CouchLog

Razhumikin

Razhumikin

Well-Known Member
3drt said:
Ok, first impressions: can definetely confirm wireless, big hit, serious clouds - it handled it! I'm using it with a glass bowI so had to turn it up to 6.5ish, and performance-wise I find it superb, and definitely more powerful than OG. Got new glass today too, and this is easily one of the hottest setups in my modest collection now:)
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What a lovely rainy Friday evening😊
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God mine cant get here soon enough! Cheers!
 
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Pcloudy

Well-Known Member
Just got my magnetic connector stuff in and it seems like it’s not heating up the couch log as much as the regular cord. I know it’s not accurate but the temp reading on the metal rim was like 250 with the magnetic cable and 325 with the regular cable.
Should I just crank up the knob to compensate? What would cause this? I’m no electrical expert so this just seems like a weird problem to me.
 
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BreadStick

Well-Known Member
Pcloudy said:
Just got my magnetic connector stuff in and it seems like it’s not heating up the couch log as much as the regular cord. I know it’s not accurate but the temp reading on the metal rim was like 250 with the magnetic cable and 325 with the regular cable.
Should I just crank up the knob to compensate? What would cause this? I’m no electrical expert so this just seems like a weird problem to me.
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I think the most likely cause of the temperature difference is the new cable has a higher impedance/resistance and is sucking up some power on your CouchLog. If I'm right I'd imagine if you felt the new cable it would be fairly warm because that's a lot of missing energy between them two temperature readings.

If the cable isn't getting too hot I'd imagine it's fine to increase the temperature on the controller to compensate
 
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Pcloudy

Well-Known Member
BreadStick said:
I think the most likely cause of the temperature difference is the new cable has a higher impedance/resistance and is sucking up some power on your CouchLog. If I'm right I'd imagine if you felt the new cable it would be fairly warm because that's a lot of missing energy between them two temperature readings.

If the cable isn't getting too hot I'd imagine it's fine to increase the temperature on the controller to compensate
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I will do some more investigation tonight.
Would the extra resistance have something to do with the adapter, the cable, or the magnetic connector? Or a combination? I don’t remember having this issue before. I’m also not opposed to hacking the end off and splicing the proper connector on to avoid having to use the adapter if that would potentially help.
 
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BreadStick

Well-Known Member
Pcloudy said:
I will do some more investigation tonight.
Would the extra resistance have something to do with the adapter, the cable, or the magnetic connector? Or a combination? I don’t remember having this issue before. I’m also not opposed to hacking the end off and splicing the proper connector on to avoid having to use the adapter if that would potentially help.
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It'd hard to say for sure, I want to preface I'm only a graduate electrical engineer I have a decent understanding of electricity but I still have a lot to learn!

The magnet's field could be causing some interference with the electricity flowing through the cable and that would be one source of power loss. If other people aren't experiencing this issue I don't think this would be the cause because I doubt there's that big of a difference in magnet strength between cables.

I think the cable itself would only be causing a power loss that noticeable if the conductor size was way bigger/longer which I doubt is the case. Unless they used some high resistivity material to make the conductor which would be weird. There could also be a break somewhere along the conductor inside the cable but again this is unlikely

I think the most likely is that there was some poor manufacturing involved with your adapters and they aren't making a great contact.

Before you try splicing anything I would check and see if the cable gets hot during use. If it doesn't get hot during use I think the easiest solution would be to just increase the temp on the dial?

Maybe you have a different cable that you could use with your adapter? If this other cable works fine then I would say it's the magnet, if not then it's the adapter? Another test that might be useful is if you have a multimeter connect a cable to the couchlog and measure the impedance on the other barrel jack that plugs into the PSU. Compare the 2 cables and see if there's a noticeable difference? I think if there is a noticeable difference this would tell you that it's a problem with the adapters because the DC test signal from the multimeter to measure Ohms shouldn't be affected by the magnet.
 
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Pcloudy

Well-Known Member
BreadStick said:
It'd hard to say for sure, I want to preface I'm only a graduate electrical engineer I have a decent understanding of electricity but I still have a lot to learn!

The magnet's field could be causing some interference with the electricity flowing through the cable and that would be one source of power loss. If other people aren't experiencing this issue I don't think this would be the cause because I doubt there's that big of a difference in magnet strength between cables.

I think the cable itself would only be causing a power loss that noticeable if the conductor size was way bigger/longer which I doubt is the case. Unless they used some high resistivity material to make the conductor which would be weird. There could also be a break somewhere along the conductor inside the cable but again this is unlikely

I think the most likely is that there was some poor manufacturing involved with your adapters and they aren't making a great contact.

Before you try splicing anything I would check and see if the cable gets hot during use. If it doesn't get hot during use I think the easiest solution would be to just increase the temp on the dial?

Maybe you have a different cable that you could use with your adapter? If this other cable works fine then I would say it's the magnet, if not then it's the adapter? Another test that might be useful is if you have a multimeter connect a cable to the couchlog and measure the impedance on the other barrel jack that plugs into the PSU. Compare the 2 cables and see if there's a noticeable difference? I think if there is a noticeable difference this would tell you that it's a problem with the adapters because the DC test signal from the multimeter to measure Ohms shouldn't be affected by the magnet.
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I was using a similar setup on my last couch log with no issue. I’ll get my multimeter out today and do some testing.
Thank you for your input. Your electrical knowledge has far surpassed mine
 
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Pcloudy

Well-Known Member
Well I did some testing and what I found out was that my couch log no longer heats up. I do not know what happened. I was taking readings from the different cords and now it wont heat up with either of them. Sad day for me

So I have double checked the plug and all the connections. I am still getting power from the control to the end of the cord but no heat. Im hoping I dont have to take it apart but it may be the case.
 
