Author Archives: Rob Ellard

 

Then the spirit of progress arrived in the form of bulldozers, diggers and men. But then progress is awesome when you’re 8 years-old and allowed to do anything during the summer. We gave little thought to the grass being churned or them razing the beautiful dovecot to the ground because for kids scaffolding is like cake to members of the Women’s Institute. Not just any scaffolding, this was 1970’s scaffolding. This was the kind that didn’t have an impenetrable fence surround or daft signs telling you to go away. Daft signs compelling you to go vandalise a bus shelter instead – and this would have been really stupid as we’d already done that.

A new road and identikit houses rose from the rubble and mud. The stream steadily filled with old cement bags and then the village shop shut down. Something was going wrong with the world. It was becoming a greyer place. Adulthood beckoned with a life devoid of milk floats, rural bus services and frequent power cuts. I didn’t have a concept that this would become a preamble for a tale on the UK’s leading vaping spares company’s website at the time. When it took place I didn’t care about the future.

So there it is, an event from my life that I’ve now despatched to the Internet like Peter Kay tale of yore, but lacking in humour and no mention of lamb bhuna. That’s because we didn’t have them; if we wanted to go all fancy food then it was lasagne or a Sodastream. Damn, now I’m just a couple of references to Juliet Bravo and Crackerjack away from a full-on Kay routine.

Sharing. It’s nice to share, it has to be true because that’s what children are told. We don’t lie to kids. Imagine the misery that would exist in a small person if they had to eat an entire packet of Haribos all by themself. No, little ones prefer to feel a warm glow of contentment as a parent removes a fistful. Sharing stories or sharing sweets, it matters not – the world adores being involved in our lives.

And that is why joy is unbridled when it comes to like and share competitions on Facebook. Not only do you get to see what competitions are running you can count how many of your friends have already entered by the email notifications of being tagged in them.

 

 

Travel by plane, train or, as the late John Candy demonstrated, automobile is often not easy. But the issue is more fraught when you are a vaper as it can lead to danger, being spoken to in a condescending voice or even public humiliation. We plan on tackling the toughest challenges head on.

In a car, especially at this time of year, vaping leaves a residue over the windscreen. It can quickly build up and combine with dust particles to form a barrier that scatters light in multiple directions and leave the driver feeling like that acid tab from 1982 is kicking in again. It should be noted at this point that this is simply information we’ve gleaned from our research and does not reflect our lifestyle choices.

While some may tell you to use an alcohol-based wipe to clear the screen we believe they have overlooked the cost this would incur to a heavy cloud chucker. The solution, as if it wasn’t obvious enough, is to have a small child hold the steering wheel while you lean out of the driver’s window and carry on vaping. If also means that you will be able to give other travellers a friendly smile as you point to the impressive cloud you’d just exhaled. A cheeky wink at the same time will elicit smiles and goodwill amongst the other road users – and probably improve the overall image of vaping to boot.

As little Johnny angles the motor into a stationary vehicle in the station car park, it’s time to turn our attention to trains. Be it on the platform or in the carriage, there are multitudes of people ready and willing to take offense at something they can neither smell nor be endangered by. A number of strategies are open to us in overcoming this problem starting with a Thomas the Tank Engine costume. Instead of demanding a SWAT team wipe your blood over platform 2A, parents will be lining up to shove their children’s faces into your chimneystack.

Fancy dress is less practical in the confines of a carriage. By far the best play here is to take some tugs behind a newspaper and then, after breathing out, declare in a loud voice that you are worried you are about to self-combust again. In order to make this tactic work for you it pays to have spent thirty minutes talking in a loud voice about the last time it happened. If no one is sitting with you then pretend to have this conversation on a cellphone, everyone loves to listen in on other’s telephone conversations.

The police will have safely handed over little Johnny to social services, and impounded your car, by the time you arrive at the airport. The trick to dealing with vapes on a plane is to keep an eye on the toilet. Thrill seekers continue enjoy a bout of coupling at altitude and will be so focussed on each other they’ll never notice you nipping in at the same time. Grab an article of frantically discarded clothing, place it over the smoke detector and lose yourself in a flavoured haze. The fog you’ve produced will help you to return to your seat unnoticed, leaving you free to tut loudly with the other passengers at the toilet couple being berated by angry cabin crew.

We would like to take this opportunity to thank you for travelling with Stealthvape, to remind you to return your seats to the upright position and hope that you have a lovely weekend.

