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Out of the entire glossary of vaping lingo, one term stands out amongst others. Squonking. But what is squonking and why should you care? Let's take a crash course and dive into squonking for dummies.
What does squonking mean?
Essentially, it is a made-up vaping word.
Way back in 2010 making your own e-cigs, or modifying them (hence the word mod), was all the rage. As vaping started to gain popularity, people quickly became frustrated at the e-cigs on the market. They wanted more out of their vaping experience.
One of the biggest frustrations was flavour and soon the popular opinion was that dripping your e-liquid straight on to cotton was the path to amazing flavour. But this was time-consuming and difficult at the time. Vapers therefore started playing with the idea of bottom feeding atomizers.
This was a cartomizer that had a hole in the bottom, allowing e-liquid to be fed up from the bottom. This eliminated the need for dripping down the top. Less mess and easier dripping appealed to vapers and bottom feeding atomizers quickly became the 'in thing'.
A member of the E-cigarette Forum described the action of squeezing a bottle to force e-liquid up as 'squonk'. The name stuck and squonk boxes were born.
They soon fell out of the limelight as they were expensive and difficult to get hold of. However, they have recently enjoyed a resurgence and are proving to be more popular as they become cheaper and easier to get hold of.
How are squonk mods different?
Squonk mods incorporate your battery, bottle and dripper. It is essentially hands free dripping.
Within the body of the squonker is a bottle and a battery, usually behind a magnetic cover.
Cut into the side of the box is a 'squonk hole', which allows you to squeeze the bottle. This pushes e-liquid into the dripper from below. As you squeeze e-liquid is pushed up, saturating your cotton and wick without having to drip into the top. As you release pressure any excess runs back into the bottle.
What are the Benefits of Squonking?
No more manual dripping - Vapers who drip will sing its praises all day long. Let's be honest, dripping can be a messy, manual process. A few draws, drip more e-liquid onto your cotton, a few more draws, more e-liquid. Check the cotton is soaked, don't overdrip...rise and repeat. You get the idea. Squonking eliminates this process. Dripping without the hassle.
It minimises the risk of over dripping - People who regularly use drippers will feel the pain of this one. With a regular RDA if you drip too much e-liquid in, it has nowhere to go but down the sides of your mod. With a bottom feeding dripper any excess e-liquid goes back into the bottle.
No more forgetting your bottle of e-liquid - It's built right into the mod, job done.
Dripping and driving - This shouldn't be a thing anyway, so if you do drip and drive...stop. With a squonker you can still enjoy your RDA on the road.
What are the Drawbacks of Squonking?
Not everyone wants a mech mod - We have spoken before about the death of the mechanical mod. Not all vapers want them. Most prefer an e-cig with internal regulation, a level of vaping safety. Unfortunately, most squonkers are mechanical, mostly down to size. There is a bottle of e-liquid and a battery in there, so to save space a lot of manufacturers will leave any internal chip out. Luckily squonk mods with internal regulation are starting to emerge.
Dripper only - Not everyone wants a dripper. But to squonk you have to use an RDA. There are no tanks that can be used with a bottom feeding mod, so unless you drip, squonking isn't for you.
BF drippers only - Do you have a favourite dripper that is easy to build, matches all your vaping kit and has the perfect drip tip for you? Well unless it has a compatible bottom feeding pin, you're out of luck, it can't be used with a squonk box.
Battery life - It's down to space again. Most squonk boxes can only accommodate a single 18650 battery. For some vapers this just won't provide enough battery life.
Is Squonking for Me?
The short answer is, you don't know unless you try it.
As we have shown, squonking has various pros and cons. If you’re already a dripper, but want a cleaner way to drip day to day, squonking might be for you. Perhaps you’ve been toying with the idea of building your own coils and fancy something different, if so, squonking might be for you.
If you don't fancy building and / or installing your own coils, rewicking your own RDA, or don't want to compromise on battery life, you may want to stick to your current set up.
