How to Make Your Vape Coils Last Longer?

Vaping is meant to be relaxing, right?

And the last thing you want to think about when you’re relaxing are chores and maintenance.

Yuck!

But… for the best vaping experience, this yucky activity is sometimes a prerequisite. You think about your battery. The taste of your vape juice. And, of course, you worry about how to make your e-juice vape pen coils last longer.

This one is a biggie.

The cost and effort of maintaining all these parts can make starting intimidating, especially when it comes to keeping your vape coils in tip top shape. 

Many new vapers find that their coils burn out incredibly quickly, and since there’s no genuine warranty on vape coils, new vapers wind up spending a lot of time and money replacing their coils.

But is that necessary? Is there a way to enjoy your vape without burning through coils like it’s an Olympic sport?

And more importantly, how do you know when your coil is done for and it’s time to replace them?

To help you out, I’ve put together this resource dedicated to the topic of vape coil care. I’ll be answering all of your questions about this vital component of your vaping setup, covering how to make your coils last longer and save you money too!

Let’s get into it!

What Are Vape Coils, Anyways?
Alright, so most of you already know this information and can feel pretty safe in skipping ahead to the next section on coil degradation… 

But, better safe than sorry… and I don’t want any newbies feeling bewildered.
So here’s the run-down on what vape coils are, just in case.

A vape coil is a core part of an electronic cigarette. It is the part that heats up and creates vapor from your juice.  These coils work by pulling energy from your vape pen’s battery and converting that to heat, which they then use to vaporize the juice that has been soaked up by the wicking material.

It is fairly common to burn through about a coil a week, but with proper maintenance and care, you can get a bit more life out of your gear. An experienced vaper, using a quality coil, can get a month or more out of their coils! 

Types of Vape Coils
Most vape coils are made of nichrome or kanthal, but there are a ton of other materials they might be made from such as nickel, titanium, or stainless steel. 
It’s easy to wind up overwhelmed with all the choices when you are trying to decide on a new coil to try out, as each metal and coil configuration comes with their own pros and cons.  

In the end, it’s not the metal that matters when it comes to choosing the vape coil for you, but rather the type of resistance that they offer. 

Resistance is measured in Ohms, which is what that weird number next to the brand name on your vape coil’s package is trying to tell you. I could get into the weeds explaining electrical resistance as it pertains to vaping, but the main thing you want to remember is that anything above 1.0 ohm is considered a high resistance coil, and anything below that is a low resistance coil.  

3 Tips That Will Help Your Vape Coils Last Longer  

Prime Your Coils

When you bring home your new coils from the shop, it’s tempting to just toss the old coil in the trash, screw on the new one, and puff on your merry way with no extra steps whatsoever.  While you certainly can do this, it’s not the kindest thing to do to your new gear and can lead it towards a quick demise.  In order to get the most puffs for your buck, you really want to prime that coil before you use it properly.  

·STEP #1 — screw on the new coil. A bit of an obvious thing, perhaps, but attaching your coil to the pen before doing anything else will help prevent you getting any vape juice on your fingers trying to screw it on after.

·STEP #2 — saturate your wicking material. If you look closely at your coil, you should see a couple of holes in the metal, through which you can see the wicking material. On some coils, this material will stick out and be fairly obvious, while on others you can only see the material through the holes of the coil. Either way, what you need to do is use a dropper to carefully dribble some of your vape juice onto the wick. This might take only one or two drops or perhaps a full dropper depending on your coil, but you will know that it is saturated once it stops immediately sucking up the juice that you put on the material.

·STEP #3 — fill your tank and attach it to the battery. Get everything ready to go like you normally would, though you aren’t done quite yet.

·STEP #4 — take 4-5 hits without using the fire button on your pen. This helps to pull the vape juice from your tank into your coil, ensuring that it is fully saturated before you take your first proper pull.  Be careful not to take too many dry hits though, or you risk flooding your coil.

·STEP #5 — enjoy! Not only should your coil now be properly saturated and ready to go, but the flavor of your first few hits should be far improved than if you had just started vaping without priming your new coil.  

Keep Your Vape Coils Clean

The biggest thing you can do to keep your coils fresh is to clean them. This is a little bit tedious, but it’s an important step to take. When you don’t clean your coils, the old juice from your tank clings to the coil, congeals, and eventually comes out of your pen as a horrible burnt taste.  Ewww! Not to mention all that build up weakens the metal of your coil, causing it to degrade faster — which is what we are trying to prevent. 

The easiest way to clean your coil is to simply remove it from your device and rinse it under hot running water.  Do your best to clear out as much of the old juice as possible, though the hot water should make this a fairly easy task.  When you are done, shake out the excess water and leave it to dry on a paper towel.  Make sure your coil is completely dry before reattaching it to your pen! 

When you vape on a freshly cleaned coil, you’ll notice that it tastes much better than it did before! Maybe Mom really was onto something when she harped on us about keeping our things clean.  I won’t tell her if you don’t.  

Don’t Misuse Your Coils
While vaping is a fairly simple process, there are still a couple of techniques that bear emphasizing when you are looking to get the most possible use out of your vape coils. 

·Avoid dry hits — that is, avoid hitting your pen’s fire button when your vape coil is insufficiently saturated. This is the biggest one, really. Not only do dry hits taste terrible, they are very hard on your device. Give your device a couple of seconds between each hit so the coil can cool down and your wick can absorb more juice. Patience is a virtue!

·Don’t run the vape pen on an empty tank — we all like to be thrifty. I can probably assume that you, a reader looking to extend the life of their vape coils, tend to want to use up every last drop of their juice before refilling the tank. It’s an understandable impulse, but remember that if your coil doesn’t have enough juice to saturate the wick, you are burning through your coil’s lifespan.Keep an eye on the levels in your tank and try to never take a pull from your pen with it empty. 

·Keep the wattage down — unless you are performing for an audience or a judge, running your pen above 80W is just wasting energy, juice, and the longevity of your coil.  

Go Get the Most Out of Your Vape Coils
While no one wants to make their recreational activities into a hassle, a little bit of bother can go a long way towards extending the life of your vape coils and keeping your hits flavorful and fresh.  

Remembering to adequately prime your new coils before use, keep them rinsed out, and avoid putting too much stress on your device will keep you from having to hit the vape shot every week to keep your pen functioning and those clouds flowing. As an added bonus, the flavor will be better too!