I'm a flavor chaser mostly and I've switched to high VG (70/30) at 3mg nic at .55ohms to get a healthier vape for about 3 months now. I've been seeing for some time now that the VG releases Formaldehyde in articles everywhere including FB. Does anyone know at what temperature or what ohms does it starts to do this? Is it a concern? Maybe I should go back to 50/50 at 1.5ohms? Fill me in my fellow vapers.
Formaldehyde
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I'm having trouble believing heated PG or VG creates a formaldehyde.
Have a link?
I'm not against learning more about what we're inhaling, but there's a lot of misinformation out there that's assumed true because its on the internet.
Have a link?
I'm not against learning more about what we're inhaling, but there's a lot of misinformation out there that's assumed true because its on the internet.
according to this Carbonyl compounds in electronic cigarette vapors: effects of nicot... - PubMed - NCBI it's high PG liquid, not high VG, and at "high voltage," whatever that means.
Since the abstract doesn't describe the atomizers used, it's hard to tell if this was due to the liquids being heated to higher temperatures, or due to lack of proper airflow/wicking.
Since the abstract doesn't describe the atomizers used, it's hard to tell if this was due to the liquids being heated to higher temperatures, or due to lack of proper airflow/wicking.
Somewhere between electric forklift battery, and just jamming some kanthal into your electrical outlets.
I've seen articles stating only in high PG liquids, some stating only in high VG liquids, some stating only at high voltage/temperature. I think the consensus is, they don't really know how to accurately use the devices they are using for the testing, or how to accurately test for what they want to test.
These issues (heat degradation of refill liquids that either increases the quantity of unwanted compounds or creates new ones) apply to both PG and glycerine.
It's not really worth debating the specifics until better test results are available. Many of these tests are funded by the pharmaceutical industry and the results deliberately misrepresented, in the hope that people will be scared away from vaping and therefore fewer will quit smoking; so at this point in time it is impossible to describe lab tests of ecig vapour as altogether accurate - some are clearly nothing more than baseless propaganda.
However there are enough tests by reliable researchers that we can safely state that the vapour produced by atomisers run at high temperatures is not the same as that produced at the 'normal' atomisation temperature commonly used until RBAs became popular. Whether the elevated proportions of certain compounds, or the amounts of new compounds created, might have any significant impact on health on average is completely unknown at this stage (and cannot be known for at least another decade).
Specific advice cannot be given
Here are some of the specifics - you will have to make your own decision on all these issues as there is no one who can give you accurate advice at this time [1].
- Overall, you can only rely on the advice of independent experts who have the necessary expertise and no significant COI [2]. See those listed in note #1. There are extremely few such experts at this time.
- The description "high voltage" is drivel, spouted by persons ignorant of even the basic concepts involved. If you read something that talks about high voltage, you can immediately assume two things:
a) This person knows nothing about the subject
b) They are almost certainly a paid propagandist
- The problem, if one exists, is high temperatures, and this is caused by high power. High power draw is normally the result of very low atomiser resistance. To put it simply: a voltage that is limited to a narrow range (normally between 3 and 6 volts but in some cases up to about 8 volts) with a resistive load of 2.5 ohms has a low current draw. The very low voltage and the low current draw (toward the bottom end of a single-figure draw in amps over most of this range) results in low power consumption (measured in watts), and this low power, by design, creates low atomiser temperatures commonly around the 60 to 70 C mark.
- Older designs of atomiser (and cartomiser etc) in addition employed tight restrictions on the heater space volume (the enclosed area in which the atomiser-wick arrangement is working) so that the high saturation of air by refill liquid or in some cases even submersion, together with the tightly-directed airflow jet cooling and negative pressure cooling effects, together resulted in a combination of low nebuliser temperature and high aerosol humidity.
- New designs of atomiser (RBAs) can employ traditional resistance atomiser coils. They can also use low and super-low resistance coils to draw very high currents (not voltage) that result in super-high power consumption. An example is a 40 amp draw creating a 170 watt consumption. This requires very capable batteries, and some can now supply a 60-amp pulse without damage. The atomiser chamber is typically also much more open than the old style. The design goal is to generate dense clouds of vapour.
