Simon G
Olympian
- Joined
- Apr 12, 2016
- Messages
- 26,295
This was sent to me by Sue @Healthcabin for review. Some of you may have seen Todd's Review on YouTube a couple of months ago where he put a disclaimer at the front of the video saying that he'd fried the mod by putting the battery in the wrong way and that KSL Vapor were replacing those mods and all new mods would be fixed going forward from the 18th August so this shouldn't be an issue. At that time there was no battery orientation marks either. On my mod the battery orientation is now marked negative on the battery cap, the mod version is also showing at V2.0 on the firmware. This mod appears to be a new batch at Health Cabin, So I'm presuming this is not an issue and no longer a concern. I'm not going to try reversing the battery because I don't have the ability to test that in a safe environment. So with that out of the way, lets get on with my own experience.
Other than the mod there's not a lot else in the box to talk about, just a manual, warranty card and a short USB cable. I did plug the mod in to test that it charged via USB and it worked fine, although as always it's recommended to charge your batteries externally. I did check the KSL website to see if there was any updatable firmware and there wasn't so I'm not sure if the mod has that ability or not.
Aesthetically this mod certainly has 'a thing' going on. I expect it was inspired by a 'high end' mod I've never heard of and yeah, it does look the part. The main part of the body is a rubbery paint coated zinc alloy frame and the battery tube and cap seems to be made of aluminium. The stainless steel 510 connection is screwed down with 3 small torx bolts. It's a cup/dish design and will take up to a 24mm atomiser. If your 24mm tank has a bulgy AFC ring at the bottom then you could run into trouble. A 25mm tank will not work. The front fascia is what I call 'plasti-chrome' this usually holds up well over time but continuous rubbing from your hand and fingers in use can cause this to dull and wear. Anyone who owned and used an original eleaf pico will know what I'm talking about. Overall though the quality and construction is fine for a mod of this price.
I really like the battery tube and battery cap especially, with it's brushed finish. It's a fairly light mod too, just 134g and 181g with a (single 18650) battery inside. This is pretty much the perfect weight, it's heavy enough to not feel top heavy with a full tank on top but light enough not to feel like a brick in your pocket. Running it down to the 'low battery' warning the mod cuts off at 3.3v, which is slightly higher than a typical 3.1/3.2v, but overall it does seem pretty decent on batteries.
In use, it's a mix of good and not so good. Many of the features are enabled with button presses rather than through a menu and that does make navigation a little awkward at times. 5 clicks will access the 'menu' but in that menu the only options available are a screen brightness control (which is welcome, it's bright as standard), there's 'version' which says '2.0', exit and power off. It feels a little odd that there's nothing else in the options. 3 clicks will let you switch between Power, 'Mech' and a few TC options, Ni, Ti, SS316 and SS317 (more about TC later) this is done directly on the screen not through a menu. In power (watts) mode pushing the up and down buttons at the same time will lock the up/down buttons but still let you fire. In TC mode you push up and down together to change the wattage and Temp and fire to confirm. Down and fire will make the mod read the resistance of the coil and let you adjust it. When I first switched to TC mode the mod was reading the coil way under what it actually was and screwing the atomiser on and off didn't make any difference at all, it seems in TC mode it won't automatically read the coil and you have to do the process above to make it read the coil. This is slightly annoying but I can see the point, it removes the accidental reading of a warm coil and once you either read the cool coil or set the resistance of the coil then that's locked in and it can do it's TC thing correctly...... in theory anyway. Aside from the slightly clunky user interface, using this is power mode is no bother at all, other than feeling a little under powered (I was often vaping a watt or two higher than I usually do).
In SS316 TC I didn't manage to get a vape I was happy with. It would do a lot of sudden dropping of power and just didn't feel as smooth and controlled as some of my other mods. I'm sure it would stop you getting dry hits but the TC experience was a little lacking for how I vape. With a different wire and set up differently it might be better, but I can't recommend using it for TC based on my experience. I'm enjoying using it a lot though and as long as you don't need TC then I don't have any major complaints. If you need TC or have a lot of larger sized tanks and attys then it's not going to be a good choice. The user interface is also a negative for me, it's alright once you get used to it but it's not very intuitive and I did need to look up some things in the manual. I think it's better as a 'set and forget' mod because it isn't fun to play around with the menus and functions.
Overall this mod looks and feels very 'retro' to me … The styling, the interface, the monochrome screen. That will either have a lot of appeal or be a big turn off depending on what you are into. It feels really nice in the hand and it's super comfortable to use. It's a good weight and it looks very cool. If you are after a stylish single 18650 mod to use in power mode, or the bypass 'mech' mode which also works well, then I don't have a reason not to recommend it. I said before that it has a rubbery coating but actually it doesn't feel like rubber, it's not soft and 'bouncy' ... it's more like a smooth hard velvety matt finish paint. It's feels 'soft' but when you tap it on a wooden table it's clearly a hard finish.
It's a very different style to most of the more mainstream mods, so if you are looking for something that stands out on a budget then I think this is worth considering, this mod has been growing on me a lot over the last couple of days. I'm thinking that this will end up my new daily driver. It really is the perfect size, weight and shape for me. It's going to get a lot of use.
It's also available in white and can be found at Health Cabin here.
