Good. Now we need that ban in germany too. I don't know why those are legal in the first place. It's useless pollution and wastes ressources.
this post was submitted on 05 Sep 2023
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I took a few discarded ones apart. The plastic mouthpiece and bottom can be separated from the metal tube with pliers or a pocket knife. Pulling the bottom out will slide out the internals.
- 400 or 550mAh Li-Ion rechargeable battery at 3.6V - not even close to empty!!
- Breath controller (mic and some circuitry) and maybe an LED in the bottom piece (looks like this)
- Something like cotton wool infused with some volatile substance that is 2% nicotine (I hope I didn't get addicted to it at this point), still very wet and smelly
- 3 cm (1.2 in) of resistive wire (about 2 Ξ©) in a woven sleeve inserted into the wool. The power to it is controlled by the breath controller. The peak power is about 8 W, a lot for such a tiny battery and thin wires!
InterestingI always wondered how the activation trigger worked, you said there is a mic?
There is a capacitive (electret) mic and air blows past it, and some models have a ring that adjusts the airflow non-electronically. A chip on the micβs tiny PCB crudely measures sound level (which is way higher when breathing as opposed to any other sound) and drives its power transistor to switch the heater. It probably also refuses to work below 2.5 V to prevent the battery from discharging too deep. Some models also drive an LED with their heater output.
Musicians use breath controllers to play digital wind instruments but those are obviously more sensitive and complicated (likely using a piezoelectric or MEMS pressure sensor on a membrane of a chamber the user breathes into).
Here's a video of it in action (turns out it flashes for a while after you stop breathing) and the best photo I could take with my phone and two magnifying glasses (sadly, the trick of a water droplet over the camera didn't work because of its hydrophobic coating).
Same here in Russia. The old ass government is so quick to ban absolutely anything, but somehow haven't taken any action on anything that actually matters.
Not that I'm surprised in any capacity, just mad.
Stuff that actually matters brings profit to some important people. Addictive drugs are a lucrative biz. If selling them hasn't got an approval from the top, they couldn't have spread as much as they had.
In EU\US it's mostly about lobbies, there it's pure feudal nepotism. Someone's been probably given a role to oversee their import\certification\reselling and collect their %s in return. Hard to imagine a legistation to hurt that scheme being even voiced.
Theyβre also 80% counterfeit bullshit, too. Nobody will enforce that so maybe just banning them is a good idea.
Also they get around the ban of flavoured tobacco (which appeals to children) by using heated fragrant oils with 2% nicotine instead.
Yeah, cause that'll stop them!
If anything, this is a good environmental measure, because the single-use devices tend to be thrown into household trash (despite the Li battery and the electronics) or at the side of the road. More costly reusable devices enforce longer use times.
It also increases the cost of picking up the habit if you have to invest in a recachargeable device first.
The French are notorious for hating cigarettes!
2 cigarettes and a glass of wine is a breakfast in France.
That's lunch. Breakfast is coffee.
A student version of that is a cigarette and a cup of coffee.
Drugs being more expensive (initially) is definitely something that stops young people (who are usually poor) from getting regular access to them. It's probably one of the most effective ways to reduce drug usage.