- Together all these factors mean that atomiser temperatures can in some cases be 3 times higher than the traditional range. Temperatures approaching (or even exceeding) 200 C at the coil can be expected for extreme vaping set-ups. The vapour is also going to have a lower water content per unit volume (it will be 'drier').
- It is impossible that the chemical profile of vapour created by very small coils at 60 C in a small chamber under high humidity or by large coils at 200 C in an open chamber is the same.
- More potential toxins will be seen in the high-temperature vapour.
- Nobody knows what the implications are, or even if the toxins have any significance at these (usually) comparatively low levels compared to smoking.
- The individual vaper can easily organise their consumption patterns to minimise risk or maximise other aspects. You can't have everything at the same time as obviously there is a compromise to be struck. The individual must decide what is important to them.
- It may be possible that there is an increase in toxin generation proportional to reduction in coil resistance. We won't know this until we have honest research unaffected by the massive corruption in this area. At this time, all that can be said is that higher resistance probably equals a higher safety margin but this is only speculation.
- The specific issues for (1) PG, (2) glycerol, and (3) possibly a mix of the two, are different. It is very hard at this stage to say that one is 'better' than the other two options for high-temperature vaping - indeed this may be the wrong attitude if you are talking about risk reduction, as it is about the same as saying Pikes Peak bike racing is safer than TT bike racing. One may have less risk than the other judging by annual deaths but neither are 'safe' by any definition of the word.
----------------------
[1] I know or correspond with or am aware of the work and status of everyone who counts in this field and whose opinion has any value. To get specific advice about the toxicity of vapour components and the possible effect on lung function or health, I can only think of two people who have anything like the required qualifications and expertise in the field of ecig vapour-related toxicity and health to be able to give an accurate professional opinion on the health implications of inhalation of a variety of different ecig aerosols. They are Prof Burstyn the toxicologist and Prof Polosa the lung disease specialist. Dr Farsalinos the cardiologist will also be able to give a good overview of risks in this area as he probably has the best appreciation of the overall impact of all the combined risk factors in vaping.
Without asking any of them I can tell you what their opinion on this is:
a) It doesn't matter all that much what you vape or how you vape it, you are still inhaling water vapour as against smoke and therefore it is impossible that the risk for vapers can be any greater than one-twentieth of that for smokers at the absolute maximum. (This is their usual reply to questions about overall maximum risk evaluation.)
What this means is that if every smoker switched to vaping, and then every vaper chain-vaped, and exclusively used super-sub-ohm rigs with the cheapest refills including poor-quality materials and known toxic adulterants such as diacetyl, then smoking-related mortality would still reduce to 1/20th or 5% of the smoking-related deathrate or lower.
It also probably means that if all vapers acted conservatively and safely with regard to their vaping choices, a reduction in the deathrate by a factor of 10,000 could be expected. (That means if 100,000 a year die from smoking, and all smokers switched to vaping, and all vapers acted conservatively, then we might instead [eventually] see 10 deaths a year - which is an invisible amount among the 10 million smokers needed to create a deathrate of 100k/year).
b) Higher atomiser temperatures will inevitably create proportionately higher amounts of unwanted materials in the vapour. There may be some risk to individuals who are not average in terms of their genetic makeup or current health.
[2] Everyone has some form of COI (conflict of interest). There is going to be some kind of influence on the agenda, for most people, though often of minor relevance. At the other end of the scale, you have people whose current or future employment depends on promoting a specific agenda and thus deliberately lying.
The trick is to work out who is who before you listen to what they have to say. The general area of health / tobacco / pharmaceuticals has more COIs for more people than any other debated topic area anywhere: there are more people involved than any other disputed area and the money is bigger. The smoking economy is greater than $1 trillion a year (probably around $1.5tn) and huge numbers of people depend on it for their employment. The affected group that currently has the most influence on policy and which has the most to lose is the pharmaceutical industry and its dependants. Pharma derives about 15% of its global $1 trillion turnover from smoking-related channels, and is desperately fighting to protect those revenues. By definition this means they must try to protect smoking. Indeed it is their primary concern in this area.
