A Guide to making your own e-juice

[Scubabatdan]

Here is a guide to making your own juice, it might help the new guys and gals out there:

Ok so you are tired of the vendors taste or price and think you can do better. Some of the things you will need:

1- Propylene Glycol (PG) Food grade (USP), this is the main liquid of choice among most e-cig users. Some people have an allergies to PG and can only use VG
2- Vegetable Glycerin (VG) Food Grade (USP), or just Glycerin most people use the term interchangeably but VG is made from vegetables and Glycerin is made from animal fats.
3- Distilled water, this is mostly needed for 100% VG mixes to thin the juice out
4- Flavoring, a lot of people use between 10-20% flavoring in their mixes. Some flavors are strong and require as little as 5%
5- Nicotine liquid, this is can be found at most larger online stores. You want unflavored nicotine juice, most places will offer it suspended in either PG or VG. For first timers I recommend 50mg nic juice.
6- Mixing supplies, you will need pipettes, 10ml – 100ml bottles, 1ml(cc)-12ml(cc) syringes, 16ga blunt tip needles

Ok so now you have all the supplies, YAY lets mix. You will need a program to help with the mixing; this takes the guess work out of figuring out the percentages to combine each liquid.
A simple formula for figuring out nic strength manually:

Given:
Liquid#1 - 10ml of 50mg nic juice
Liquid#2 - 30ml of PG

To figure out the strength of the nicotine when they are added together you calculate the following:
Liquid#1 _QTY * Liquid#1_MG + Liquid#2_QTY * Liquid#2_MG / Liquid#1 _QTY + Liquid#2_QTY

Or

10 * 50 + 30 * 0 / 10 + 30
500 + 0 / 40
500 / 40 = 12.5mg

Ok so here is a trick, say you have 5ml of 50mg nic juice and want to make a 10mg juice with 10% flavoring and 20% VG added. Here is how to do it:

5 * 50 = 250mg (This is the total amount of nic in our juice)
Now divide 250mg by 10mg = 25ml total juice
Subtract the 5ml of nic juice from the 25ml and you have 20ml of liquid of any combination that will be added to the nic juice to make 25ml of 10mg juice.

So….

10% of 25 = 2.5ml of flavoring
20% of 25 = 5ml of VG
20 – 5 – 2.5 = 12.5ml of PG

So our total mix is:
5ml of 50mg nic juice
2.5ml of flavoring
5ml of VG
12.5ml of PG

5 + 2.5 + 5 + 12.5 = 25ml of 10mg nic juice with 10% flavoring and 20% VG

Below you can see how our manual numbers can be plugged into the calculator, and the results of what needs to be added together in section 2.

This is where a syringe helps to measure the exact quantities. Or a pipette if you are using drops. I would only use drops when making 1ml total mixes. Of course each dropper is different and you need to measure how many drops from each type of liquid equal one ml so when you move to ml the ratios are the same. But since most people make 10-50ml batches I would stick with ml measurements.

Resource list:
Pipettes: Amazon.com: Pipettes: Toys & Games
10ml Bottles: 10cc Natural Boston Round Bottle with Dropper Cap | U.S. Plastic Corp.
Syringes: Amazon.com: 10cc Syringe (Pkg. of 5): Toys & Games
16ga Blunt needle: Amazon.com: Stainless Steel Blunt Needle With Luer Polypropylene Hub 16 Gauge x 1" Length (Pack of 25): Industrial & Scientific
Food Grade PG: Go-goUSA.com | Go-goUSA.com
Food Grade VG: Go-goUSA.com | Go-goUSA.com
Nic Juice: Xtreme Vaping Nic Liquid

Flavoring:
Lorann: https://www.lorannoils.com/c-6-super-strength-flavors.aspx
Capella: Concentrated Flavorings|Sugar Free Drink | Flavor Drops
FlavorArt: Flavourart. La sartoria degli aromi
The Perfurmers Apprentice: Perfumers Apprentice - Professional DIY Flavors

E-Juice Calculators:
https://www.filesanywhere.com/fs/v.aspx?v=89716a8d58646ea772a0
eJuice Recipe Calculator
E-Liquid Calculator - An easy way to mix your own E-Liquid
eJuice Me Up - e-Juice e-Liquid Recipe Calculator
http://www.ecigexpress.com/ejuice-calculator.php
DIY E-Liquid (E-Juice) Mixing Station!
e-Liquid Calculator
Advanced E-liquid calculator - DIY eJuice Calculator for the electronic cigarette ? Svapo.it
Cloud 9 Vaping E-Liquid Mixing Calculator - Cloud 9 Vaping
E-Liquid Recipe Calculator

Remember ALWAYS take notes and write your recipes down, I can atest to the fact of making an awesome juice but never able to replicate it because I could not remember what I mixed together or the quantities!! Always record what you do!

Well hope this is helpful.
Dan

 

[beckah54]

Thanks Dan. Excellent examples and explanations, as usual.

 

[MaxUT]

I would add that 1 mL syringes are very handy for measuring small quantities of flavoring when making test batches. Get a long 18 gauge needle for these if you can.

 

[Scubabatdan]

I would add that 1 mL syringes are very handy for measuring small quantities of flavoring when making test batches. Get a long 18 gauge needle for these if you can.

Good point on the 1ml syringes, but 16ga is bigger than 18ga, better for VG.
Dan

 

[markdpman]

Good point on the 1ml syringes, but 16ga is bigger than 18ga, better for VG.
Dan

A friend of mine is an insulin dependent diabetic and he gave me a lot of his used .5 ml syringes. With plyers the needles come off and an alcohol (Everclear) rinse to clean and they are perfect for mixing your flavors when making small batches. If you can find these they measure easily to .01 mls.

 

[KeysBum]

Thanks for the tutorial. Best relatively simple one I've seen.

 

[loden813]

Very nice job! Thanks!!

 

[Lambch3p]

Great , as always Dan. You have a gift for explaining things in ways that people new to DIY can understand. Thank you for the time you spent putting this together.

My $0.02, it is easier to measure and mix with syringes rather then trying to count drops or use pipettes. Liquids with different viscosities have different drop sizes and you have much more measuring control with syringes rather then pipettes.

 

[KTaylor]

Looking at getting into DIY soon. Thank you for a great thread Dan!

 

[markfm]

Perhaps one minor thing, maybe recommend that the PG be USP? (a nit, excellent writeup )

 

[Scubabatdan]

Great , as always Dan. You have a gift for explaining things in ways that people new to DIY can understand. Thank you for the time you spent putting this together.

My $0.02, it is easier to measure and mix with syringes rather then trying to count drops or use pipettes. Liquids with different viscosities have different drop sizes and you have much more measuring control with syringes rather then pipettes.

I agree! hence the mention of sticking to ml

Perhaps one minor thing, maybe recommend that the PG be USP? (a nit, excellent writeup )

Great catch, added!
Dan

 

[fray]

A friend of mine is an insulin dependent diabetic and he gave me a lot of his used .5 ml syringes. With plyers the needles come off and an alcohol (Everclear) rinse to clean and they are perfect for mixing your flavors when making small batches. If you can find these they measure easily to .01 mls.

I use these syringes for small batches but they are new. Something about using used syringes gives me a little eek factor. Surely the alcohol kills anything worth killing, just a little out there for me personally.