 

Petition of the Year

Never before have so many been asked to sign so much so many times. The only petition we haven’t seen is a petition to stop petitions. Some of these have been very worthwhile – the Totally Wicked petition deserved all of our support to lend weight to their legal action. Likewise, Clive Bates’ petition attacking the TPD and the recent (and essential to sign it if you haven’t yet) 100K Campaign are highly commendable. But in a field of strong competition, we have to award the prize this year to the amazing Save Vaping petition – the only petition where you can invalidate your signature by obtaining a T-shirt saying you saved vaping. Here’s to Greenpeace giving away free petrol in cans labelled “I saved everyone from global warming”.

Shed of the Year

It’s very easy to be flippant about things but no one should underestimate the importance of a good backdrop for a YouTube video – it’s probably the most important thing in vaping. Some YouTubers think it is important to show you they live in a Comet showroom, others film their shows inside a cardboard box. Only one man has the perspicacity to use a shed. Sheds are part of the fibre of this country – if sheds aren’t celebrated then the terrorists win. Huzzah for Todd’s shed.

Idiot Move of the Year

It’s been a tight call in this category as so many have gone above and beyond in attempt to lift the title. Whether it has been politicians attempting to force through de facto bans or anti-ecig activists lying about research, we’ve been spoilt for options to exclaim “My word, what idiots!” As vaping has faced the strongest opposition around the world ever, some vape companies decided that they would attack…err…vapers and vape companies. For everyone who has sent out a Cease & Desist letter because they wanted to cover up the truth about their products – you are all joint winners.

Handbags of the Year

Handbags, as everyone knows, are even more important than sheds. Especially when the bag contains two bricks and a Cease & Desist letter. Following on from the last award: strange people run some companies. They seem to believe that the best way to win admirers and customers is to live their lives in Caps-loc. Five Pawns must get an honourable mention as runners-up for trying to obfuscate test results on their juice range – but it wasn’t good enough to win this year’s coveted prize. So step forward and collect you prize Fernando Solis of Hyon Mods. His spat that inspired two glorious videos from Vaping with Vic  made for great entertainment. Unfortunately, Mr Solis can’t be here with us tonight and so we would like to ask Vic to collect the jpg on his behalf.

Vapefest of the Year

It can be very difficult to out-do yourself when you have already attained a level of excellence. Like a man’s razor – surely they can’t manage to add one more blade and make it even better, and yet they do. Likewise, Vapefest continued to leap up to a whole new level this year. In fact, the only downside is the concern regarding if there can be one in 2016 given the latest pronouncements from the government. So, well done to Vapefest 2015, worthy winners and only candidates for the Vapefest award.

Forum Joke of the Year

The social media is a tricky place to navigate. The written word is cast adrift from the context given by visual cues and vocal inflection – what can appear like a light-hearted quip to the writer is suddenly interpreted as an insult on everything a reader holds dear. More words ensue; someone invokes Godwin’s Law and the sound of e-Tears fill the internetz. So, well done to everybody for posting a picture of Sting or Leslie Ash whenever the word Mod is used. We all appreciate you effort to be witty and you can feel proud of your contributions – but everyone who posted a picture of a tank can feel justly proud and have the use of the winners’ jpg for the whole of 2016.

Complaint of the Year

All vendors will have their own stories and we’ve heard many of them (we all talk to each other). Some customers have been concerned that their vendors haven’t anticipated the order and cycled it around to their house 15 minutes before the online transaction was made. Other customers have expressed disgust that vendors have the audacity to charge for postage. Our winner though goes to the Stealthvape customer who genuinely believed that we were profiteering to a disgusting level with our exclusive Oscillation Overthrusters.

For the record, we make a loss on every £125,000 sale.

Thing That We Can’t Talk About In Case It’s Used To Ban Vaping of the Year

Frequent mentions of XXXXXXXX or XXX XXXX XXXXXXXXXX are removed on social media so that some sections of forums end up resembling a redacted chemical weapons report. XXXXXXXX users must be wondering if the same response would happen if vape devices could be used for vaping XXXXXXX or enhancing a XXXXX. Aha, it seems like these are automatically censored too. 2015’s winner then is XXXXXXXXX.