Together with its paid researchers, university staff and fake charities / front groups, pharma has the most effect on the legal aspects of vaping. Nothing from this source or anything connected with it can be trusted to the slightest degree. It controls the largest propaganda machine the world has ever seen, and this huge volume of commercial black propaganda significantly affects every possible aspect of the public perspective on, and the policy and laws relating to, vaping, nicotine, and smoking.
In other words the pharmaceutical industry and its associates are far more corrupt than the tobacco industry, the arms industry, the energy industry or any other (and far worse in every respect including the corruption and the number of people killed than any illegal drugs organisation and probably even all of them combined). One reason we know this is that by legal definition the pharmaceutical industry is the world's largest criminal organisation, since no other entity, group or collection has paid so many fines of such high amounts across such a wide spectrum of those involved (untold billions of dollars for criminal fraud and criminal corruption globally). Once again this is strictly a legal description, as against some kind of opinion or speculation. It is a simple fact.
It's not really worth debating the specifics until better test results are available. Many of these tests are funded by the pharmaceutical industry and the results deliberately misrepresented, in the hope that people will be scared away from vaping and therefore fewer will quit smoking; so at this point in time it is impossible to describe lab tests of ecig vapour as altogether accurate - some are clearly nothing more than baseless propaganda.
However there are enough tests by reliable researchers that we can safely state that the vapour produced by atomisers run at high temperatures is not the same as that produced at the 'normal' atomisation temperature commonly used until RBAs became popular. Whether the elevated proportions of certain compounds, or the amounts of new compounds created, might have any significant impact on health on average is completely unknown at this stage (and cannot be known for at least another decade).
Specific advice cannot be given
Here are some of the specifics - you will have to make your own decision on all these issues as there is no one who can give you accurate advice at this time [1].
- Overall, you can only rely on the advice of independent experts who have the necessary expertise and no significant COI [2]. See those listed in note #1. There are extremely few such experts at this time.
- The description "high voltage" is drivel, spouted by persons ignorant of even the basic concepts involved. If you read something that talks about high voltage, you can immediately assume two things:
a) This person knows nothing about the subject
b) They are almost certainly a paid propagandist
- The problem, if one exists, is high temperatures, and this is caused by high power. High power draw is normally the result of very low atomiser resistance. To put it simply: a voltage that is limited to a narrow range (normally between 3 and 6 volts but in some cases up to about 8 volts) with a resistive load of 2.5 ohms has a low current draw. The very low voltage and the low current draw (toward the bottom end of a single-figure draw in amps over most of this range) results in low power consumption (measured in watts), and this low power, by design, creates low atomiser temperatures commonly around the 60 to 70 C mark.
- Older designs of atomiser (and cartomiser etc) in addition employed tight restrictions on the heater space volume (the enclosed area in which the atomiser-wick arrangement is working) so that the high saturation of air by refill liquid or in some cases even submersion, together with the tightly-directed airflow jet cooling and negative pressure cooling effects, together resulted in a combination of low nebuliser temperature and high aerosol humidity.
- New designs of atomiser (RBAs) can employ traditional resistance atomiser coils. They can also use low and super-low resistance coils to draw very high currents (not voltage) that result in super-high power consumption. An example is a 40 amp draw creating a 170 watt consumption. This requires very capable batteries, and some can now supply a 60-amp pulse without damage. The atomiser chamber is typically also much more open than the old style. The design goal is to generate dense clouds of vapour.
- Together all these factors mean that atomiser temperatures can in some cases be 3 times higher than the traditional range. Temperatures approaching (or even exceeding) 200 C at the coil can be expected for extreme vaping set-ups. The vapour is also going to have a lower water content per unit volume (it will be 'drier').
- It is impossible that the chemical profile of vapour created by very small coils at 60 C in a small chamber under high humidity or by large coils at 200 C in an open chamber is the same.
