5stars

Hellvape Dead Rabbit V2 RTA Review

The Dead Rabbit has been a veritable gold mine for Chinese manufacturer ever since the original Dead Rabbit RDA came out. It sold like crazy, and since then we’ve seen a bunch of Dead Rabbit products, including a V2 RDA as well as a Dead Rabbit RTA, and now we have a V2 RTA as well. But is the brand as innovative as it was a couple of years ago? Let’s take a look at the Hellvape Dead Rabbit V2 RTA and find out:

Dead Rabbit V2 RTA Packaging

The newest member of the Dead Rabbit family comes in a small, red box with a clear plastic window offering a view of the atomizer inside. It has the iconic dead rabbit logo on the front, along with the Hellvape logo, and a list of technical features and package contents on the back.

Inside the box we have the Dead Rabbit V2 RTA in a red Styrofoam holder, and a smaller box of accessories, including a bubble glass for the tank, spare o-rings and fill port gasket, spare grub screws for the build deck, a small screwdriver and an Allen key. At the bottom of the box, you’ll also find a user manual and a Dead Rabbit V2 RTA sticker.

Dead Rabbit V2 RTA Design and Build Quality

The new Dead Rabbit V2 RTA measures 25mm in diameter and is made primarily of stainless steel and glass, with a Delrin 810 drip tip. It holds up to 2ml of e-liquid with the pre-installed straight glass, and up to 5ml with the included bubble tank. 2ml really isn’t going to last you very long, especially if you plan on doing a really low resistance build, but I will say that the RTA looks a lot better with the straight glass in my opinion.

Starting at the top, we have a very nice 810 drip tip that goes really well with this atomizer. Still, it’s removable, so if it’s not your style, you can just replace it with another one. One of the main differences between the original Dead Rabbit RTA and the V2 is the fill port. This time around, you don’t need to unscrew the top cap to reach the fill port, instead you have that ball-bearing system we see on a lot of sub-ohm tanks, where you push the top cap to the side to access the fill port.

This new filling system is a lot more practical than before, but you do get a bit of juice on the side of the atomizer when you slide the top cap back into position, as it basically scrapes the top of the fill port on its way back. Still, it’s not a big deal, especially if you’re familiar with this system.

Like the original Dead Rabbit, the V2 is a top-airflow RTA, and the airflow control ring is located right under the top cap. The two air slots located opposite each other are absolutely massive, offering one of the airiest draws I’ve ever experienced as a vaper when wide open. I preferred to leave them about a quarter of a way open, which not only restricted the draw, but also made it much less noisy.

The chimney looks fairly straightforward from the outside, but it’s actually one of those double-wall designs we’ve seen on top-airflow RTAs, like the Augvape Intake RTA, or the OBS Engine RTA. The air travels from the air slots, through the channel between the two walls to some honeycomb style slots at the top of the atomization chamber.

The bottom section of the Dead Rabbit V2 RTA has a built-in build deck that looks suspiciously similar to that of the original Dead Rabbit RTA. The ear-style posts are slightly slanted compared to the original, but other than that, the deck is pretty much identical, down to the silver-and-gold combination. The juice well is fairly deep, so as long as your cotton leads are long enough, there is plenty of juice to soak up.

The very bottom of Hellvape’s latest atomizers is a bit different than what I’m used to. It has this translucent plastic disc base that is apparently supposed to prevent heat from transferring to the mod. I’m not entirely sure how that works, or anyone would even care, but it looks pretty cool, and different than most other atomizers.

Honestly, I kind of like the look of the V2 a bit more than that of the original. The drip tip is nicer, the etched motif along the base and the top cap is a nice touch as well, and the small dead rabbit logo looks very cool as well. I received the black version for this review, which is great because it goes well with virtually any other color, but I know you can get it in matte silver and stainless steel as well.

The overall quality of the materials is nice enough for this price point, as are the threads and the tolerances of the o-rings, but all that doesn’t mean much if the performance is lackluster. And that’s what we’ll be talking about next:

How Does the Dead Rabbit V2 RTA Vape?

Right off the bat, I can tell you that, just like the first Dead Rabbit RTA, the V2 has a very simple build deck, so simple in fact that almost anyone could mount a couple of coils on it. You just unscrew the screws at the end of the rabbit ear posts, insert the leads into the holes at the top, tighten back the screws and you’re pretty much done.

Now, in order to get a good vaping experience with the Dead Rabbit V2, you will have to tweak your build a little bit. And I’m not talking about the type of coils you can use, that’s subjective. I mean you are going to have to cut the leads of your coils at just the right point to ensure that they don’t sit too high or too low on those rabbit ear posts.

The way the airflow is designed on this atomizer, those honeycomb slots need to hit the coils dead on in order to produce the best flavor, so a few millimeters too high or too low can make a world of difference. You can obviously vape even if the coils aren’t positioned perfectly, you’re just not going to get the best flavor.

Leaving the coil leads too long will also impact the wicking. If the coil sits too high up, the cotton wick will turn out too long, which means that the juice will take longer to reach the coils and could result in dry puffs, or a bland vaping experience.

About the wicking, simply positioning the cotton leads right over the wicking ports at the bottom of the build deck works much better than stuffing the cotton into the slots. As long as the holes are covered, the risk of the atomization chamber getting flooded is pretty low.

There isn’t much to mention in terms of cons, but I will warn you that this is a very loud atomizer when used with the airflow slots wide open. Luckily, I never use it like that as I feel it mutes the flavor.

I’ve only been using the Dead Rabbit V2 for just over a week now, and I’m fairly happy with it. The flavor is decent, but only if I restrict the airflow to about a quarter-open, vapor production is sufficient, and I have had no major issues with it. That said, I can’t say I was blown away by how well is performs either…

I never posted a review of the Dead Rabbit RDA, but it was in my rotation for a long time, because it really was one of the best drippers money could buy. The original Dead Rabbit RTA was a very successful atomizer as well, even though it didn’t match its dripper sibling in terms of innovation, but the V2 doesn’t really bring anything new to the table.

Apart from the new drip tip, the slightly slanted rabbit ear posts and the airflow slots, this is basically the first Dead Rabbit RTA with a slightly different look. Again, that’s not saying it’s bad, but if you already own the first one, I don’t see why you would want to get this one as well.

Conclusion

The Dead Rabbit V2 RTA is a decent rebuildable atomizer that does what it was created to do, but not much else. It looks a bit nicer than the first one, in my opinion, but it doesn’t really feature anything noteworthy in terms of innovation. The build deck is virtually the same, the changes to the top airflow are mostly cosmetic, which means that you will be getting a very similar vaping experience to the first version.

Do I recommend buying the Hellvape Dead Rabbit V2 RTA? Well, if you’re in the market for a rebuildable atty that’s easy to build on and performs decently, it definitely qualifies, but if you already have the version one, this is virtually a repackaged version of it.

The Hellvape Dead Rabbit V2 RTA was sent to me by Health Cabin, for the purpose of this review. They currently have it in stock for $31.49.