RBA Reviews

Augvape Merlin RTA

The Merlin is a 23mm Rebuildable Tank Atomizer designed by Roxy and produced by Augvape who are an American manufacturer. The tank features all of the typical features you can expect including juice flow control, dual adjustable airflow, top filling and a 4ml capacity.

by VapeMaster
Nov 2, 2016

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Augvape Merlin RTA

The Merlin is a 23mm RTA (Rebuildable Tank Atomizer) designed by Roxy and produced by Augvape who are an American manufacturer. The tank features all of the typical features you can expect including juice flow control, dual adjustable airflow, top filling and a 4ml capacity. One innovative feature is that the Merlin uses a variant design of the highly praised “Velocity” style deck which means it is very easy to work with and it also allows this tank to be primarily set up using a single coil.

Augvape Merlin RTA features

23 mm Diameter
47 mm Height (Without Drip Tip)
Top Fill Design
4ml Capacity
Single or Stacked Dual Coil Compatibility
Single Sided Velocity Style Deck
PEEK Insulator
8mm Post Holes
5mm Internal Airflow Hole
Stainless Steel 2.4mm Airflow Hole Insert
Adjustable Juice Flow Control
3mm Juice Flow Holes
Bottom Adjustable Dual Airflow Slots
510 Drip Tip Compatible

What’s in the box?

1x Merlin RTA
1x Wide Bore Delrin Drip Tip
1x Spare Glass Tank
1x Bag Of Spares including O-rings and an airflow reducer/adapter
User Manual

Augvape Merlin RTA styling and build quality

In terms of its construction the overall machining is really good considering the low price. The threading for the most part was excellent the only exception being the top fill cap which did stick slightly on occasion.

The glass is reasonably thick and the box does include a spare tube should you ever have an accident. This RTA can be entirely broken down for cleaning. A wide bore Delrin drip tip is included with the Merlin and this is nicely tapered making it very comfortable on the lips, the tank uses a standard 510 fitting so you can easily swap the drip tip out for one from your collection.

The diameter of the Merlin is 23mm and it has a 4ml E-Liquid capacity. The tank is not overly large and stands 47mm in height. Much like a lot of other tanks the Merlin uses the popular “Velocity” style deck featuring twin posts that have two post holes each. The difference with this particular tank is that Augvape moved the posts to the edge of the deck, by doing this it allows a single coil to be placed directly in the centre over the air hole with the juice flow channels positioned to either side. By doing this they eliminated the requirement to plug the unused juice channels which to be honest doesn’t always work that well anyway so this is certainly a nice innovation!

The Merlin includes all of the typical features you can expect from an RTA including adjustable airflow, juice flow control and top filling.

Airflow

The Merlin has a single airflow hole in the deck and two “Cyclops” style fully adjustable airflow slots. The adjustment ring itself was neither too loose nor too stiff and you can easily adjust it when the tank is fitted on your mod. Included in the package is an airflow reducer/adapter which when fitted to the deck cuts down the airflow by half and this allows the Merlin to function as a dedicated mouth to lung tank.

Ease of use

What is really excellent about the Merlin is how straightforward it is to build. The deck itself is a “Velocity” style affair with the notable difference being that the posts are set back to one edge of the deck. There is a single air hole in the deck and your coil is positioned horizontally over it. You could of course build it with a dual coil and they would have to be fitted vertically with one positioned over the other. Personally given the limited airflow I thought it was better to stick to a single coil but at least the option is there if you want it!

Fitting a coil is an absolute breeze and the screws work well. The included notch coil is quite brittle and the legs are really thin which meant I ended up having to make my own. The deck has plenty of space so I went for a 3mm internal diameter coil but you could certainly fit a 3.5mm ID coil and possibly even a 4mm one. Wicking is very easy and you simply have to position your wick tails into the juice flow slots. For someone new to rebuildables this would make an excellent choice as their first RTA.

The Merlin has a top fill design that works well and there are large filling holes so you won’t have any problems with larger juice bottle nozzles or droppers. Just remember to keep the juice flow completely closed when filling.

How does it vape?

I initially planned to make use of one of the included coils but the wire snapped when I was tightening down the screws so I decided to go with a 26 gauge 3mm internal diameter coil which had a final Resistance of 1.0ohm. I wicked the coil with Japanese cotton and after having primed the wick I filled up the tank with VIP’s Affinity E-Liquid Nirvana.

Since this was fairly thick juice I turned the main section of the tank to open up the juice flow holes. The vape was actually rather pleasant and the tank certainly puts out a reasonable enough amount of vapour that is more satisfying than being overkill. As far as the draw goes it is certainly a restrictive lung inhale but by closing down the airflow I found I could happily vape it mouth to lung even without using the included airflow reducer. It might be still a little loose for some peoples taste but I found it enjoyable. When you do fit the airflow reducer it cuts the airflow down by half and the tank does give you a very good mouth to lung vape but ideally I found you really need to swap out the wide bore drip tip for something with a smaller diameter.

When it comes to flavour the Merlin won’t win any awards since it is decidedly average (decent enough but not as flavoursome as a lot of other RTA’s) when the airflow is fully opened up although it does improve if you close down the airflow sufficiently and make use of the included airflow reducer.

I had no real issues with dry hits but I suspect given the small size of the juice flow holes that you may have problems when using very thick 80VG E-Liquids.

What I did like about this tank is that it worked well with a 1.0ohm Resistance coil and I never had to crank up the power to get a good vape which meant the batteries in my mod lasted ages. The rate the juice drains at is also very reasonable and it can still put out fairly good vapour without literally devouring your E-Liquid like some tanks do. In my opinion given the size of the juice flow holes and the average airflow the Merlin is not really designed for high power vaping and even though you could probably go as low as a 0.5ohm build I would be hesitant to push this tank higher than 50 Watts.

Conclusion

The Merlin is certainly a very decent budget RTA which offers solid machining and ease of use/build. It’s only real shortcoming is the flavour which while adequate enough feels quite middle of the road compared to a lot of other tanks, of course this will vary a great deal depending on your build. In fairness I found it didn’t matter greatly to me and it was perfectly suitable for stronger flavoured 50VG/50PG or 60VG/40PG liquids, the real appeal of this tank for me was how easy it was to build and use!

One real plus point about the Merlin is its flexibility since in its default configuration it suits restrictive lung inhaling users and can very quickly through use of the airflow reducer be altered to give an enjoyable mouth to lung vape. A decent juice capacity along with juice flow control rounds off this very worthwhile product!