It’s a scenario all too familiar to vapers. One second, all’s fine; you’re happily vaping, enjoying the taste of your carefully selected, delicious e-liquid flavour. And then the next – tragedy! – all you can taste is some sort of horrible burnt flavour. What’s happened? Why has the ‘hit’ suddenly changed like that? And how can you put it right and prevent it from happening again?
Is your tank’s coil head at fault?
Should you vape using a tank, you ought to think first about the age of your device’s coil head. If the device is otherwise operating perfectly fine, then it could well be you’ve a burnt coil or, yes, the coil’s too old. Don’t forget; vaping should never produce burnt hits, so replace a burnt coil head with a new one.
Should you turn down the wattage?
A good rule for vaping is that when the ohms are high, the wattage ought to be low – and vice versa. Otherwise, you can check how best to vape according to the taste of the e liquid flavours ; if it doesn’t taste as it surely should, then it’s a good idea to alter the setting and find a better one – and that may very well turning down the wattage. Indeed, should you be vaping when the watts are particularly high then there’s a better chance your e-liquid might taste burnt.
Are you controlling the temperature?
You might not be, but using a temperature control with your device, especially if you have a mod with coils made from nickel, stainless-steel or titanium, ensures you can restrict the temperature you vape at – and, yes, that could also avoid a burnt taste over and over again.
Should you slow down?
Allowing your coil-wick more time to ‘wick up’ is another way to try to prevent a burnt taste. Sure, you may not consider that when you buy a new vaping device, but the reality is that not all atomisers are built the same, nor are they intended to be, so some will inevitably wick faster than others and those that wick slower could, yes, result in burnt flavours when you try chain-vaping.
Beware those hot spots
Has your coil developed pesky ‘hot spots’ – identifiable because they glow red – thus, causing burnt tastes? To be fair, you may not be able to see hot spots themselves, as your wicks will likely be fully saturated when they show up, but you may get a tip-off owing to the fact the burnt taste also has something of an unpleasant metallic tang to it.
Should you suspect your wicks have developed hot spots then, unfortunately, there’s no getting around it, you’ll have to remove the wicks – and then seek to get your coils pulsing evenly (which should help avoid further burnt hits) by softly pinching them with tweezers or strumming them with a suitably small screwdriver. The latter’s a good tip, for sure, so long as you don’t pinch or strum the coil in a conductive device while pushing the fire button; the result of doing that wouldn’t be fun!
How clean are your coils?
Cleaning anything’s rarely fun and pretty much always seems to be a burden, but cleaning your coils can certainly help prevent those pesky throat burns during vaping. To do it thoroughly, you might want to disassemble the atomiser and then rinse its coils with either an ultrasonic cleaner or warm water.
Could the weather be to blame?
Seems a bit extreme that the outside elements could be to blame for burnt hits, doesn’t it, but yes, they might just be. Extreme cold when you’re outside vaping may ensure e-juice in an e-cig or mod thickens and so doesn’t wick correctly; even if it contains far more propylene glycol (PG) than vegetable glycerine (VG) – usually, the opposite’s true. So, if it is seriously cold out of doors, it may be best to avoid vaping until it’s a little warmer; otherwise, you may not be able to avoid that dreaded burnt taste!