Not-Vapefest of the Year

There is only one Vapefest but life is not like the Highlander film, there can be more than one. This year there were three more than one in the UK. That’s four, there were four vape events this year. In trying to work out which one would win this hotly contested category we had to appraise a number of qualities, like: Did they serve beer? Did the beer run out? And, how many bags of Freeshit™ was it possible to go home with? The process was more intensive than a school Ofsted inspection but ultimately hinged on one vital thing – did we manage to visit it? As such the Vape Expo UK beat off the other challengers to lift the top prize. Well done Vape Expo UK for being something we attended. Given our love of staying in bed all weekend this was no mean feat.

Forum of the Year

Some might think that a field of one is not expansive and barely reflects the excellent options out there. Some might think that but we encountered huge problems trying it another way. One minute we were debating “Best Forum”, the next we had spent seventeen hours locked inside Mumsnet. Fortunately the shopping needed doing and the break snapped us back to our senses. To time to watch Ash vs. The Evil Dead we renamed it the Forum (that we advertise on) of the Year award. Congratulations go to Planet Of The Vapes, we love advertising with you and really appreciate the Vendor of the Month award we won.

Ostrich of the Year

It takes skill and practice to make it appear as though you are listening to someone and yet at the same time imagining bunnies frolicking in meadows. Oh sure, most married couples do it to a semi-professional standard but it takes a politician’s effort to elevate it to full pro status. Lame Duck Drakeford sat through hours of submissions by experts telling him vaping is good, got the results of a Welsh government funded survey demonstrating that there’s no gateway effect – and yet still believes that a threat he can’t prove exists needs banning in case it appears in the future like the Rapture or a New Kids On The Block comeback tour. Feel free to use the jpg all year on your website, Mark, you earned it.

Stupid of the Year

This year there has been: Too. Much. Stupid.

The Californian Department for Public Health saying that there is such a thing as third-hand nicotine is still as duh as it was in January. Martin McKee (he really is a professor) telling folks that vaping can lead to cocaine addiction was a real head-stuck-in-railings moment. How about the ban on vaping in the great outdoors of North America? It probably renormalises Smoky the Bear or something. People continuing to use subohm tanks on hybrid mods or setting fire to their homes with dodgy chargers is now too commonplace to be even worth thinking about any longer. No, it has to be the UK government/Department of Health’s proposals for the implementation of the TPD. Any piece of regulation that stops vape companies advertising, that blocks forums and social media groups on Facebook and the like and restricts freedom of speech in public is abhorrently stupid – and that is why we encourage everybody to sign the 100K Campaign. The Rt Hon Jeremy Hunt MP can collect his jpg when he promises to scrap the proposals.

Ban of the Year

Attempted bans don’t get a look in here – you tried, dear legislators, but you failed and fail to win the lovely jpg as a result. You failed in Wales and in California, leaving the award wide open to the authorities in New Jersey. The dullards who organised Vape Expo NJ thought the law wouldn’t apply to them – but it did. Vaping was banned…from a vape event. Will this happen in Britain next year? Promoters Andy Balogh and Don Miller will have to share the jpg with health Nazi Jay Elliot.

Vendor of the Year

It would be too easy to make Stealthvape the winner of this award. We were surprised exactly how easy – and awarded it to ourselves. There’s no rules prohibiting this kind of thing apparently, you’d have thought there would be a government department dedicated to the elimination of self-promotion…but then what would Peter Andre do with his days? Fear not, we created a 1^st equal winner. We could have come to our decision based on things such as type of products sold or customer service or any of a thousand other criteria. We didn’t. We chose Vape Geek because Nat is lovely and Rob has an awesome name. There should be more people called Rob. We could have called the award “Best Rob” but then there’d have been no 1^st equal.

Reviewer Who Looks Most Like A Puffin of the Year

We like puffins. Actually we love puffins and everything about them. We love their bills, their funny walks, the fact that that they are the only sea-based bird to run a publishing house and their name. Puffin. Use it instead of a swear word every time something goes wrong and you’ll have an instant smile back on your face. So when it was suggested that Damian Safer Vaper group Morter bore a passing resemblance to one we felt compelled to whip up a special award just for him.

Scopes of the Year

Keep your friends close, they say, and keep your enemies closer. It’s never made an awful lot of sense; personal space is essential. But then it’s important to keep your juice man exceptionally close – otherwise he’d never be able to fight his way through all the friends and enemies hanging around outside Stealthvape HQ. Scopes fits the bill. And for everyone who doesn’t live next-door to him, Scopes E-Liquid can also use the postal service to deliver fine juice.

