Hellvape Dead Rabbit MTL 2 RTA

Hellvape are still flying the flag for traditional rebuildable vapers, and Antony got his hands on the latest Dead Rabbit MTL 2 RTA

by Antony Lord
Sep 24, 2024

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Hellvape are one of the few manufacturers still catering to the traditional rebuildable atomiser market, and this time they’ve sent over the Dead Rabbit MTL 2 RTA for me to try. The original seemed to get quite mixed reviews, but I never got to try that myself, so I was looking forward to seeing how this performed, especially as I find myself leaning more towards this style of vaping these days anyway.

Specifications

22.5 mm diameter
single coil rta catering to the MTL vaper
2ml ”short” glass and 4ml “long” glass included
28.9mm tall with short glass, 35mm with the long glass
6 air pins included ranging from 0.8 to 2.0mm
Standard 510 drip tip

The Dead Rabbit MTL 2 comes in a box with the colour option denoted by a sticker on the front of the box, I was sent the matte black and gold versions for the review. Hellvape are always quite good with the included extras in their kits, but I was more than a little surprised when I opened the box and saw just how much is included here with two tank/chimney sections, six air pins, two drip tips, and all the usual spare O-rings and the like. Given that Hellvape atomisers are generally very competitively priced, this is an impressive little piece of kit.

The first thing I decided to investigate was the two different size tanks included in the package, you have a 2ml short section fitted out of the box (to make it TPD compliant) but there’s also a 4ml long section in the box as well. This is achieved with a three piece design (chimney, top section and glass) and I was pleased to see that Hellvape have gone the extra mile here and actually included two separate chimney sections rather than opting for the cheaper option of a chimney extension piece as those are all too easy to lose. Both sections have a deeply engraved Dead Rabbit logo on the side which looked especially good on the matte black tank and swapping between the two different sections takes a matter of seconds so top marks so far.

The 4ml section obviously adds a bit of height to the tank but it’s still a fairly short tank at 35mm (excluding the drip tip and 510) and the rather funky drip tip that Hellvape have selected as the default option is nearly as tall as the short tank in its 2ml guise ( the drip tip is 20mm tall with the 2ml tank coming in just under 30mm). I’m not normally a big fan of tall drip tips like these but this somehow suited the tank, and I’ve actually found myself enjoying using them, a shorter drip tip is included if you don’t like the taller one and of course as this is a standard 510 fitment you can use any of your own.

The top cap is a threaded design but only requires one full turn to reveal two generously sized fill ports and a large silicone grommet under the lid which provides a good seal.

Whilst the top cap is threaded the build deck is on a bayonet system: look carefully at the base and you’ll notice two small dots, line them up and you can now pull the deck free. Whilst I was playing with this I noticed that Hellvape have managed to include something that’s become a bit of rarity in the design, a working juice flow control. With the deck fitted, turning the tank all the way to the left will fully open the system whilst turning it all the way to the right will close the juice flow off. You can also gain a little fine control in the airflow this way just bear in mind that this will also close down the wicking ports.

There are six air pins included in the box ranging from 0.8 to 2.0 mm so this should cover MTL fans from a super tight draw up to a borderline restricted direct lung vape. The air pins are all clearly marked at the base and out of the box the 1.2mm is fitted which will probably be the default option for most people in any case. As I was sent two tanks I decided to go for a 1.5mm pin in the gold one and a 2mm pin on the black tank so I could run two parallel builds.

The screws in the deck need to be lifted up quite a bit to enable you to get your coil legs trapped between the screw and the posts. This wasn’t an issue with a standard round wire build but proved to be a bit trickier with a more complex micro fused clapton, I even had to remove a wrap on the clapton build as there wasn’t enough room to fit the coil between the posts. Overall I’d say this is an easy enough deck to build on and you have plenty of room to get in and neatly clip the excess leads off the coils as well.

The wicking ports actually use a floating deck design with wicking coming not just from the side ports but also from three small ports at the base as well. These were easy to use, I just cut the wicks in line with the edge of the deck then brushed the cotton in from the sides letting it fall naturally into the ports until it felt like they were full and then trimming off any excess cotton left over.

With both tanks built, it was now time to find two mods to go with them and I decided on two quirky little setups to match…. I was expecting the slightly odd 22.5mm diameter to throw up a few issues here but I think you’ll agree that even on my 22mm 18350 tube mod that this looks quite smart.

Both setups worked well with good flavour and the wicking even managing to keep up with the restricted direct lung micro fused clapton build, it’s been very satisfying watching air bubbles regularly forming at the wicking ports. Even better I’ve not had a single leak or even so much as a gurgle from over saturation on either tank and I’ve been using these as my only setups for a full 10 days at this point.

Conclusion

I’ve been more than satisfied with the Hellvape Dead Rabbit MTL 2 rta. With the two different builds outlined above this has covered me on both the MTL and restricted direct lung side of things so I’ve not felt the need to use anything else, so this has proved to be a versatile little rta. Of course, if you want a full blown direct lung vape then this isn’t going to suit you, but Hellvape has plenty of other rta’s to cover you on that front and if you’re primarily a MTL vaper then you should be more than happy here.

Many thanks to Hellvape for sending the Dead Rabbit MTL 2 over for review.

Pros

Lots of airflow options
Two tank/chimney sections included
Good performance from both builds

Cons

Slightly odd 22.5mm diameter may not work well on smaller mods

Antony Lord

Reviewer at POTV

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I was a twenty a day smoker for 25 years and like most smokers I was always going to quit "next week". Having hit my mid forties and having the usual smokers cough and difficulty with anything more than moderate exercise it was obviously time to give up the cancer sticks. I bought my first e-cigarette in 2013 when they were expensive, difficult to find and quite frankly... crap. I used it for about a week then went back to the roll ups, mark up another failed quit attempt. The fact that I had just changed jobs and was under quite a lot of stress probably didn't help. Move on to 2016 and whilst I was browsing eBay I noticed that one of the suggested items that would occasionally pop up was for a cheap e-cigarette. It looked similar to the one I'd bought 3 years earlier but it was only £5 (about 8 times cheaper than before) so I decided to give it another go on a whim. Once the kit arrived I managed to gradually replace the cigarettes with my new kit over a two month period and got into watching YouTube reviews for newer kit. My cheap and cheerful kit was replaced by a more upmarket affair, and being a noob I made a mistake once it arrived... I put in the supplied direct lung coil, this was of course a complete revelation and I haven't touched a cigarette since. Oh and I no longer spend the first five minutes of every day having a coughing fit either.