How to use Temperature Control on an IPV without Nickel (ni200)

There is a lot of talk lately about the safety of vaping with nickle wire.  Health reasons aside, personally, I get a funky taste when using nickel builds in my RDA, so I have been staying away.  I also want to see more studies and reports regarding leaching toxic metals before I junp on the nickel band wagon.

So does that mean Temperature Controlled devices, like the IPV3 Li or the IPV 4S are not worth the money?  Not entirely.  With those devices, you can actually trick the devices to use the temperature control settings WITH Kanthal wire!  Granted, they arent as accurate as with using temperature sensing wire like ni200 or titanium, but if youre like me, and dont want to risk the possible health risks of using these wires just quite yet (or you have an allergic reaction to the metal), this is a great trick that you can use to still take advantage of this really neat feature.

But why is Temperature Control so popular?  Well its simple.  When you push your button on a regular wattage (regulated or unregulated) device, the device will continue to push power to the coil and the coil will get hotter and hotter and hotter.  With temperature control, you can set how hot you want your coil to fire, and regardless of how long you hold the power button down for, the coil will only get as hot as the temperature you set.  This is great for the life of your coil, saves on juice, AND will keep your coil within safe vaping parameters.

With both the IPV3 Li and the IPV4s by Pioneer4U, there is a feature that you can set the resistance of your coil.  You do this by pressing both the up and down arrow at the same time.  This is useful if you change your coils or RDA/Tanks frequently.  Always make sure you do this with each build so your device can fire the coil properly.  If you get burnt taste in tanks or your RDA is not firing as hot or quick as it should, be sure to check this setting.  Also as your coil gets more used, the ohms will increase over time, so its important to check this setting at least daily if not every few days, even if you dont swap out atomizers.

If you've downloaded and upgraded the most recent firmware on your IPV3 Li, it includes titanium support.  IPV4s comes that way by default.  If you have an original IPV4, you can download the 120 watt upgrade as well.  I prefer using the titanium setting as opposed to the nickel setting when using a standard Kanthal build because it allows me to adjust the Joules higher than 50.  Joules is essentially the same as watts, in that it will determine how quickly your coil heats up.  I usually use between 50-65 Joules when running in temp control mode because I build around a .2 to .35 ohm standard dual coil.  If you dont vape higher than 50 watts, then you can use either the nickel or the titanium setting.  they operate the same way when using Kanthal.

Here's where the magic happens.  If you set your proper resistance and use the titanium (or nickel setting) on these devices, even with Kanthal wire, I have found that the coil doesnt get AS hot as if you were just running in standard power mode.  The benefits of this is, you will not get as many dry (or burnt) drags, even when the cotton isnt fully dry AND you will be able to dry out your cotton much better than with normal power mode.  I find I can get anywhere from 8 to 10 more drags using the temperature setting than with regular power mode.

I have been using this trick since I first purchased my IPV4, and I used it with my IPV3 Li.  Both devices handle this trick really well, so much so that I hardly ever use power mode (except when first building and firing off my coils between cotton changes).

Unfortunately not all temperature sensing devices are equal.  This trick will NOT work in the Snow Wolf or any other device that automatically senses whether or not youre using a nickel or titanium wire.

So until we get a definitive answer regarding the safety of using specialty wire, its nice to know that there are workarounds for those of us who want to take advantage of the temperature control settings while using normal Kathal wire builds.  Give it a try and let me know your experience in the comment section.