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Pcloudy

Well-Known Member
Zillacon said:
@Pcloudy a little bit back I investigated and fixed a female port failure on the unit. Although failures are not common, this seems to be a more consistent one.
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I just dug through until I found it as I remember seeing it when it was happening. Im waiting to hear back from Chris, which will probably be sometime tomorrow as I think its the middle of the night over there. Just need to see if there is anymore trouble shooting I can do/should do. It happened right after plugging and unplugging cords a few times so it may just be the port.
 
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sickmanfraud

Well-Known Member
Pcloudy said:
I just dug through until I found it as I remember seeing it when it was happening. Im waiting to hear back from Chris, which will probably be sometime tomorrow as I think its the middle of the night over there. Just need to see if there is anymore trouble shooting I can do/should do. It happened right after plugging and unplugging cords a few times so it may just be the port.
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The Temperature controller died on the CL I bought from you. The way I was able to isolate the issue was to use a VVPS in place of the temperature controller.

If your CL works with the VVPS then the board of the Temperature controller is the likely problem. If that is the issue you don't need to send the whole Couch Log back to Germany just the Temperature controller.

If your issue is the temperature controller you can use your CL with the VVPS until you sort out the temperature controller.
 
rvarick

rvarick

Well-Known Member
Maybe a dumb question, but is the cable that connects from the temp controller to the couchlog simply a 20AWG, 5.5x2.1mm Male to 5.5x2.1mm Male DC cable (i.e. like this)?
 
rvarick,
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Pcloudy

Well-Known Member
rvarick said:
Maybe a dumb question, but is the cable that connects from the temp controller to the couchlog simply a 20AWG, 5.5x2.1mm Male to 5.5x2.1mm Male DC cable (i.e. like this)?
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I believe its 5.5x2.5 on both ends. I found out recently that 2.1 is very common around the house and 2.5 is not.
 
Pcloudy,
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rvarick

rvarick

Well-Known Member
Received my Grenadill (Blackwood) XL last week. The worksmanship with this is top-notch, no surprise. Performance-wise it's great, and pretty consistent with the regular Couchlog - albeit over a larger size of material of course. In turn, effects are POTENT. I have found I need to crank the heat up to ~8 for a glass bowl, and my preferred roast though. This is also consistent with my regular Couchlog. The XL gets hotter to hold at this temp compared to the regular one, but it's a "sure, if I held my hand here for 20 seconds, it might burn" type of hot; nothing unmanageable.

I do have some minor nits on the bowls provided though. The glass one works fine/well, but maybe could perform better without the taper/widening above the screen, and less distance between the screen and the intake joint (?). I've been using a GVB Injector Bowl instead. Also hoping Joda might make a glass WPA for the XL too🤞, as this is my favorite bowl for the regular Couchlog.

I had to shelve the wood bowl. It performed amazingly - especially flavor-wise, but the grenadill/blackwood one really gunked up the tip of the injector with black sap (or whatever you'd call it). I've seen this same issue with an aftermarket grenadill/blackwood bowl with my regular Couchlog too. I guess glass/metal bowls are more my speed. Do wish there was a fully compatible metal herb chamber for the XL per this, but again - minor nit, and other's MMV.
 
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TigoleBitties

TigoleBitties

Big and Bouncy
rvarick said:
I had to shelve the wood bowl. It performed amazingly - especially flavor-wise, but the grenadill/blackwood one really gunked up the tip of the injector with black sap (or whatever you'd call it). I've seen this same issue with an aftermarket grenadill/blackwood bowl with my regular Couchlog too. I guess glass/metal bowls are more my speed.
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That's too bad about the sap. I've heard that this can happen with Kingwood as well. My only wood bowl is Cocobolo and it's been really nice with no issues, but I admit I was ignorant about this being an issue with some woods before buying.

However, there's a long list of woods that aren't problematic so I wouldn't give up on the wood bowls yet. As you said they're really tasty and I believe it has a lot to do with wood being a great insulator. Also a bonus that they're pretty, and way less fragile than glass. They seem to stay clean longer too which I suppose makes sense as there's less chance for condensation.
 
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sickmanfraud

Well-Known Member
TigoleBitties said:
That's too bad about the sap. I've heard that this can happen with Kingwood as well. My only wood bowl is Cocobolo and it's been really nice with no issues, but I admit I was ignorant about this being an issue with some woods before buying.

However, there's a long list of woods that aren't problematic so I wouldn't give up on the wood bowls yet. As you said they're really tasty and I believe it has a lot to do with wood being a great insulator. Also a bonus that they're pretty, and way less fragile than glass. They seem to stay clean longer too which I suppose makes sense as there's less chance for condensation.
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wood bowls and stems are great.

Until you have a "combustion event".

I ruined the finish of my CL wood stem when I was getting the combustion stink out.

I still use the wood stem, I simply make sure to be extra careful.

BTW, @TigoleBitties did you ever make your Couch log "portable" via powerbanks?
 
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