New customers at HealthCabin can get an extra 10% off the price, as always sign in to check all available offers and discounts as these can vary. If you want a serious bargain then I noticed the Vaporesso Target Mini Kit is just $9.99 at the moment.
Thanks again to Sue at Health Cabin.
Other than the mod there's not a lot else in the box to talk about, just a manual, warranty card and a short USB cable. I did plug the mod in to test that it charged via USB and it worked fine, although as always it's recommended to charge your batteries externally. I did check the KSL website to see if there was any updatable firmware and there wasn't so I'm not sure if the mod has that ability or not.
Aesthetically this mod certainly has 'a thing' going on. I expect it was inspired by a 'high end' mod I've never heard of and yeah, it does look the part. The main part of the body is a rubbery paint coated zinc alloy frame and the battery tube and cap seems to be made of aluminium. The stainless steel 510 connection is screwed down with 3 small torx bolts. It's a cup/dish design and will take up to a 24mm atomiser. If your 24mm tank has a bulgy AFC ring at the bottom then you could run into trouble. A 25mm tank will not work. The front fascia is what I call 'plasti-chrome' this usually holds up well over time but continuous rubbing from your hand and fingers in use can cause this to dull and wear. Anyone who owned and used an original eleaf pico will know what I'm talking about. Overall though the quality and construction is fine for a mod of this price.
I really like the battery tube and battery cap especially, with it's brushed finish. It's a fairly light mod too, just 134g and 181g with a (single 18650) battery inside. This is pretty much the perfect weight, it's heavy enough to not feel top heavy with a full tank on top but light enough not to feel like a brick in your pocket. Running it down to the 'low battery' warning the mod cuts off at 3.3v, which is slightly higher than a typical 3.1/3.2v, but overall it does seem pretty decent on batteries.
In use, it's a mix of good and not so good. Many of the features are enabled with button presses rather than through a menu and that does make navigation a little awkward at times. 5 clicks will access the 'menu' but in that menu the only options available are a screen brightness control (which is welcome, it's bright as standard), there's 'version' which says '2.0', exit and power off. It feels a little odd that there's nothing else in the options. 3 clicks will let you switch between Power, 'Mech' and a few TC options, Ni, Ti, SS316 and SS317 (more about TC later) this is done directly on the screen not through a menu. In power (watts) mode pushing the up and down buttons at the same time will lock the up/down buttons but still let you fire. In TC mode you push up and down together to change the wattage and Temp and fire to confirm. Down and fire will make the mod read the resistance of the coil and let you adjust it. When I first switched to TC mode the mod was reading the coil way under what it actually was and screwing the atomiser on and off didn't make any difference at all, it seems in TC mode it won't automatically read the coil and you have to do the process above to make it read the coil. This is slightly annoying but I can see the point, it removes the accidental reading of a warm coil and once you either read the cool coil or set the resistance of the coil then that's locked in and it can do it's TC thing correctly...... in theory anyway. Aside from the slightly clunky user interface, using this is power mode is no bother at all, other than feeling a little under powered (I was often vaping a watt or two higher than I usually do).
In SS316 TC I didn't manage to get a vape I was happy with. It would do a lot of sudden dropping of power and just didn't feel as smooth and controlled as some of my other mods. I'm sure it would stop you getting dry hits but the TC experience was a little lacking for how I vape. With a different wire and set up differently it might be better, but I can't recommend using it for TC based on my experience. I'm enjoying using it a lot though and as long as you don't need TC then I don't have any major complaints. If you need TC or have a lot of larger sized tanks and attys then it's not going to be a good choice. The user interface is also a negative for me, it's alright once you get used to it but it's not very intuitive and I did need to look up some things in the manual. I think it's better as a 'set and forget' mod because it isn't fun to play around with the menus and functions.
Overall this mod looks and feels very 'retro' to me … The styling, the interface, the monochrome screen. That will either have a lot of appeal or be a big turn off depending on what you are into. It feels really nice in the hand and it's super comfortable to use. It's a good weight and it looks very cool. If you are after a stylish single 18650 mod to use in power mode, or the bypass 'mech' mode which also works well, then I don't have a reason not to recommend it. I said before that it has a rubbery coating but actually it doesn't feel like rubber, it's not soft and 'bouncy' ... it's more like a smooth hard velvety matt finish paint. It's feels 'soft' but when you tap it on a wooden table it's clearly a hard finish.
It's a very different style to most of the more mainstream mods, so if you are looking for something that stands out on a budget then I think this is worth considering, this mod has been growing on me a lot over the last couple of days. I'm thinking that this will end up my new daily driver. It really is the perfect size, weight and shape for me. It's going to get a lot of use.
It's also available in white and can be found at Health Cabin here.
New customers at HealthCabin can get an extra 10% off the price, as always sign in to check all available offers and discounts as these can vary. If you want a serious bargain then I noticed the Vaporesso Target Mini Kit is just $9.99 at the moment.
Thanks again to Sue at Health Cabin.
That's not really an issue for most people because it seems hardly anyone uses any of the 'advanced features' and 'modes' commonly found on mods anyway. As long at you aren't expecting it to do any of that stuff then I don't think you'd be disappointed. The only real downside was TC not working very well for me, but I can live without it just fine.
