I have been looking into hardware to use as an electronic vaporizer, not for the sake of saving cash or discrediting other praised hardware like GVG og vulcano-type vaporizers, but rather for the sheer fun of tinkering and tweaking. Figuring out the middle ground between theory and practice when it comes to convective heating and gentle vaporisation etc.
After digging around on Aliexpress (aka communist Ebay, pun intended), I got a hot air gun station for soldering with adjustable temperature (100-450⁰C) and air flow (up to 120L/min).
http://www.aliexpress.co...ade-from/1966416691.htmlJudging from the building materials, it doesn't seem contain any lead, mercury, chrome or other nasty stuff. The heater element is basically just a resistive coil wrapped in a tube of mica foil, with a small brush-less fan supplying air flow and a stainless steel tube as outer support. I looked up material data on the mica foil and it seems to be basic mica from what I can tell, heat resistant and without toxins. I'm willing to take my chances, though I can't confirm it's totally idiot proof regarding potential health risks.
There is a few drawbacks of course, I had to run it a while before the air stopped smelling of plastic. Hopefully I got most of the residual solvents from production out.
As pipe for the changa, I have a 24/29 glass dripper for lab glass condensers, some tin foil for hookahs and a pad carved out of a ceramic foam filter disk for molten metal (zircona ceramics). The filter disc isn't all that necessary, but you can make two of them for $12.5 + $10.2 shipping to Europe.
After trying different temperatures I found that 165⁰C seems to work ok, first I preheat the changa with low air flow at about 160⁰C, then I flick it up to 165⁰C and add more air flow until the pipe is filled with dense white fog.
This works surprisingly well so far.
Next I'm going to try using oven turkey bags like Ann does in here:
https://www.dmt-nexus.me...&m=700090#post700090 She beat me to it obviously, at least with using hot air guns with thermostat and adjustable temp. If there is any notable differences concept wise, then I prefer to have more room for tweaking the air flow.
Money spent so far (roughly):
Hot air gun station, $48
Ceramic foam disc (optional), $12.5+$10.2
24/29 adapter, condenser tap, $6
(On a side note, I got a feeling the origin of vulcano-type vaporizers had something to do with stoners who couldn't be assed to hold a air gun while filling up owen bags with vapor, as well as being prone to finger burns.)
ManicMongrel attached the following image(s):
pipe.jpg
(563kb) downloaded 175 time(s). solderingstation.jpg
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