The Mechman 228 was sent to me for review directly from Rincoe (check it out here). Despite the name, this isn’t a mechanical device. It’s regulated. The Mechman gets its name for its mecha-robot-style appearance.
Specs
- 228 watts max
- Size: 53.8 x 29.2 x 90mm (2.1 x 1.2 x 3.5 inches)
- Temperature Control modes
- Price: $59.90 for the kit (items not sold separately)
The Design
So like I mentioned earlier, this definitely has that anime mech-robot style going on here. It’s pretty cool looking. Makes it look tough too.
The panels have some cool designs too. There are four main sticker designs to pick from; UK flag, camouflaged, wolf, and US flag.
And for each design, there are three different designs for the outer metal, which they call steel case, steel bone, and steel wings.
And on top of that, there are two different finishes; black or stainless steel.
So just four main styles but plenty of options to pick from overall. I love the way that American flag model looks. Rincoe definitely knows what appeals to their customers!
And what’s really awesome is that Rincoe says that you can buy the panels separately, so you can swap out any style and design that you want. But one important thing on this – I can’t find the pictures that go inside the panel available to purchase anywhere. But if you can find them, what you would do is unscrew the metal exterior and then exchange the picture. This side of the device doesn’t come off, so it’s a little work, but it’s possible.
Even if you can’t find the authentic stickers, you can easily change the design to whatever you want as long as you cut the sticker the specifications that Rincoe recommends, which is 46mm wide x 81mm tall. A plain piece of paper isn’t going to last long, so if you make your own, you’re going to have to find a way to laminate your printout or maybe use photo paper.
The panel on the battery side sits really tight on the device and doesn’t wiggle around or anything, so it fits nice.
As for the size, it’s a fairly big device. Not enormous, but it’s what you’d expect from a dual-18650 device. It’s 2.1 inches thick, 2.1 inches wide, and 3.5 inches tall. It’s a little heavy too, but I think that really adds to the toughness and durability of this thing.
And with the rounded corners, it’s comfortable to hold and use. But one thing to note about those rounded corners is that it’s a little wobbly when it’s sitting on a table.
Modes & Functionality
To turn on the device, hit the fire button five times fast. This has a nice bright LED screen that shows your battery levels, the mode you’re in, the wattage or temperature you’re set at, how many seconds you hit the device, your ohm reading, and the voltage. The one thing I’ve noticed with the LED is that it’s hard to see outside in the sun.
If you want to lock the device, press and hold the up and down buttons at the same time. You can’t change settings but you can still fire it.
To get into the settings, hit the firing button three times fast while the device is on.
You have a few modes you can use, variable wattage mode, bypass mode, and then you get into the temperature control modes, which include nickel, titanium, and stainless steel.
Power mode works like normal. You adjust your wattage up or down and that’s basically it. The wattage moves in 0.1 increments until you get to 100 watts. I’m not a big fan of moving in such small increments, but it moves up and down really fast. You can run coils built between 0.08 and 5.0 ohms in power mode. 5 ohms is a new one to me. I’ve never seen a device fire a resistance that high. I can’t imagine why you would ever have a 5ohm build, but you can fire it if you have one!
You do have a bypass mode here too if you like to run your device as if it’s a mech mod. You still have the regulated chip protecting the device, but I know some people seem to like having this mode.
Temperature control mode also works as you’d hope. You can adjust the temperature between 200-600F (or 100-315C) and the device supports NI200, Titanium, and Stainless steel wire. In TC mode, you can fire coils with a resistance anywhere between 0.05 and 3.5 ohms, but Rincoe recommends 0.15. You can also adjust the wattage while in TC mode, so to do that, hold the fire button and minus button at the same time. And to lock resistance, which you always want to do when using temperature control and while the coil is at room temperature, you hold plus, minus, and the fire button at the same time.
To fire the device, hit that firing button on the side. The button has a nice strong click to it. It’s not squishy and feels very responsive. The devices fires really fast too. Practically immediately.
Battery
The Mechman is a dual 18650 device, and that’s the only battery size that will work here. It would have been kinda nice for more compatibility among other battery sizes, but 18650 is pretty good for keeping the overall size down on a dual-battery device, and the Mechman is pretty small, so I’m sure that’s why they designed it this way. Personally, I don’t mind at all.
Safety Protections
- Overheating protection
- Low voltage protection
- Reverse battery protection
- Overload – short-circuit protection
- 10 second cut off
The Mechman Mesh Tank
The Mechman kit comes with the Mechman mesh tank and as far as I can tell, you can’t buy either of these products separately.
But anyway, let’s quickly cover the details of the tank.
First off it’s a 28mm tank and stands 36mm (which is 1.4 inches tall)
The Mechman tank comes with a nice looking drip tip, which is made of resin. It’s a wide-bore 810 tip.
Beneath the drip tip is the sliding top cap. And that’s pretty interesting because it seems like most companies have moved away from this type of top cap, usually because they tend to slide open by accident and leak. But this tank has some nice friction here so it shouldn’t be something you’ll have worry about. I haven’t had any leaking issues, but I’m usually pretty careful about how I store my device.
There’s only one fill port here and it’s nice and big, so it’s easy to fill. The rubber seal around the fill port prevents the tank from leaking while the top cap is closed.
Adding the coils to the tank is like any other tank that uses pre-built coil heads. Take the tank apart and screw the coil head into the base. You can add a little e-liquid to the coil to prime it and make sure it’s not dry when you hit it for the first time, but be careful not to add too much or it’ll leak out of the airflow holes like it did to me. This is totally my fault. But after that, screw it all together and fill up the tank.
This comes with two glass tanks, but both are bubble tanks of the same size. I would have liked to have a straight glass tank too because I never really like how bubble tanks look, but that’s okay. I don’t mind it that much. For a bubble tank, it’s pretty slim. The tank holds about 4.5ml of e-liquid, which I think would be good enough for most people.
The tank comes with two types of coils; a 0.25ohm single mesh coil designed for 40-60 watts and a 0.2ohm dual mesh coil designed for 50-80 watts. Both of them perform great and produce a lot of flavor.
The main thing to consider with these coils is how hot you like to vape. If you like a cooler vape, go with single, and if you like hotter, go with the dual. I’ve found that the 80-watt coil actually works pretty well at 80w, hit after hit, and the single mesh coil works great at the max of 60 watts, so I think the ratings are accurate.
Okay, and finally airflow. So the tank has an adjustable airflow control ring at the bottom of the tank. You can close it down pretty tight or open it up really wide to get a ton of airflow, but this tank is really designed for higher wattage and bigger clouds, so I would guess most people would have this more open. But it works fine either way. When it’s wide open, you can get big lung hits without much restriction at all.
So the Mechman tank is your typical sub-ohm tank. And I don’t mean that in a bad way. It’s a very good tank. It’s just not any different than any other sub-ohm mesh tank out there. But it is nice that you can get a solid 228w device with a great sub-ohm tank for only $60. I think that’s a good deal.
Final Thoughts
The whole kit is really nice. The Mechman device looks sweet and there are some really cool designs to pick from. It’s heavy-duty and durable, it goes up to 228 watts, it has temperature control, and it fires extremely fast. Other than the rounded corners on the bottom, I have no complaints. This device is awesome.
And the tank that comes with it is nice too. It’s a great sub-ohm tank that has very good flavor in both coils and the tank has lots of airflow if you need it. I don’t have any complaints about the tank either. So yeah, I think this is a great kit all around.
The Mechman 228 kit was sent to me for review from Rincoe and you can pick this whole kit online for around $60.
Thanks for checking out this review and I’ll catch you on the next one!