Coil priming can easily be overlooked when vaping when it should be second nature. Here’s why.
You’ve just invested in some of your favourite e liquid, your mouth is salivating at the thought of getting that sweet juice you’ve just bought from your favourite vape liquid UK shop. You fill up the tank of your trusty vape device, never having encountered problems before and now you’re all ready to get that satisfying vape hit you’ve been waiting for. The only problem is that when you go to take an inhale of that punchy flavoured vape juice, you are instead pummelled by a repulsive burnt taste. You spit, you splutter, you’re startled. What’s happened to that delicious vape taste you remember so fondly?!
The answer is that you haven’t primed your coil. An often-overlooked necessity for a vape device is that you prepare the new flavour you’ve introduced into the tank, so it can be primed for optimum satisfaction.
Why should I prime my coil?
If you don’t prime your coil, you’ll be subject to a whole range of problems. Priming your coil basically means that your vape wick is saturated. The wick is the piece of cotton in your vape device which is soaked with vape juice. This is usually filtered through the tank, unless you own a dripper, in which case you drip vape juice directly onto it. If your vape device is not sufficiently primed, then the wick gains no vape juice. What you’ll essentially be inhaling therefore, is burnt cotton. This burnt cotton will decompose and turn into water and carbon dioxide
Water will dilute the flavour of your vape juice and if inhaled could flood your tank. Adding extra liquids to your vape device is not recommended and if you want to keep the potency of your vape liquid flavour then burning your wick is certainly no way to do this.
Carbon dioxide is the gas we breathe out, and although it’s considered nourishment for plants, it’s not as good for humans. It is noxious and poisonous, obviously not healthy to inhale. With vaping acting for many as a smoking cessation tool, this is not something most vapers will want to inhale.
Another reason for priming your coil is to break in a new one. These often work without a fuss, but sometimes need a little warming up, literally to reach their full vaping potential.
Where did coil priming start?
Priming coils has been a method introduced through trial and error process ever since the introduction of vaping to mainstream societies. Due to the gradual development of the vape device from its archaic cig-alike origins to the diverse range available today, the coil became a prime component and one which was removable. From the original disposable e-cigarettes came the new generation which had parts you could remove and replace, thus ensuring their longevity as a device. The coil was one of these pieces, and so through the process of introducing coils, they were perfected and priming began to make them vape-ready.
How to prime a coil
The process of priming a coil is easy once you get your head around why you need to do it. After priming your coil once, it’ll become habit and you’ll be able to do it without bother the next time.
The process looks something like this.
Take your new coil out of the packaging and after installing it in your vape device, give it a few drops of e liquid. These drops will ready it for the process ahead. Make sure that when you install it, that it is surrounded by cotton. There are countless variations of wick out there, and they all cater to a range of tastes and vape device specificities.
After screwing in your coil, it’s time to let this settle for around 30 seconds, allowing the previously dripped in e juice to saturate into the wick. Once you’ve allowed this, it’s time to take some dry hits. A dry hit means you take an inhale on your vape device whilst the power is off. Take about 8 to 10 dry hits, the sucking of your breath will encourage the vape liquid to distribute throughout the coil.
After this, turn on your vape device and turn the wattage down to around 10. Then take a few hits on this low power setting and wait for about 10 seconds.After this turn the wattage up and again, take a few more hits. This process should continue, turning your vape device up before taking a few more hits. You’ll eventually get your wattage up to where you usually have it when you vape. This now means that your coil is primed, and whilst there are a few variations on the process, you’ll always end with a fully primed coil which is ready to go!