A hot vape tank can really put a damper on your vaping routine. If a tank gets hot enough, the mouthpiece can become quite uncomfortable against your lips. In some cases, you may feel the heat from your tank radiating into the body of your vaping device – and that might cause you to worry. Could a hot vape tank potentially be dangerous? Could it cause your battery to overheat?
Here’s the good news: In most cases, a hot vape tank is nothing but a minor inconvenience. Your tank will cool off on its own if you simply slow down your pace of vaping and put your mod down for a few minutes. If your tank starts to feel uncomfortably hot immediately when you begin vaping after a long rest, though, it may be a sign that you need to change something about the way you vape. So, why is your vape tank getting hot? Let’s discuss the likely reasons for that before we begin talking about some potential solutions.
Modern Vape Tanks Don't Overheat
The biggest reason why older-style vape tanks tend to get hot is because their coils contain massive amounts of metal. These heavy coils take a long time to heat up and even longer to cool down, and that means the heat will tend to transfer to your device and to the tank's mouthpiece. Modern vape tanks don't have that problem. If it's time for you to step up to a newer tank, here are a few of our favorites.
- Uwell Valyrian 3: Uwell has always been known as the company that you should choose if you want to buy a vape tank that prioritizes flavor above everything else. With the Valyrian 3, Uwell went in a slightly different direction and created a tank that combines superlative flavor with excellent vapor production. You're going to love this one.
- SMOK T-Air: If you've ever been frustrated by top-airflow tanks that never seem to work quite as well as you hope, the SMOK T-Air is the answer you've been waiting for. This tank's large top airflow vents allow plenty of air to enter, facilitating the production of huge clouds -- and the tank is almost completely silent when you use it.
- Freemax Gemm: If you're going to get rid of your overheating vape tank, why don't you eliminate coil replacements as well while you're at it? Sold in packs of two, the Freemax Gemm is a a modern vape tank with a high-end mesh coil for cool, smooth operation -- but it's also completely disposable. You can continue using and refilling the tank as long as you like, and when it burns out, you'll just throw it away. Sub-ohm tanks have never been more convenient.
Why Your Vape Tank Gets Hot
There are two common reasons why a vape tank might get hot. The first reason is that the tank has a metal mouthpiece that directly touches the tank’s chimney or coil. Since metal conducts heat, the heat from the coil will travel to your lips if that’s the case. Modern vape tanks get around that problem in two ways. One way is by placing an insulator between the tank’s chimney and mouthpiece. Another way is by not using a metal mouthpiece. Many modern vape tanks use Delrin or Ultem mouthpieces. Both of those materials are forms of plastic that conduct heat poorly and can help to keep your lips cool. If your vape tank is getting hot, then, one very simple solution is to replace the mouthpiece; the heat from the coil will stop reaching your lips.
The second reason why a vape tank might get hot is because it has a high-mass coil that takes a long time to heat up and retains heat for a while after you’ve stopped vaping. A few years ago, that’s how cloud chasing tanks worked; they used several heating wires that worked in tandem to generate vapor simultaneously – and when you’re using that much metal as your heating surface, it’s going to stay hot for a while after you’ve put your device down.
Thankfully, the best tanks don’t work that way anymore – which brings us to our first solution for fixing a hot vape tank.
Upgrade to a Modern Tank
The best thing that you can do to fix a tank that’s uncomfortably hot during operation is to replace it with a more modern vape tank. That’s partially because you get the modern conveniences described above, such as the integrated insulators that shield your lips from heat. It’s also because most modern tanks no longer use the dozen-wires-working-all-at-once design of the past generation of cloud chasing tanks. Instead, today’s tanks use strips of metal mesh that provide the same heating area with much lower metal mass. They heat up instantly, and they also dissipate heat quickly when you release your device’s fire button. Using a tank with a mesh coil really is a wonderful way to vape. Learn more about the benefits of mesh coils.
Install an Insulator Between the Tank and the Mod
Aftermarket insulators or spacers for vape tanks aren’t as common today as they used to be because, as mentioned above, excess residual heat just isn’t as common a problem with vape tanks as it once was. Today, vape tanks that require heat insulation have the required insulators built in. The most common insulator for vaping is polyether ether ketone (PEEK). If you can find one, a PEEK spacer that fits between your tank and your vaping device can keep the heat from radiating to the device and battery.
Confirm Your Battery’s Capabilities and Dial Down Your Vaping Wattage
Are you sure that your tank is the thing that’s getting hot, or is it actually possible that the heat is coming from your vape battery – or batteries – and radiating to your tank? If you’re a high-wattage vaper, you’re making your device’s battery work hard.
How hard is your battery working? Plug your device’s operating wattage and the resistance of your coil into an Ohm’s law calculator to find the amperage that your vaping configuration is drawing from your battery. You’ll probably find that the amperage being drawn is well below the maximum discharge rate printed on your battery’s wrapper – so you’re good, right?
Well, not exactly. The problem with batteries sold for use in vaping applications is that the brands selling those batteries are not actually the companies who made them. Battery cells are made by very large corporations such as Sony, Samsung, LG and Tesla. Those companies don’t sell batteries directly to the public, and they don’t market their batteries as vaping hardware.
When you buy a battery sold by a company such as EFest, then, what you’re actually getting is a cell from Sony, Samsung or another company packaged in an EFest wrapper. That wouldn’t be a problem except that some battery sellers are known to grossly exaggerate the capabilities of their products, sometimes to the point of completely falsifying the maximum discharge rates printed on their wrappers.
The only way to know a battery’s true safe maximum discharge rate is by testing it – and if you don’t have the equipment for that, you’ll just have to let someone else do the testing for you. Thankfully, people like Mooch of the E-Cigarette Forum have already done that work. If you can find a test for your battery, you’ll have a definitive idea of what the battery can handle and whether you’re using the battery past its safe discharge limit or not.
If you’re operating your device at or near the limit of your battery’s capabilities, you are probably stressing the battery and should strongly consider lowering your device’s operational wattage to keep the battery’s temperature down and prevent the excess heat from radiating to your tank.
Consider Whether Sub-Ohm Vaping Is Really for You
One final thing to remember about vaping is that, to a certain extent, heat is always going to be part of the equation when you’re using a sub-ohm tank. Anything that’s designed to produce large vapor clouds is going to get warm during operation, and the vapor that it produces will be warm as well. If that isn’t what you want from your vaping experience, you might be happier if you switch to a refillable pod system with nicotine salt e-liquid.
Learn more about the benefits of mouth-to-lung vaping and find out about the pros and cons of nicotine salt e-liquids.
Why might you consider switching from a sub-ohm vaping setup to a pod system? As we’ve just mentioned, if it bothers you that your vape tank gets hot during use, you might appreciate the fact that pod systems produce very cool, smooth vapor in comparison. In addition, most pod systems aren’t designed for direct-to-lung inhaling as sub-ohm tanks are. So, in addition to the fact that a pod system operates at a cooler temperature, the fact that you inhale the vapor from the mouth to the lungs further cools the vapor since you’re taking in additional air along with the vapor.
Switching from a sub-ohm vaping setup to a pod system doesn’t only mean that you’ll enjoy a cooler vapor temperature. A vaping device that operates at a cooler temperature also uses less e-liquid. Since you’ll be taking in smaller vapor clouds each time you vape, you won’t need to refill your device as often as you currently do – and you also won’t need to buy as much e-liquid. A pod system can dramatically cut your cost to vape.