RDA Review: Vandy Vape Original Clone

Update 5 Nov 22 - The Vandy Original clone is no longer recommended owing to the the build deck being a self-contained unit and practically impossible to dismantle for cleaning/fault finding.  Current advice is to go for the Mesh Pro clone instead.

Two Vandy Vape clones arrived from the Runvape store on Aliexpress..

Hitherto I've been assured that these are of equal quality and indistinguishable from the originals. However, from my experience today I have to disagree. Here are my observations..

• One of these looked visually identical to the Vandy Original complete with logo etc, the other was plain with barely any markings which is interesting.

There are a few important quality issues as follows ...

• When I first fitted a mesh to one of the Knockoffs, the coil resistance was detected at 0.26Ω, which is far higher than it should be. Plus, the "No Toke" wattage check was varying wildly between 3->9W. Not Good!

This was rectified by the following...

1. Unscrewed and removed the 510 centre pin (taking care not to drop and lose the plastic insulator) and polished the base and thread of the centre pin with Solvol Autosol polish. Cleaned afterwards with WD40

2. Squirted WD40 into the hole where the centre pin would normally fit.

3. Sprayed WD40 on the mesh screws/contact blocks and repeatedly tightened and loosened

4. Shake dry, wipe off excess and dry thoroughly, reassembled and remembered to do a good burnoff before vaping

In case of concerns from the fumes, I've had 2 reports of success from using isopropyl alcohol - soaking overnight and cleaning the dismantled RDA. From the point of residual fumes, it might be preferable to use this, but my own preference would still definitely be for WD40 drenching and a through polishing of anything which makes electrical contact, working all screws in and out multiple times etc.

• Following the above, the mesh resistance reading had dropped to 0.21Ω but the "No Toke" wattage was rock steady at 5.4W. Much more constant than even my genuine Vandy. Success!

• Also, the mesh terminal screws are non-captive. Unlike the original, if you unscrew them too far they will fall out and easily become lost.

• Compared to my original, the mesh terminal blocks are a much looser fit in the housing and seem to be slightly magnetic to want to close when the screws are loose. This makes installing the mesh a frustrating operation, but not impossible.

• The mesh body is a much looser fit on the RDA base than the Original, and far more so than I'd ideally prefer. Upon inspection, the two O rings on the RDA base are slightly thinner on the Knockoff. I tried replacing them with the spare O rings from my Original but then the fit was too tight. Luckily, I have an assorted set of O rings (purchased from Lidl - see pic background) and managed to find some to fit OK when smeared with Vaseline. Edit 30 April 2021 - I've now decided that these new rings are a little too tight so for now I've switched back to the originals and will just live with them until I can get round to ordering some better fitting ones.

• The O ring in the cap was slightly too small to provide a secure fit for the extended driptip adapter. I replaced this with the spare from my genuine Vandy Original and this solved the issue.

• The other knockoff seemed electrically fine from the box but I gave it the same treatment, just to be sure.

Vaping - After sorting out the above issues I can report that it's now perfect for vaping from. 

Verdict - Mine were OK with a little fettling but the build deck being a non-dismantling self contained unit is a serious disadvantage. Consider the Mesh Pro instead.