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The Definitive Arctic Turbo Tank Review
The most remarkable thing about the new Arctic Turbo from Horizon is that the tank has a fan inside. I’m not kidding. Does it make a difference? We’ll get to that, and more, in today’s full on review on this monster subohm tank.
Horizon Arctic Turbo Tank
The Arctic Turbo Tank by Horizon Tech is said to be the improved version of the terrific ‘original’ Arctic Tank we reviewed some months ago. But it is much more than an improved Arctic tank really, in fact the only thing the Turbo shares with the original is the word “Arctic”.
When the staff received their stock of Ma tank I was alarmed by the size of the prebuilt coil heads that fit into that monster sub-ohm tank. But the Arctic Turbo coil heads make the TFV4 look like the old Aspire Nautilus coil heads.
Truly innovative, the Arctic Turbo sports Sextuplet atomizers, and dual adjustable airflow at top and bottom, plus that integrated Top Turbine Cooling System for heat dissipation, i.e., the fan. The atomizers, or coil heads in plain English are huge, and they have to be to fire up 6 coils. Thankfully, you’re not forced to use the 6-coil setup, it can be configured with 1,2 or 3 Dual coil atomizers with the included coil stoppers, or “spacers”. Sound complicated? In many ways it is, but not so much that it will scare you away.
The Coil Heads
The Sextuplet Coil Head was designed and implemented by Horizon and it features triple independent chambers in which we place dual vertical coils in each one. These sextuplet coilheads can handle up to 120 wattage of power, enough to create extraordinary heat insulation, airflow distribution, and raging clouds of vapor. To achieve maximum vapor and flavor the Horizon Arctic Turbo has four adjustable airflow slots distributed around the base of the tank, and additional dual “Cyclops” at the top of the tank.
The Fan
The Horizon Arctic Turbo Tank comes with a Top Turbine Cooling System (TTCS) to augment an unremitting vaping experience that will have you thinking you’re beyond the natural as you step into supernatural vaping. As you draw on the dip the blades spin, whipping up even more vapor and cooling the vapor down at the higher wattage levels. Does it work? Yes, it does, in cooling the vapor down anyway. Tom removed the fan from his and said the vapor production was affected, though the vapor was warmer without it.
The Arctic Turbo also offers a wide bore stainless steel drip tip to aid in staggering lung hits the likes of which you won’t below.
The Horizon Arctic Turbo is constructed with 304 Stainless Steel and Glass, with a 3.5mL juice capacity. Now, 3.5mL isn’t bad, but when I get to my real world usage section below, you’ll get a better understanding of why the 3.5mL is a tad lower than we need for a tank like this.
Top Fill
Like many of the newer subohm tanks the Arctic Turbo has adopted the Top Fill method for refilling e-liquid. That never means that you don’t need to drop several drops of e-liquid directly into the coil/cotton but it does mean that after your first fill and cotton saturation the tank doesn’t need to be removed from the battery, unscrew the base and fill. Removing the upper most top cap reveals a half-moon slot that handily acts as a fast refill slot. I like many of the various methods created by tank designers and this one is no exception. I don’t have a single issue with the way you go about refilling the tank, no matter the consistency of the e-liquid.
Horizon Arctic Turbo Tank Features:
- Dimensions: 3-1/4″L x 7/8″D (Including threads)
- Available in SS and Black Finishes
- 22mm Diameter
- Can be configured to use 1,2 or 3 Dual coil atomizers with the included spacers (coil stoppers)
- 5mL Juice Capacity
- Conveniently fill from the top
- 510 Threaded
- 304 Stainless Steel Construction
- Glass Tank
- Intuitive Sextuplet Coil Design (0.2 ohm when using all three atomizer heads)
- Top and Bottom Adjustable Airflow Control
- Top Turbine Cooling System
- Stainless Steel Wide Bore Drip Tip
- RBA Head Option (Sold Separately)
Replacement Coils for the Arctic Turbo are here:
Horizon Arctic Turbo Coil – 0.6ohm dual coil
Real World
The 3 Dual Coil set up looks unlike anything we’ve seen before. Horizon did an amazing job building this monster tank, but even better, they designed a coil system that allows you to replace the individual dual coils, or as mentioned above, remove one or two and replace them with a spacer, a coil-looking piece that screws into the base to maintain proper current. With this remarkable idea you can add, remove, or null the coil ‘space’ to adjust the performance or ohms of the tank.
When you purchase the Arctic Turbo you’ll find 2x of the abovementioned spacers, along with a 3x set of coils preinstalled in the tank (all .6-ohms, which equals .2-ohms when using all 3 coils), and a backup of 3 replacement dual coil heads. Although I have been using the Arctic Turbo for more than 3 weeks I have yet had the need to replace a single coil.