- More potential toxins will be seen in the high-temperature vapour.
- Nobody knows what the implications are, or even if the toxins have any significance at these (usually) comparatively low levels compared to smoking.
- The individual vaper can easily organise their consumption patterns to minimise risk or maximise other aspects. You can't have everything at the same time as obviously there is a compromise to be struck. The individual must decide what is important to them.
- It may be possible that there is an increase in toxin generation proportional to reduction in coil resistance. We won't know this until we have honest research unaffected by the massive corruption in this area. At this time, all that can be said is that higher resistance probably equals a higher safety margin but this is only speculation.
- The specific issues for (1) PG, (2) glycerol, and (3) possibly a mix of the two, are different. It is very hard at this stage to say that one is 'better' than the other two options for high-temperature vaping - indeed this may be the wrong attitude if you are talking about risk reduction, as it is about the same as saying Pikes Peak bike racing is safer than TT bike racing. One may have less risk than the other judging by annual deaths but neither are 'safe' by any definition of the word.
----------------------
[1] I know or correspond with or am aware of the work and status of everyone who counts in this field and whose opinion has any value. To get specific advice about the toxicity of vapour components and the possible effect on lung function or health, I can only think of two people who have anything like the required qualifications and expertise in the field of ecig vapour-related toxicity and health to be able to give an accurate professional opinion on the health implications of inhalation of a variety of different ecig aerosols. They are Prof Burstyn the toxicologist and Prof Polosa the lung disease specialist. Dr Farsalinos the cardiologist will also be able to give a good overview of risks in this area as he probably has the best appreciation of the overall impact of all the combined risk factors in vaping.
Without asking any of them I can tell you what their opinion on this is:
a) It doesn't matter all that much what you vape or how you vape it, you are still inhaling water vapour as against smoke and therefore it is impossible that the risk for vapers can be any greater than one-twentieth of that for smokers at the absolute maximum. (This is their usual reply to questions about overall maximum risk evaluation.)
What this means is that if every smoker switched to vaping, and then every vaper chain-vaped, and exclusively used super-sub-ohm rigs with the cheapest refills including poor-quality materials and known toxic adulterants such as diacetyl, then smoking-related mortality would still reduce to 1/20th or 5% of the smoking-related deathrate or lower.
It also probably means that if all vapers acted conservatively and safely with regard to their vaping choices, a reduction in the deathrate by a factor of 10,000 could be expected. (That means if 100,000 a year die from smoking, and all smokers switched to vaping, and all vapers acted conservatively, then we might instead [eventually] see 10 deaths a year - which is an invisible amount among the 10 million smokers needed to create a deathrate of 100k/year).
b) Higher atomiser temperatures will inevitably create proportionately higher amounts of unwanted materials in the vapour. There may be some risk to individuals who are not average in terms of their genetic makeup or current health.
[2] Everyone has some form of COI (conflict of interest). There is going to be some kind of influence on the agenda, for most people, though often of minor relevance. At the other end of the scale, you have people whose current or future employment depends on promoting a specific agenda and thus deliberately lying.
The trick is to work out who is who before you listen to what they have to say. The general area of health / tobacco / pharmaceuticals has more COIs for more people than any other debated topic area anywhere: there are more people involved than any other disputed area and the money is bigger. The smoking economy is greater than $1 trillion a year (probably around $1.5tn) and huge numbers of people depend on it for their employment. The affected group that currently has the most influence on policy and which has the most to lose is the pharmaceutical industry and its dependants. Pharma derives about 15% of its global $1 trillion turnover from smoking-related channels, and is desperately fighting to protect those revenues. By definition this means they must try to protect smoking. Indeed it is their primary concern in this area.
Together with its paid researchers, university staff and fake charities / front groups, pharma has the most effect on the legal aspects of vaping. Nothing from this source or anything connected with it can be trusted to the slightest degree. It controls the largest propaganda machine the world has ever seen, and this huge volume of commercial black propaganda significantly affects every possible aspect of the public perspective on, and the policy and laws relating to, vaping, nicotine, and smoking.
