Looking for engineers who vape:

[G+_Chad Lawson]

Looking for engineers who vape:

 

A few years ago I worked for a company that made e-liquid (or whatever term you use) in IT. While I had never been a smoker or that into vaping, the geek in me was really interested in the technology of it.

 

In order to satiate my curiosity, I've started a series of tech experiments building a mechanical mod and then a VV/VW mod.

 

The reason I'm writing is this: what's the difference between VV and VW from a tech standpoint. The best way I can think to achieve varying either is with variable resistance. So if that's the case, aren't they just the same thing (V=R*I, P=R*I^2) aside from the degree to which the numbers change? In either case, don't I just adjust resistance?

 

I feel like I'm missing something simple. And I'm sure I've done a bad job of explaining where I'm at, so this may come across more amateurish than it is.

[G+_Jeff Gros]

I built a vape device for a client a few years back. However, I don't know anything about the community, so nothing you said meant anything to me.

 

Something of note. I had a fume extractor in my office to suck up the fumes generated while I wrote software and tested it. My client swore up and down that it was perfectly safe to inhale but I wanted some sort of fume extractor because I was also going to be generating a lot of smoke (instead of vapor) while sitting at breakpoint and debugging the software.

 

One day I noticed that the filter was not working so well, so I investigated. I found that the filter was clogged with a thick oily mess. I wiped down the filter to get the oil off and it worked better.

 

Smokers who keep at it long enough get tar lung. I can imagine based on what I experienced that a similar effect might happen with vaping. I hear that smokers say it feels a lot like drowning.

 

I though it was worthwhile sharing this data point. Even if you don't smoke or vape, perhaps another KitA might get something out of this.

 

Just keep in mind that I'm no doctor, and I'm definitely a hypocrite. Now please excuse me while I go drink something with aspartame... :)

[G+_Jason Marsh]

Something else to consider: many of the vaporizer liquids use a glycol as the carrier or base liquid. These glycols metabolize to oxalic acid or oxalate. This binds with calcium in the bloodstream to form calcium oxalate, and when the kidneys cleanse it from the blood it is concentrated enough to form crystals. These form kidney stones, and I can tell you from experience they are quite painful. If you have had a stone, stay away from e-cigs/vape pens. If you haven't dealt with stones, you will greatly increase your chances to experience them if you vape or drive a car with a coolant leak.

 

If you're going to work on building such devices, do yourself a favor: protect yourself from the vapors. You don't have to wear a military gas mask and chem suit, but reasonable measures to extract the vapor by filtration or by exhausting them outside are an absolute must.

 

If stones aren't enough, there are other dangers. A close friend of mine decided to quit smoking for the obvious health benefits, so he switched to vaping. After several months he had a series of unexplained allergic reactions. He's in his fifties and had never had an allergic reaction to anything. One night while the wife and I were up for a visit, he had a severe reaction and his face swelled up like a pumpkin. He was experiencing great difficulty in breathing and I took him to the ER. They fixed him up and we were back at his house within a couple of hours. We left the next day to trek the 600 miles home. Within weeks he had another, more severe reaction. It nearly killed him, and the doctors asked what he'd been doing different. When he told them he was vaping to get off of tobacco they told him to stop vaping. It's been several months since and he hasn't had any reactions. He still carries an EpiPen, but won't likely need it since putting down the "vape".

[G+_Chad Lawson]

Hi, Jason Marsh. Thanks for the info. I don’t vape myself nor do I want to. I’m just interested in the tech and want to build one as an intellectual exercise. :-)

[G+_Chad Lawson]

H, Jeff Gros. I’m just playing with building the mod and the tech that goes into it. Having said that, my own eating/caffeine habits aren’t much better.

 

And on your point about fumes, I taught a kid to solder a couple years ago and had to tell him many times not to inhale the fumes even if he “really [did] like the smell!”