When Tyson from Cloud Shack reached out about a few reviews he wasn’t kidding and he sent over a couple of juice lines and a hardware kit. The kit that arrived is from Vaporesso which I’m sure most of you have heard of at this point. They make some really nice gear with a focus on really sleek looking hardware. The kit I received is called the Vaporesso Polar and I’ve been using it for the past few weeks to really get to know the device. So far I have to say I’m pretty impressed with the kit so far. As always there are a few things to point out but here are my honest thoughts on the Vaporesso Polar from Vaporesso care of The Cloud Shack.

Package contents:

Item Quantity Polar Mod (without batteries) 1 CASCADE Baby SE Tank (6.5ml/2ml) 1 GT 8 Coil (0.15Ω) – Pre-installed 1 GT Meshed Coil (0.18Ω) 1 Replacement glass tube 1 USB Charging Cable 1 User Guide 1 Warranty Card 1

Listed features and specs:

Dimension: 45*28*144mm

Tank Capacity: 6.5ml/2ml

Display: 2” TFT color screen

Battery: 2 * 18650 (Not Included)

Power Range: 5-220W

Resistance Range: 0.03-5Ω

Packaging and Contents:

The Vaporesso Polar kit comes packed in a fairly big cardboard box with an image of the kit on the front and a list of the contents as well as some specs on the back. The sleeve slides off to reveal a book style box that opens up with an accessory pack on one side and the rest of the kit neatly packed on the other. The presentation with the kit is fantastic and opening it up feels like a premium experience. In the kit you get the Polar mod, the Cascade Baby SE tank, one GT Meshed Coil(0.18ohm pre-installed), one GT 8 Coil(0.15ohm), a spare glass tank, a micro USB cable, a manual, warranty card and a warning card. It comes with everything you need to get started along with the usual spares we like to see so nothing to complain about here.

The Tank:

The Cascade Baby SE is an odd looking tank. It’s fairly tall standing at about 55mm and the glass tank juts out well beyond it’s 24.5mm diameter base giving it a sort of set phasers to stun pew pew kind of look. It’s mostly made of stainless steel and it holds a comfortable 6.5ml of juice or 2ml if you get the TPD version. Starting at the top it’s got a slightly tapered delrin 510 drip tip. It’s wide bore but obviously narrows through the 510 connection. It’s comfortable to use so I’ve pretty much stuck with it but you can change it out for one of your own if you chose. Just below the tip is the rather unique locking top fill. It’s slide to open like many of the popular tanks on the market these day but you have to pull the top upwards before you can move it. It doesn’t slide in a straight line either it sort of tilts open. It gives it a little extra added security and somewhat makes it childproof. Once you’ve slid the top back it exposes the top fill port. It’s kidney shaped but fairly small for such a large tank. It’ll still fit most bottle tips so it shouldn’t be a problem but considering the size of the tank they could have made it slightly more spacious.

The tank itself breaks down in to three parts, four if you include the base to give it a good cleaning or to change the glass should it break. It comes with a red coloured glass installed but the extra glass is clear if you’re not a fan of coloured glass tanks. Once the tank is unscrewed from the base you can swap the coils. It comes with a 0.18ohm GT Meshed coil installed and to replace it you just unscrew it from the base and pop in a new one. It also has what Vaporesso calls isolation structure and triangular airflow. Basically around the base is the airflow control which comes in via three cyclops style holes or triangular airflow as Vaporesso calls it. You can turn the AFC ring to open or close it off but I found with the three holes even closed down almost all the way it’s still pretty airy. I’m not exactly sure what they mean about the isolation structure which is supposed to separate the coil and juice chamber but it does mean you can swap coils without emptying the tank which is always handy. On the very bottom there is a bit of branding and the usual CE markings. Besides that it has a floating 510 center pin which I would not recommend be used on a hybrid device.

The Coils:

The Cascade Baby SE comes packed with two coils. The one installed is a GT 8 0.15ohm coil but I opted to start with the GT Meshed 0.18ohm coil which is the same that shipped with their Armour Pro Mod. It’s a decent performing mesh coil that compared to others leaks a bit less from my experience but also has a much longer break in time. Once it’s broken in I get some solid flavour from it and some decent clouds. The GT Meshed coils are rated from 50-85w and for me the sweet spot was around 60-65w where I found a good balance between performance and battery life. On the coil it doesn’t have a suggested best range like the 0.15ohm GT 8 coil which I believe is a quad barreled eight wire coil, as in each of the four coils is doubled up in parallel to make it eight. It’s rated from 50-110w with a best suggested range between 60-80. For me this one needed a bit more power and I was running it around 75-80w to get a good hit from it but it also tended to run a bit hotter. Still good flavour and good vapor but when considering coil life it’s going to vary based on juices used, personal vaping habits and QC on the coils. I however easily got just over two weeks on the mesh coil before switching to the other so I’m guessing they should last quite a while but I’m sure individual results will vary.

