RDA Reviews

Vaporesso Transformer RDA

Vaporesso’s latest RDA is the hugely impressive Transformer, a very versatile RDA that offers a wide range of options. Switch from a two post deck to a postless one and two different top caps included that cater for tighter, flavour chasing draws and more open, cloud chasing unrestricted lung hits. A bottom feeding pin is even included for use with squonking mods!

by Dan Willis
Feb 9, 2017

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22mm width
Over 10 different building configuration styles
Two post and postless deck options
Stainless steel construction
Two top cap styles included
Short top cap for concentrated airflow
Bottom feed pin for squonking
Larger top cap for increased vapour build up and bigger clouds
Delrin wide bore drip tip included
Stainless steel drip tip option
510 drip tip threading
510 connector

What’s in the box?

Inside the Vaporesso Transformer box you get the Vaporesso Transformer RDA, postless build deck, two replaceable Velocity styled building posts, a bottom feeding pin for squonking, a shortened top cap, enlarged top cap, delrin wide bore drip tip, stainless steel drip tip, spare screws, spare o-rings, two pre built coils and a screwdriver. There’s plenty of kit to be found here!

Design and build quality

The Vaporesso Transformer is quite a petite 22mm RDA, even with the larger cloud chasing top cap fitted, but even more so with the smaller flavour chasing top cap installed, which gives it a great low profile look! It sports a stainless steel construction, with a delrin drip tip included on the smaller top cap, and a stainless steel wide bore drip tip on the larger top cap. An adjustable 510 pin is present, and this can be swapped out for a gold plated bottom feed pin that you will find in the spares baggie, if you wish to use the Vaporesso Transformer with a squonker.

Build quality here is actually pretty nice, there’s no sharp edges or burrs to catch your fingers on, and everything fits together as it should. One thing I did note was that machine oil was present inside the Vaporesso Transformer when I took it out of the box, and it was also present inside the larger top cap too, so I gave it a good clean before using it.

Airflow

You have a fair few options here when it comes to airflow, as the experience will differ depending on which top cap you actually use with the Vaporesso Transformer. If you are looking for big clouds, then you will want the larger top cap, which offers 30 small airflow holes on each side, however this is fixed and non adjustable. You’ll get a huge amount of airflow when using this top cap, and a lot of vapour production with the wide bore drip tip.

If you fancy a more condensed and flavoursome vape, the smaller top cap offers a tighter, adjustable draw and a more intense vape. The airflow slots here take up far less surface area, and offer a slightly restricted lung hit, right down to a mouth to lung draw when closed right down. You can also adjust the airflow by rotating the top, and even close off one side of the airflow if you wish to use a single coil build.

Building the Vaporesso Transformer RDA

This is one of the key selling points of the Vaporesso Transformer RDA, as there are a multitude of ways to build this RTA, from single right up to quad coil builds, and there is a postless deck option as well as a two post velocity styled deck option. There’s a pretty reasonable amount of deck space available as well, especially when using the postless option.

Neither option is particularly troublesome to build, when using the postless option you just need to gauge the length of your coil legs before installing them, however if you find you don’t get on with this option, you can easily install the Velocity styled posts into the deck, and it then becomes incredibly easy to build on.

Performance

I based my experiences with the Vaporesso Transformer RDA by using it with the postless deck and the shorter top cap, and also with the two Velocity styled posts and larger top cap. First off, I went for the postless deck and smaller top cap, as this is how the Vaporesso Transformer is packaged.

First off, I used a dual 0.4mm 316L Stainless Steel build with a 3mm ID, which came out at 0.5ohm. With the airflow fully open at 35W, this gives a really nice, relaxed vape full of flavour, and a tasty restricted lung hit. The top cap stays nice and cool during use, and there is a pleasing amount of vapour present. After this, I removed one of the coils to give me a resistance of 1ohm and also test out the functionality with a single coil build, and to see how a mouth to lung vape fares.

Mouth to lung vaping on this RDA actually works perfectly. You need to utilize a single coil build and close off one side of the airflow entirely, the remaining airflow slot needs to be open halfway at an absolute maximum. At 16-18W I achieved a very tasty mouth to lung draw, that was packed full of flavour, and tobacco juices such as Dripworx Tabac Gold Blend and House of Liquid Cigarillos tasted absolutely fantastic.

Next up, I set the deck up in the Velocity styled configuration, installed a dual Stainless Steel/Nichrome 80 fused clapton build, coming out at 0.2ohm. Cranking the wattage up to 70W, I was seriously impressed with the amount of vapour produced, and there is a very loose unrestricted lung hit present. I pushed it up to 80W, which seemed to increase the vapour level slightly more, however I did find the top cap was getting very hot with sustained use, and this heat was being transferred to my lips. There isn’t a drip tip adaptor included, so I actually switched the Delrin drip tip in from the smaller top cap. This reduced the heat transfer to my lips somewhat, but the top cap still did get very hot!

Conclusion

I tip my hat to Vaporesso for bringing something to the market that is new and exciting, and offers a lot of different options for your money, this also holds appeal to just about any vaping style out there, from mouth to lung draws right through to unrestricted airy lung hits. It’s been very well thought out, and works exceedingly well in practice, and they haven’t scrimped on the build quality of the Transformer either when implementing these options.

Using the included bottom feed pin, this can even be used for squonking, and with the positioning of the airflow holes I experienced very little leakage indeed. The Vaporesso Transformer also performs really well during use, with very good flavour indeed as well as some impressive vapour when using the cloud chasing top cap, and is well worth having a look at if you fancy a break from the norm!

Dan Willis

Reviewer at POTV

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Dan was an early adopter of vaping as a way to quit smoking and has seen and done pretty much all there is to see and do in the vaping world! From Ego batteries to mechs and from rebuildables to pods there isn't much that Dan hasn't tried.