented multi hole system that spirals the air flow and it has been reported to produce very even heating (compared to the LSV/DBV/SSV, but many convection designs seem to suffer from this issue and require stirring like the ESV for instance, maybe the Firefly to some extent...)

This is a very fascinating subject and I would like to thank @Pipes and the other pioneers from the Bulli thread for their work paving the way.

 

[Pipes]

Wow, leave the thread for a day....
@KeroZen, The Teflon insulator. This was a part of the build I had concerns with as well. Kept my eye on it throw weeks of testing the same unit. Did not see any deterioration at all. Agreed, that ceramic would be a better fit but could't fine. The TO220 insulators are at any electronics store. Keeping this open source with easily obtainable materials is part of the goal. So if the Teflon works, I'd say we go for it. But keeping an eye on it would be a good precaution. They will melt if you glow the coil and maintain it. I had to give it a test that way at least. But if used with correct TC settings, no problem. If anyone can find a better substitute, chime on it. After all that what this is all about!!

SS vs Ti, again, agree about Ti unknowns, as there does seem to get a build up of something on it. SS stays clean looking. I think the Ti coil gets a rough feel to it and collects particles of anything passing by.. I have read through the Chemical properties on THIS page and could not find anything toxic. Bad things don't start happening until 1200 degree Celsius. I'm sure hoping it's safe as used for 6 months or so. However, I'm using the SS now and yes, loving it. Unless someone has an older mod not TCR featured, I'd go for the SS. But if one already has an older Ni capable mod, Ti is definitely not to be frowned upon. Still works fine for most? Myself, taste isn't that different. But the SS looks cleaner for sure.
Using the Project in VV or VW is something I would not recommend. Just too easy to hit those high notes by mistake. And yes, the Teflon insulator would melt.
@nondarb, correct about the coil not getting red any more. It's actually just below a noticeable glow I think. According to some rough math, the actual coil temperature is 600-650 degrees F. Lots of loss mixing with the air.
@legalcloud, Correct, Being making so the air Air/Solo stem compatible. Thicker O ring would make it Nano friendly as well.
I made a simple stem to make it usable out of the box. Other stems taste better.... ie. glass.
LOL, now for part of my testing I use my widest Solo stem to make sure it clears the hole. Here's what happens when I get a little too cocky and shove too hard. All I had to do was sand the lip a bit!!! Dang.
FAIL, both of the hole size and my frustration.
OTOH, makes for a good shot of a cross section of the make-up.

I've also made a video today on a coil making and installing "how to" procedure.
For your viewing pleasure:

Project Update. On track and will be able to get units out to all enquires so far. And still on my schedule for the week. I have noticed I'm down to my last foot of tubing. Currently using 14mm OD ss tube and supplier no long has it. Emailed him to see if just temporary. So I'm looking for a new source. Anyone have a link?
Was thinking 1/2" but still try and see if would work but thinking it won't go over the Ego base. Will try and see what can be done.

Good stuff guys, this is going to be good!!!

Pipes

 

[u bwade wunner]

I ordered a black cuboid along with Pipes mod and some 5300mah ultra fire batts.I realised after reading the Bulli thread that my batts are probably not the best,but will hopefully tide me over for a little while.

What to order next? ....maybe some 20awg SS wire or 22awg hmmm

Re the design : I thought about trying to reduce the overall length of the mod for easier pocketing by shortening the mouthpiece section above the herb bowl.Im guessing the long mouthpiece is to make vapor cool enough to consume.I can see there is quite a bit of leverage on the atomizer especially if it is bumped while in a pocket for example.One idea is to add a few micro air intake holes after the herb chamber to pull cooler ambient air into the vapor mix thus cooling down vapor.VapMan utilizes 3 tiny holes in his middle mouthpiece section.this would allow for a much shorter cooler airpath and a smaller device.otherwise.Also For cooling I'm trying to figure out a chanelled mouthpiece that could split the vapor stream much like what the crafty cooling device does,.although I haven 't tried one personally, I have read encouraging things about it.