The Mod:

The Polar mod is a candy bar shaped device with what Vaporesso calls an elegant prismatic style. It’s fairly compact for a dual 18650 mod and stands at 90mm or 144mm if you include the tank. It’s 45mm wide and 28mm thick but tapers at the top so it’s not going to fit much beyond 24.5mm diameter gear. As much as the mod is rectangular in shape all of the edges are rounded so it’s very comfortable to hold in your hand. On the very top of the device is the stainless steel 510 connection. The threads are nice and smooth, it’s got what looks like a gold plated spring loaded 510 pin with a decent amount of travel and so far everything I’ve tried on it has sat flush.

On the face of the device it’s got a bright 2″ full colour screen which is easy to ready and well laid out. Just below the bottom of the screen there’s a bit of a pattern etched in which continues on the opposite side where the battery cover resides. Below that etched pattern are the adjustment buttons, they’re nice and clicky and don’t have any kind of rattle when shaken. In between the adjustment buttons is a third button which acts like a menu or mode button which uses three clicks to bring up the main menu. Below the adjustment buttons is the micro USB port for both charging and firmware updates. On the opposite side the battery cover is held in place with magnets and is quite secure without any wiggle. There’s a little finger nail cutout on the bottom left side to help remove it since the rounded edges are so smooth. Inside there’s a ribbon to help remove your batteries and both positive and negative are clearly marked in the plastic of the battery tray. On the side of the device is the fire button which is big and rectangular with a very light concentric circle pattern etched in to it. It’s easy to find and fire with your finger or your thumb so you can hold it in either orientation.

It’s powered by version 4.0 of their Omni board which at this point is a pretty proven piece of tech. It does however make using this thing is a bit different from most mainstream mods but it still includes all the regular functions and protections we’d expect in a modern device. For protections it includes overtime, overcharge, burn, no load, low resistance, ESD circuit, short-circuit, low power and pass-through. I’m not sure what all of these terms mean but I think you get the idea, it should be a safe mod to use in nearly any situation and it includes pass-through vaping. It also supports 2.5A quick charging which means you can fully charge in as little as 1.5 hours where using a 1A charger will likely take between 4-5 hours. Another standout feature is it’s insta-fire which Vaporesso claims to be as quick as 0.001s. I’m pretty sure that beats some of the other fast fire claims of other boards but I don’t have any means of testing it. They also claim a super player mode which supports resistances between 0.03 and 5ohm which is pretty much unheard of in any other mod. It includes a number of modes including VW-H, VW-N, VW-S, CCW, SP, VV, CCV TC-SS, TC-NI, TC-TI, M1, M2 and BP. VW-H is variable wattage high, VW-N is variable wattage normal and VW-S is variable wattage small I guess. I think most people know what these smart power modes do but for those who don’t they basically fire either above, at or below the set wattage depending on the mode you select. With CCW and CCV you can set a custom curve using either variable wattage or variable voltage. The SP options is kind of funny, when you select it the main screen displays an animated skull with glowing eyes and a ring that grows around it as you press the fire button. It’s basically VW mode but with a funky display face sort of like the clock options available on some other mods in the market. It was a bit of a surprise to find it on a mod called the Polar but it’s kind of fun so I’ve actually been using it. It also includes all of the usual TC modes and two mem or TCR slots for you to set your own values should the defaults not provide what you need. The last mode that it supports is BP or bypass mode which we all know draws directly from the battery but in the case of the Polar it does so with protections still in place.

Three clicks of the fire button locks/unlocks the device where five clicks will turn it on and off. Three click of the mode/menu button will bring up the main menu and you can cycle through the options using the adjustment buttons. In the menu you’ll find all of the modes I just listed as well as a settings menu. The settings menu has options to set the time for the RTC real time clock, brightness adjustment, puff counter, theme colour, smart mode on/off, auto on/off, screen timeout, version and a reset to defaults option. It’s a very fully featured device and it even supports firmware updates so future updates could possibly bring new features or fix any bugs that might have snuck through. In my basic testing and day to day use however I haven’t found anything unusual with it’s features or functions. As far as I could tell it performed accurately in variable wattage and voltage modes but I did have a bit of trouble using it in TC mode. It just didn’t seem to cut off properly regardless of the temp set. I actually heard my issues echoed in another review so I’m pretty sure I’m not alone with that however I primarily vape in wattage mode so it’s not a huge issue for me. I also saw that using TCR addressed the issue so TC fans could still get a good vape from it if needed.

Likes:

Build quality

Looks sharp

Performance

Full featured

0.001s firing speed

2.5A quick charging

2″ colour screen

Super player mode(0.03-5ohm firing range)

Beautiful and easy to use menu system

Lift to slide top fill

6.5ml capacity

Good flavour and vapour from included coils

Dislikes:

Small top fill port

TC a bit flaky

Overall:

I found the Polar mod to be a great little device. For my needs it works well and includes all of the regular features that most people look for. Sure the TC isn’t all that great but as a regulated power user it doesn’t really bother me. The included tank works well and the mesh coils were pretty much on par with others I’ve tested and in general gave a really good experience when matched with the Polar mod. Hopefully a firmware update can address the TC performance which would resolve probably my biggest complaint with it. Right now Tyson has it on in his shop for a very reasonable price and with his Reddit10 coupon you can get an additional 10% off. So huge thanks to Tyson and the Cloud Shack for setting me up with this great little kit for review!!