Introduction
There are a lot of very good MTL RTAs available, usually my main considerations when reviewing them is flavor and throat hit.
This RTA offers something a little different, but equally important; it’s pretty much fool-proof.
Product overview
The Dead Rabbit MTL RTA measures 23mm, comes with the choice of 2ml and 4ml tanks and four airflow settings.
What do you get?
- Dead Rabbit MTL RTA (fitted with 2ml glass)
- 4ml glass+extension
- 1×0.7ohm Ni80 claptop
- 1×shoelace cotton
- spares+tool
- alternative drip-tip
First impressions
While the actual RTA aesthetics are reasonably restrained and in line with other recent Dead Rabbit releases, the 22mm, two part, reverse tapered drip-tip is far less restrained. It does come with a far more conservative (ie. boring) black delrin drip-tip, but the 22mm monstrosity works really well, so it’s staying in place on my RTA.
Build
- Coiling - the deck is a standard opposing post design with large lips on the posts that making catching the coil leads extremely easy. Drop the coil in, secure/align it/snip the leads and you’re done. The only thing it’s missing is somewhere to rest a coiling rod.
- Wicking - the DR MTL RTA is very easy to wick. Due to the honeycomb juice flow ports, you can thin the cotton a lot, which results in excellent wicking and no hint of leakage, moisture or flooding.
I can’t overemphasize how well it wicks, I have the amount of bubbles in the tank that I’d expect from a dual-coil RTA.
Tank extension
This isn’t the first Hellvape MTL RTA that I’ve had with a tank extension, the Vertex RTA had one; it required a tool to remove, was almost impossible to remove and was generally horrible.
The DR MTL RTA’s tank extension is very different. It comprises the tank, chamber and top-fill section in one; you just screw it on/off as you would when building. No tools, no chimney extensions, etc. This is how every tank extension should be done.
Airflow
While there is an airflow control ring, it’s a little different. Rotating the airflow ring exposes one of four airflow paths to the underside of the coil. While it doesn’t allow you to fine tune the airflow precisely, it does give the options of 0.8, 1.2, 1.4 and 1.6mm.
I’m assuming this contributes to the lack of leakage/moisture that I’ve been experiencing.
How does it perform?
- 28g round wire, 2.5mm 1ohm - this was a nice build for an apple tobacco juice. The overall flavor was good and it picked up the subtle apple flavor very well. From 12w with the 0.8mm airflow setting to 16w with the 1.4mm setting was good. I did try it fully open at 18w, but it seemed a little more power than was suitable for a round wire build in this RTA.
- supplied coil - while detailed specs were not given, it seemed very similar to the 30g superfine MTL claptons that I use in most MTL builds. Either way, it was really good. The tightest airflow setting wasn’t so great for this coil, but 1.2, 1.4 and 1.6mm were very nice. 1.2mm at 14w gave a very satisfying semi-tight MTL vape with very nice throat hit, 1.6mm at 20w was getting into loose MTL territory.
Overall flavor. While the flavor was very good, it wasn’t quite in the league of something like the Labs RTA, but there isn’t much in it (and it is about half the price of the Labs RTA)
Conclusion
There isn’t anything to negative to say about this RTA. It performs well with different coils and throughout its airflow settings. It’s very easy to build and wicks extremely well.
I wouldn’t go so far as to recommend it as a replacement for a Pioneer, Labs or Bishop – but as a backup, or as a fool-proof first MTL RTA, it would be a great choice.
Disclaimer
The Dead Rabbit MTL RTA was provided for this review by Sourcemore who currently have it stock from $19.39