Just wondering if Anything like this has passed you're mind? @Pipes it may even allow You to use standard drip tips on your mod.

As for agitating the airstream from the heater to prevent hot spots, the triikle Daisy vaporizer uses a separate micro turbulater hole that pulls a tiny amount of ambient air sideways into an already hot vaporpath.turbulence agitates the airstream into the herb bowl with good results.

Love the design,One day,I would like to see an open source manual vape similar to this one with little or no electronics that would be available to those who need it.

Im keen to see this open source portable project grow and thrive.its a great start.I realise too You have spent many many hours on this design already which I thank You for.

 

[E0x]

the SideKick vaporizer use this kind of tube with a spiral inside that make more path in less lengh ( if that make sense hehe , my english is not very good ) maybe this can give ideas or find a way to use the same tube/part from the sidekick

 

[KeroZen]

and some 5300mah ultra fire batts

Don't try sub-ohm vaping with these cells or you'll get.. a ultra fire! I shouldn't even joke about that, as the outcome wouldn't be funny. But really I'm serious, don't draw more than 10A out of these cells because they are simply not what the label says and are a potential hazard.

the SideKick vaporizer use this kind of tube with a spiral inside

We would need something shorter I imagine. We want to avoid the heatsink effect as it will rob too much power for a on demand convection unit. For conduction like in the Sidekick it's fine because it's on for an entire session and requires about one minute to get to temperature. Maybe a tiny spiral made of glass or another insulator rather than metal?

 

[E0x]

Don't try sub-ohm vaping with these cells or you'll get.. a ultra fire! I shouldn't even joke about that, as the outcome wouldn't be funny. But really I'm serious, don't draw more than 10A out of these cells because they are simply not what the label says and are a potential hazard.



We would need something shorter I imagine. We want to avoid the heatsink effect as it will rob too much power for a on demand convection unit. For conduction like in the Sidekick it's fine because it's on for an entire session and requires about one minute to get to temperature. Maybe a tiny spiral made of glass or another insulator rather than metal?

i was thinking use that spiral tool( sidekick hardware ) for the mouthpiece so i don't see how this will rob too much power because that is hot-air/vapor with the herb component not the hot-air that will vape the herb.

 

[KeroZen]

Ah my bad, I thought you were bringing it for the vortex part, that is upstream before the bowl, between the coil and the screen, in order to improve on the hot spots front.

For the downstream part as a cooling unit, I understand indeed.

 

[Pipes]

Some kind of impeller between the heater and screen would be perfect for preventing hot spots.
It would turn with the air movement slicing or chopping it as it passes. Keeping the mechanism clean might end up being a nightmare though. Cost a little on the efficiency as well.
A reflector of sorts on the input air holes might help to form a vortex moving past the element. Things I've pondered on but in the end wanted to keep it simple as possible.
The stem screw is a great idea. Where can it be had? Seems like that would be a fairly simple mod to the dowelling.
Like it!

 

[E0x]

Some kind of impeller between the heater and screen would be perfect for preventing hot spots.
It would turn with the air movement slicing or chopping it as it passes. Keeping the mechanism clean might end up being a nightmare though. Cost a little on the efficiency as well.
A reflector of sorts on the input air holes might help to form a vortex moving past the element. Things I've pondered on but in the end wanted to keep it simple as possible.
The stem screw is a great idea. Where can it be had? Seems like that would be a fairly simple mod to the dowelling.
Like it!

not luck yet , is not sold as replacement parts at http://7thfloorvapes.com/

 

[Pipes]

Some units will start getting delivered soon so I have started to put together an Instruction Sheet.
It will be sure to change as questions roll in, but here it is as far. It is linked to a more printable version.

 

[Pipes]

And here is the Mod Set-up Instructions, Also, links to a printable copy which may have updated information in the future.

 

[nondarb]

From Bulli thread:

This thread excites me. I wish there was a finished version I could purchase...

Get in here @WakeAndVape