Coolest Juice Maker of the Year

We don’t understand popular culture but think it’s important there are juice makers out there who are down with the kids. The hippest bloke in Vapeland knows what is happening from what is not happening – and all the cool people love techno goth, apparently. Many already appreciate that the translation of the Native American word Manabush into English is: “He who moves with dayglo dreads to a pumping beat”. No wonder then that Manabush receive as many letters asking for fashion tips as they do for juice orders.

Vape Accessory of the Year

Let’s be perfectly clear here, the beard is out. Last weekend, a man sat near us in a Nottingham pub. Many questions could have been posed but why anybody would intentionally make himself into a Gary Glitter tribute remains unexplained. As he tugged on his ecig you could imagine him humming one of his never-to-be-heard-again songs to himself. We don’t need that in vaping. The trouble with this award is that it’s related to fashion – and now I think about it there will always be a problem with whatever we award it to. It’s too late to scrub the thing now so let’s just say you can give it to whatever you think rocks. As long as it’s not a baseball cap. Donald Trump wears baseball caps. Please not a baseball cap.

Vaper of the Year

There can only be one winner here – you lot. It’s been a delight to supply you all with wicks, wires and rest all year, a delight and an honour. We’ve been blown away by the wonderful comments you’ve made to us and on the Internet. Whatever the future brings it has been a special year full of special people. You are special and we love you for it. The Stealthvape team want to wish you all a happy holiday and that 2016 brings you nothing but fantastic vapemail.

 

 

They said that about Nigel Pearson. He’s a bloke, for all but the three of you who know, who does stuff with football teams. What he does and who he did it for is irrelevant – but they said it when he was reappointed to a club he’d worked at before. It’ll all go wrong, they said. It’ll go wrong and we’ll all hate him and everything will be wrong with the world. Unfortunately they were wrong but they won’t remember that because they’ll only recall the times they were correct.

They said the girl who binned me on my 21^st birthday shouldn’t return to me. Now on this point I can fully understand the reasoning behind it seeing as I was an utter waste of space. But come back she did. Years of marriage and children later all of their objections to our partnership probably still hold true but it’s worked in a fashion.

But when it comes to vaping I hold no store in the adage. Revisiting past ways of vaping is brilliant for mixing up the experience. For sure there’s been the repetition of past failures but also the rediscovery of enjoyable ways to exhale vape.

There’s not an atomiser in the collection that doesn’t sport Kanthal again these days. Gone are the dalliances with temperature-controlled set-ups and the sojourn into stainless steel coils. As much as it was interesting to try out new ways of procuring a cloud I’ve returned to the ease of whipping up with wire that I can do blindfold. The thing is, for Kanthal, there was nothing wrong with it to begin with. After the initial learning process to eliminate hotspots or glowing legs it’s never missed a beat – and the vastly improved range of wire diameters makes it a doddle to wind for any desired outcome.

Maybe, in hindsight, I shouldn’t have bought another Maraxus. It seems so obvious now, but there was so much I didn’t like about using one it makes a nonsense of the decision to make a repeated purchase. Fortunately the same can’t be said for the Heron. Much loved by many, at one point in time two of them adorned mods on the shelf and were my daily tanks. I caught myself eyeing them again last week and was fortunate to get one on loan. It saved me the disappointment of trying to shift it on; it’s just too tight for me now.

Of course, that’s the benefit of going back to old kit – it reaffirms my belief that where I am with my current kit is exactly what I need. With the decline of the second-hand market purchases are fewer and the collection tends to remain shelf-bound rather than being moved on. It gives me pleasure to clean and use.

‘They’ might not like it, but I’m going to break out an 18350, coil to 1.2Ω and try out a 12mg tobacco-based liquid with a well-deserved Friday night beer tonight. It’s been a while.

 

 

Crouching on the rooftop, he reached inside his cape for the bottle in the utility belt. The contents were meticulously added to a wick while arching over the device to protect it from the torrential deluge. Everything held a reflective sheen, a steel aquatic shroud. The bottle returned to safe storage, he raised the copper tube to his mouth and inhaled.

The traffic rumble intertwined with the weather’s gentle white noise, the metropolitan soundscape offering a bleakness to compliment the view. A drab austerity that mirrored itself in Vapeman’s heart while clouds of peanut scented vegetable glycerin pearled out from the mouthpiece and upwards.

