The Artery PAL 2 was sent to me for review from HeavenGifts.com. You can get it from them for about $35 (affiliate).
So it wasn’t that long ago that I reviewed the original Artery PAL, even though it’s been out for quite a while now. The draw was a little too airy for me and the coils were just average, but some people like an airy draw so that’s just personal preference and the device looked great. But now I’m here with the Artery PAL II, and while it looks similar in form factor on the outside, it’s totally different on the inside.
So this one was developed in partnership with Tony B. From the Vapor Trail Channel. He didn’t design it himself, but he collaborated with them on making sure it’s a really good device. Tony has said that he prefers higher powered vapes but that he did this because he believes these devices are good for beginners and for general on-the-go vaping for anybody. And while he might believe that devices like this aren’t his forte, I’d argue that with all of his squonking experience, particularly with single coil setups, he knows more about it than he thinks, which is evident in the final product here.
Specs:
- 83mm tall, 17mm thick, 43 wide
- Material: 6063 aluminum
- Voltage: 3.2 to 4.2 volts
- 1000 mAh battery
- 3ml capacity (2ml in EU)
- Colors: Purple, Red, Gunmetal, and Black
In The Box:
- PAL 2
- 2 coils (one preinstalled)
- Pod plug
- 2 extra o-rings
- USB cable
Design
This looks a lot like the original PAL but with a more modernized look. This time around, you can only remove one plate, so there’s no possibility of Artery selling removable plates to change up the look. That’s not a problem, just something I wanted to point out.
The body is made of 6063 aluminum, which was used to make it very light while also being durable. The PAL 2 also has an anodized finish to prevent any sort of paint issues, such as chipping.
It’s a very nice portable size at 83mm tall, 17mm thick, and 43mm from front to back.
Mouthpiece
The mouthpiece is small and skinny, which makes it very comfortable. I like the feel of it. One thing I’ve noticed is that if your mouth doesn’t cover the entire thing, it can get hot and burn your lip, so just make sure you cover the entire mouthpiece.
Device Cover
You pull off the plate to get access to the pod. The magnets are nice and strong and I don’t have any issues with the plate moving around or falling off in my pocket.
Under this is a rectangular indent, which I have no idea what its purpose is. Maybe it’s to hold something in place on the inside of the device. But as far as I know, it doesn’t do anything.
The Battery and Output
One of Tony’s requests of Artery was to make sure it had at least a 1,000 mAh battery, so that’s what Artery did. It’s a big battery for a little device, so it’ll last you a good amount of time before needing to be recharged. I’ve been using this thing a lot and the battery life is excellent.
The PAL 2 basically runs in bypass mode, so you get as much wattage as the battery has charge. I’ll talk more about that when I discuss each coil, but basically, it works perfectly for each coil.
Safety Protections:
- Overcharge
- Overheat
- 8-second timeout
- Short circuit
The Pod
The pod is basically a big block of plastic that contains a replaceable coil head. It comes in either 2ml for the UK or 3ml sizes for everywhere else and the pod is really cheap at only around $6 for a replacement (affiliate). Since you only need to replace the coils, you probably won’t need to replace this entire pod often, if ever at all, but if you want to keep a few spares around with different e-juices in them, it’s a nice option.
The coil heads cost about $8 for a pack of five (affiliate), so that’s also really affordable. The low costs for the pods and coils were also some of the requests that Tony made and it’s great to see that Artery listened.
To get the pod out you need to push down and then pull it out. It’s held in really tight, which I like so that it doesn’t pop out of place, but it’s also a little annoying trying to get it out.
Once the pod is out, you have access to the coil, which is held in place with an airflow ring. So to get that coil out, you need to unscrew from the airflow ring. It’s really simple for anyone to use.
There are two coils that come in the kit. One is a mesh coil and the other is a single round wire coil. Both coils use a cotton and wood pulp mix all woven together to create the wick. I’ve seen with other coils that this type of mixture tends to work really well for performance and for longevity.
- The 0.6-ohm mesh coil is rated best between 15-23 watts. It doesn’t matter in the PAL since you can’t adjust wattage, but it’ll give you an idea of what you’re getting. On a fully charged battery, you’ll be getting around 29 watts and it’ll drop as low as about 17 watts when the battery is just about dead. Artery says this coil is best with 70VG e-juice with either a max of 8mg regular nicotine or 20mg salt nicotine. You can get some pretty good hits from this coil head. It performs well, no dry hits from chain vaping, and produces a lot of vapor. Since this is a mesh coil, I expected the flavor to be decent, but it’s just okay. I get some flavor, but I think it should be better.
- The 1.2-ohm coil is rated best between 7-12 watts. On a fully charged battery, you’ll be getting around 14 watts and it’ll drop as low as about 8 watts when the battery is just about dead. Artery says these coils are good to run 50VG e-juice with a max of 18mg regular nicotine or 50mg salt nicotine. They also perform well. They wick fast enough to keep up with chain vaping and they deliver a good hit, but there is even less flavor than the mesh coil.
So these coils work fine for getting good hits, but the flavor isn’t all that great. They are okay though. These coils are totally different than the coils that were used in the first PAL, so they won’t work in that one and the original coils won’t work in this new PAL.
Filling The Pod and E-Juice Levels
To fill it up, you pull out the plug and fill it up. Artery also included a spare plug in case you lose one, which is great because if you didn’t have a plug on here, it would be useless. What’s nice about how this is setup is that you can fill it up while it’s still in the device. And the fill port is big enough so that you won’t be making a huge mess trying to fit an e-juice bottle tip in there.
One of the drawbacks here is that you need to take the door off and pull the entire pod out to see the e-juice levels. Some people might not care, but that’s always one of my biggest pet peeves with pod devices. I want to be able to see my e-juice levels with a quick glance. Not only is that not possible with the PAL 2, but you actually have to pull the entire pod out to see through it because it’s too dark to see through while it’s installed. That’s really annoying. They should have made the pod see-through.
Airflow
The airflow comes in from the side of the device and leads to the bottom of the coil. What’s interesting here is that Artery created a small channel on those airflow slots. This was a major problem with the original PAL because it was easy to accidentally cover those airflow holes while trying to vape. But with this channel, even if you did accidentally cover those holds, airflow would still make its way in. With the new design, that doesn’t seem to be a problem anymore anyway, but still a nice addition to the device.
Another great addition in the new PAL is that it has adjustable airflow. The original had only an airy draw, which is fine for people who like that type of vaping, but for anyone else, it just kind of sucks. The new PAL has this new airflow control ring that connects to the bottom of the coil head, which is awesome because now anybody can set it to whatever they prefer.
You can adjust the airflow while the pod is installed, but it’s really hard to get your fingers in there. You can rub your finger across it to turn it, and that will work if you get it just right, but it’s much easier to adjust by pulling the pod out. It’s a little annoying, but once you find the sweet spot, you’ll most likely leave it there all the time.
Final Thoughts
That’s It for the Artery PAL 2. To give you a quick summary…
I like:
- The small compact size
- The mouthpiece is comfortable
- Adjustable airflow
- The price of replaceable coil heads and the pod cartridge
- The long-lasting battery
- The performance of the coils
I dislike:
- The difficulty of removing the cartridge
- Not being able to see the e-juice levels
- Difficult to adjust the airflow
- The flavor isn’t great
The Artery PAL 2 was sent to me for review from HeavenGifts.com. You can get it from them for about $35 (affiliate). Or if you’re looking for a different type of pod system check out HeavenGifts for more.