So, how does it work? Glad you asked…
When using all 3 coils the combined ohms equates to running a 0.2-ohm coil head, and with any other tank that sports a normal 0.2-ohm coil head I can get a decent vape going at 40 watts or so and max out at about 55-60 watts with a thick high VG e-liquid. With the Arctic Turbo it requires more than 50 watts to get a light vape going. My best setting using my Sigelei 150w TC is 91.5 watts!! Any higher than that is just too much for me. When Tom uses his Arctic Turbo and his Vaporshark DNA200 he can go as high as 110-watts using Vaporfi Grand Reserve Catcha Latte e-liquid.
Please note that when doing these tests, or demos, both of us were using the tank with the airflow slots fully open. This allowed for cooler vapor all around, and is certainly the reason why some people can max out at 120-watts with it. Closing up the airflow holes not only tightens the draw, but warms the vapor up fairly quickly.
To find out how well this innovative approach in coil head design works I vaped various e-liquids in various combinations of coils in the Arctic Turbo. It’s one thing to use the tank as it comes, with 3x 0.6-ohm coils installed, it’s another to vape with one coil missing, and then two coils missing, replaced with the spacers instead.
When you remove one dual coil 0.6-ohm coil from the three and replace it with a spacer you wind up with a 0.4-ohm coil head. Surprisingly I could vape at the same wattages as before but the vapor was noticeably warmer even with all the slots fully open. I wouldn’t say the sweet spot with two coils was the same 91.5 watts, that’s for sure. The best wattage in this configuration was way down to about 60-watts at most.
Removing two coils and replacing them with spacers you’ll wind up vaping a single dual coil 0.6-ohm setup. This requires even less wattage, and although the Arctic Turbo handled higher wattages the 0.6-ohm sweet spot for me barely touched 34-watts. As you can see, going from 0.6-ohms to 0.2-ohms shouldn’t see such a drastic change in wattage requirements in a normal subohm tank, but by building, or subtracting ohms by removing or adding actual dual coils is a completely different thing. Clearly, 0.2-ohms when created by three 0.6-ohm dual coils requires a lot more power than a simple 0.2-ohm coil head from normal tank setups.
Flavor and Vapor
There comes a point when vaping with subohm tanks where being able to “see” the difference in vapor production isn’t easy. So, let’s just say that the vapor production from the Horizon Arctic Turbo is massive at any configuration, and the degree of warmth is a better determining factor between the different configurations. Although using all three dual coils, a thick Max VG e-liquid, and airflow slots fully open, the amount of vapor production is downright scary. Granted, I can vape at higher wattages than ever before possible, but without the four airflow slots it wouldn’t have been possible.
Unfortunately, I didn’t get many extra coils, just the extra 3 that came with the tank, and another pack that consisted of 5 individual 0.6-ohm coils. You have to wonder why replacement packs are not sold in packs of 6, you know?
Anyway, each of the dual coils are 0.6-ohms, have optimal wattage rangers of 40-watts, 100% organic cotton and they are fully stainless steel in order to resist ridiculous temperatures of 3 dual coils firing from 120-watts or power.
Using the various configurations did not affect the flavor from the e-liquids at all. All three delivered exceptional flavor notes, though at higher wattages more of the nuances made themselves known. The tests were run with a few e-liquids, but most of the time I used my current favorite, a new mysterious e-liquid from Sarcastic Fringehead Vapery (look for a review very soon).
This new as-yet-released e-liquid is definitely an all-day-vape. The kind of all-day-vape that you can get lost in, but because the nature of an all-day-vape is deliver just enough flavor to make you weak in the knees, it will not overwhelm you after an hour or so. This was the perfect e-liquid to vape using all three dual coils at 90-watts.
The secret eliquid from Sarcastic Fringehead has a light creamcicle flavor ‘tone’, with a distinct flavor I wont’ describe just now, and at 90 watts the flavor became so rich, so creamy, that it felt sexual, if that makes any sense. It felt as though my dopamine levels were spiking higher than ever, delivering a rush of pleasure to my brain, yet still not to the point where I would resist the pleasure. So, yea, sexual.
Vaping this same e-liquid flavor at different resistances and wattages delivered the same flavor, but with just a little less intensity.
The Wrap Up
The Horizon Arctic Turbo does not need the fan that is installed, though it did help Tom reach that 120-watts. While some on the team preferred the SMOK TFV4 as their “XtremeTank”, I preferred the Arctic Turbo. Both the TFV4 and the Turbo as extreme tanks, not many people will be able to use either one as a full time tank. Some will, but not me, not Tom, not Kiera, and not Jason. But when you get an e-liquid flavor that you simply can’t get into your system fast enough, the Arctic Turbo is just the right tool for the job.
Massive clouds of vapor, huge amounts of pure flavor, the Arctic Turbo is so worth the $29.98 that MyVaporStore sells it for.
Grade: A+
Julia Hartley-Barnes