In other words the pharmaceutical industry and its associates are far more corrupt than the tobacco industry, the arms industry, the energy industry or any other (and far worse in every respect including the corruption and the number of people killed than any illegal drugs organisation and probably even all of them combined). One reason we know this is that by legal definition the pharmaceutical industry is the world's largest criminal organisation, since no other entity, group or collection has paid so many fines of such high amounts across such a wide spectrum of those involved (untold billions of dollars for criminal fraud and criminal corruption globally). Once again this is strictly a legal description, as against some kind of opinion or speculation. It is a simple fact.
I have a Vaping risk reduction profile for my Vape use. Coil .5ohm or higher[usually + 1ohm]. 24mg nicotine E Liquid. Mouth to shallow lung inhales and exhale out nose. High Nic means less juice consumed and smaller amounts of Vapor inhaled. Also less puffs. This method is partly for unknown compounds in some flavorings. Basically if I use 24mg E-Liquid I use about 4 mils a day. If I used 6mg e-liquid I would need to consume[inhale] 16 mils a day. Its not to save money as I DIY all my juice and Nicotine solution is the most expensive ingredient ,followed by Quality Flavorings-no Custards or buttery tones, Sorry if I got to far off topic.
all compounds will produce toxic chemicals when burned. my stereo will produce toxic gas and may burn down my house if I plug it into a 220 volt outlet. these test that show formaldehyde production operated cheap vaporizers at very high voltages to produce these results.when operating at normal voltages no formaldehyde was detected. burnt juice or wicks do not taste good so no one would operate a vaporizer at temperatures that burn juice or wicks.this is more junk science from the people that want us to use nicotine patches or other pharmaceuticals that don't work instead of vaping that does work.don't let the pharmaceutical companies scare you into not quitting or getting on that merry-go-round of failed attempts to quick using their products. there is no evidence that vaping is unsafe and it is clearly much safer than tobacco.people do not use sub-ohm RBAs to increase vapor temperature but to increase the amount of vapor produces. more power allows you to vaporize more juice,if it raises the temperature of your vapor then the coil or wick is not working properly
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It's true that PG and VG can break down at high temperatures. The studies I have seen have all used cheap clearos, so it's impossible to gauge how that might translate to an RDA with high airflow and proper wicking.
One study found that the release of harmful chemicals began around 3.8 volts on a cheap clearo. The more recent formaldehyde study (that made the news) only found high levels at 5 volts (as we all know 5 volts on a cheap CE4 is crazy anyway).
Ultimately, it's all going to depend on the temperature of the coil/wick which will determine how hot the juice gets. There aren't any good studies (afaik) that attempt to measure the actual temperature (because it's hard to do accurately). Voltage doesn't mean a whole lot unless we know that.
We need studies on RBA's. I believe Dr. F. is trying to put one together where he will measure the temp of the coil under normal usage conditions (i.e. voltage/watts that people actually vape at).
We do know, however, that if you heat the juice up enough, it will release toxins. That much is clear. The question is how hot does our juice get under normal usage conditions?
At best - these 'formaldehyde studies' show that at the current level of technology - robots should not be vaping. They lack the ability to get repulsed by a dry hit.
Did you read rolygate's response? Who is Jason S. Herrington that we should trust his blog posts? Aside from presenting evidence that there are other compounds in e-juice vapor, what bearing does it have on the impact to human health and the increase or decrease in risk of using e-cigarettes?
One can counter with this article...
From the article:
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I'm told that the recent junk science on formaldehyde in ecig vapour didn't even find any formaldehyde - just precursors. I can't bring myself to read yet more reams of drivel so that's just going by commentary on it.
Not surprising really. People who create and promote all this rubbish get very well paid, we're told one of them gets over $6 million a year. For that money a lot of people might consider the proposition...
Not surprising really. People who create and promote all this rubbish get very well paid, we're told one of them gets over $6 million a year. For that money a lot of people might consider the proposition...
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