For what seemed like forever, Vapeman had fought for justice. He’d fought for values that he held as worthy: honesty, integrity and the need for a scientific peer-review process. When Carnage, Apocalypse and Venom had sent letters to the World Health Organisation or written articles for The Lancet, Vapeman took to Twitter with a righteous fury previously reserved only for people who jumped the lane-closing queues on motorways.

But what was it worth? What was the merit of the time spent in the secret hideout, the hours completing online petitions? There are no bad endings for superheroes. It’s a rule. Or something. No matter how bleak the outlook, there’s always “…and with one bound our hero was free”. Right? Vapeman knew his lore: no matter how one issue ends, no matter how the story arc is weaved, eventually right wins out. Right? Bad guys vanquished, friendships forged and order restored.

There’s that court case, the one people are clinging to. There’s that. Nothing else has worked so there has to be that. The clock has its hands at three minutes to midnight, Doomsday for juice. There has to be that. Another tug on the mouthpiece, another peel of vape curling and fighting with itself.

The wind picks up. It’s a bitter gust of pre-winter that carries the sheeting downpour off to an angle and sends pieces of loose paper on secret missions.

There’s something about despondency. That darkest of celluloid hours when the hero is on the verge of abdication and begins to embrace Paul Nystom’s malaise. The moment when it seems our protagonist will be subsumed by existential nihilism. It’s the cue for things to turn around. There’s that court case, the one people are clinging to? There’s that?

And it’s at this moment a sheet gets stuck to droplets on Vapeman’s boot. It’s the proposals for vape advertising in a post-TPD world. It’s not a good read – a bit like a column penned by Katie Hopkins, but serious. We don’t live in a world of heroes but like comic book characters, vaping could soon to be the stuff of myth and legend. It might be a decent time to have another chat with your local MP.

 

 

That’s right – like the rest of the entire globe, we were shocked and traumatised to hear the announcement this week that piggy products could be as dangerous for you as drinking concentrated sulphuric acid or putting Jeremy Hunt in charge of the UK’s health service. Leaving no time for second thoughts, we immediately contacted our production company and rushed through the development of iBacon™, eSausages™ and liquidHam™.

Vapers, with their experience of an electronic substitute to detrimental alternatives are ahead of the field and will welcome this exciting development with open arms. We sent a sample pack to No.10 but, since he left his career in PR, David Cameron is uncomfortable plugging pigs, battery powered or otherwise.

How have we achieved this marvel of the modern age? Firstly, we optimised the neural network of the standard porker using nickel wire and packs of Cotton Bacon, fed them a steady diet of 18350s and rewired the tail to accommodate a fuse. Bam! An instant source of electronic pig meals!

Vapourised bacon has been shown to be at least 95% safer than the smoked variety in tests carried out by researchers from Hamsterdam. “It snort rash claims,” said Doctor Babe. “We’ve been celebrating the publication of the work with bottles of swine.”

Stealthvape is very cognisant of other potential dangers posed by things we love and therefore people might like to ban. We are currently applying the same techniques to develop electronic beer, chicken curry and weekends.

iBacon™, eSausages™ and liquidHam™ will be available on the site soon and we welcome applications from vendors who would like to stick their snouts in and hog supplies.

 

 

I knew who the good side were from reading Warlord and Commando comics, which had the added benefit of teaching me some German. As an adult riding a motorbike to Cologne I discovered that “Schnell”, “Gott im Himmel” and “Schweinhund” weren’t as useful as I’d previously imagined. Fortunately I’d taught myself “zwei bier und ein Schweineschnitzel bitte”.

The feeling of posting off my collection of Kayfuns was similar to when my soldiers went back into their Tupperware barracks for a final time before being redeployed to a car boot sale in my mother’s Hillman Avenger. The Kayfun is a mighty bit of kit. After starting with basic stuff, it was strongly recommended to me by the gaggle of admin from a forum at my first Vapefest. Each of them had bought a new one that day and were declaring them the single best thing in vaping ever. When I eventually got around to grabbing my first from Cloud 9 I shared their opinion.

As time rolled on everyone had at least one, whether the genuine or one of the millions of clones that China churned out. My collection stretched to eight at one point. Easy to build on, convenient and a great vape. Well, a great vape at 1Ω+ coil builds on a mech and taking the vapour into your mouth before inhaling.

The problem they created was that I needed my next fix, I needed to recreate that moment when you try something so incredibly better that it transforms your vaping world. I needed the next leap like the one from Evod to KFL.

As quickly as companies released new tank systems I’d buy them. Each time they seemed to be surrounded by people going “Blimey these are good” or words to that effect. And every time I was left feeling the same as I did when the family first got a SodaStream – invariably more complicated and it didn’t taste as good. I’m looking at you here in particular, Erlkönigin.

My disillusionment grew until I rediscovered the dripper.

Dripping and me parted ways as they couldn’t compete with the Kayfun in my affections. They didn’t suit what and how I vaped at the time, but now there a legion of mechs and RDAs on the shelf. It’s a return to the old days, a celebration of what was really great but I’d forgotten about. So, on that basis, I’m selling my iPad and buying a load of boxes of Airfix troops. “Achtung! Achtung!”

 

 

Under normal circumstances I wouldn’t entertain helping someone to do something so superfluous but John was my designated driver for the night. John was the designated driver every night – none of us owned a car. John the Driver took us to exotic places like the Overstone Lakes in summer so we could fail to meet girls somewhere new, and at weekends he’d drive us out of town so we could embarrass ourselves in front of women in new pubs.

John felt that adding the spoiler to his car did something. I’m sure someone with a better grasp of fluid dynamics can explain the improvement to me. I’m certain it did something to make the car travel closer to the edge of 30mph in built up areas. Maybe it reduced external noise at 60mph on the dual carriageway to Wellingborough? Who cares? What it did was make John smile when the job was finished. He vanished inside to put his eyeliner on and find his Grace Jones cassette.

I never understood men’s fascination with Halfords; I never got the whole go-faster stripe. I never understood it until I began vaping.

Todd, he of the videos on the Internetz, posted a picture of a switch button on social media this week. If anything is the vaping equivalent of Driver John’s automotive aerofoil then this was it. Beautiful inlay of swirling shiny pattern nested in polished steel and provides zero performance benefit, a replacement part to add uniqueness to a device. Superfluous and smashing in equal measure.

It seems as though the last twelve months have witnessed a growth in ways that people are converting their mods into reflections of their own personality. Gone is the frenzied trading of pristine devices on the second-hand market as we appear to be adding our own influence to the vape. Boxes can now be decked out in silicone sleeves, enterprising machinists are drumming up leather coats for high-end devices and dabbling in patinas on tubes has become an all out assault with engraving equipment.

But what the flip possesses a load of us to do this? What are we thinking when we are throwing cash or time at things that have no material benefit to our lives?

According to a psychology study in Texas it comes down to two things, one of which being a desire for control. By adapting the thing we own to be different we are, apparently, tailoring it to ourselves and this brings us a sense of control – and thereby wellbeing despite the control being illusionary. Psychology Today tells us that this is important. What was important to me was to regain the feeling in my fingers and ensconce myself in a pub for the night, who cared if John improved his notion of self-worth? Hell, did you have to suffer that Grace Jones tape?

No.

No, I did.

Jean-Paul Satre would, if he were alive, contend that we invest importance in our mods because they are external displays of the fruits of our labours. As we all strive to earn money we, well most of us, don’t walk home in the evening clutching the thing we made. Him and Locke would argue that our devices are chosen representations of self and our choices for vaping ancillary items are investments in objects that then become reflections of our identity. The time and choices embody our values and identity. They justify work.

I’ve got optional silver pins in some mods, I’ve paid for handmade Vince driptips and there’s a smattering of aftermarket replacement tanks in all manner of coloured Pyrex. I play with all manner of wires types and coil to my exact tastes. There’s a heavy personalised aspect to my vaping and it makes me feel damn good.

You may chose to disagree with John Locke and Satre but there is only one thing of importance to me: if they were in the back seat of that Volkswagen as we headed to Sywell, they would have agreed that we should have listened to Flock Of Seagulls and not Grace Jones.

 

 

I don’t stand around pubs, loiter in shopping areas or get any reasonable use out of my Speedos at the municipal pool. I don’t meet strangers who are non-vapers and I don’t discuss vaping with my friends. As much as I enjoy it I have the sneaking suspicion that it ranks up on the Interesting Scale alongside stamp collecting, train spotting and whatever the damn scrapbooking is.

Someone who barely knows me signed me up to this social media group, supposedly for freethinkers. The kind of people who, I reckon, spend their days drinking expensive coffee and stroking beards. The kind of people who are probably glad I spend my days at a desk in my lounge.

And, within a week, the subject of vaping came up. And within minutes all pretensions of faux-intelligence left the building as the activity…my hobby…was roundly derided. It was mocked. It was mocked like Biggus Dickus.

Now when you have the physique of an Adonis gone to seed you develop a skin thicker than one found on a school rice pudding, I could handle Mock The Weak. But…but…they were roundly making merry about my tube of steel. It’s never happened before. Ever.

It transpired that they thought I was showing off, that we all vape just to show off. It wasn’t explained what we are all showing off but I bet it’s good. So I sought solace with like-minded vapers. We’re all there for each other – like members of a gigantic family of Waltons. We’re all there for each other, right?

Wrong.

The first thread I went into on the forum, the first post I read was by someone who had clearly been interfered with at Vapefest by a man wielding a Hellfire. “I hate anyone who spends £XXX.XX on a mod,” he cried in the style of a person who hadn’t heard the Elite War was over.

That’s when it struck me. That’s when I realised what vaping is and what vapers have become: we are the new cyclists. People in the real world hate us just for doing something we enjoy and subsets of us hate each other because…well, because reasons.

And so, in acknowledging that this is what we have sunk to I demand we have safety clothing to suit. Cloud chasers, for example, look a ramshackle bunch – the only identifying thing they have is a baseball cap that already looks stupid on anyone not from Harlem. We need apparel. We need lycra. I know what you’re thinking (and half of those words would make your mother blush). You’re thinking Lycra looks stupid.

Have you worn it? The gentle caress as it holds bits of you where they used to be when you were a teenager? It’s ideal for those arching backward moves as you attempt to watch your own exhale from somewhere you aren’t. It offers total flexibility when trying to thread four Claptons into a twin-post dripper. If we are going to be treated and act like cyclists then we may as well look like them.

You should see the headlight I’ve got on my mountain bike – cost a fortune it did. It’s far better than your headlight. I’m going into town now to shine it in people’s faces.

 

We have analysed all of the information available to ensure that what we will be offering is of the highest quality and reliable for use in suitable TC devices. Being useable up to 1300°C makes it more flexible than nickel.

NiFe30 has a high temperature coefficient at a relatively high resistivity. It is mainly used in wire form for temperature-dependent resistors. Dicodes are promoting NiFe30 wire under the name  ‘Resistherm‘ for use with the Extreme V2 Mod. It has met with acclaim for a number of reasons including eliminating the Ni200 taste some experience and the Ti worries harboured by others.

Early reports indicate that the wire also offers a number of benefits when coiling. Ease of use is suggested due to it offering malleability between that of tempered and annealed Ni200. Being less springy it is prone to hold its shape better making it simpler to coil. It is possible to close wrap the coils but we would advise against that, as the centre of the coil will heat up disproportionately compared to the ends and impair the vaping experience.

It has around four times the resistance of nickel that means far fewer wraps. No more puzzling over how to squeeze a large coil into a tiny deck: for example, aiming for 0.15Ω using 0.40mm wire with a 3mm coil inner diameter equates to 16 wraps using Ni200, 7 wraps of NiFe30 and 3 wraps of Titanium G1.

It is important to note that our NiFe30 will only work with DNA200 devices, suitable Dicodes mods or others that offer a nickel purity setting. NiFe30 performance with the Diocedes Extreme V2 chip has been tested here: http://vape-safe.blogspot.co.uk/2015/05/the-whole-truth-about-temperature.html.

NiFe30 offers dry hit elimination (like all TC wire) but the metal composition is also good news for vapers with those allergies.

It is also important to appreciate that not all NiFe30 wire is the same. Different products from vendors may be classified as NiFe30 but they can have different resistance profiles and temperature coefficient of resistance (TCR) ratings, 0.40mm/26g for example:

• Crazy/Mesh/Etc: Do not publish TCR and resistance figures
• Resistherm/Dicodes: TCR 3200 – 2.56 Ω/m
• Reactor wire: TCR 4000 – 3.36 Ω/m
• NiFethal70/Alloy120: TCR 5250 – 1.55 Ω/m
• NiFethal52/Alloy52: TCR 4035 – 2.87 Ω/m
• Stealthvape’s NiFe30: TCR 5000 – 1.55 Ω/m

The variation in specification may present a problem when setting up an atomiser if mixing products from different sources.

All in all, NiFe30 presents a very interesting proposition and we are sure you will enjoy using it. As it stands we are looking at other new wire options too, but until we are satisfied they offer a safe and viable alternative we will not be bringing them to market.