More DIY questions

[Bennylava]

I'll just number them for ease of reply. Oh and no need in parroting nic safety info I'm not using it.



1. What causes that chemical taste? You know the one. I haven't personally DIY'd an ejuice with that taste, but I've bought that taste at several vapor shops that mix their own liquid. Needless to say I'm not going back there. So what causes it? Too much flavor?

2. How much is your DIY ejuice per bottle? I'm trying to figure out if I'm using too much. This is supposed to be cheaper, after all. In order to get adequate flavoring out of my 30mil bottle of 100% VG, I had to mix in a whole container of Loranns Watermelon Flavoring. One of the tiny bottles of it from Hobby Lobby that is like 1ml. But that makes my bottle of ejuice cost about $1.70. I was hoping I would see a cost of about $0.25 per bottle, a massive savings over buying from the vapor store, or online.

3. Do some juices burn easier? Do some juices need to be vaped at a lower wattage than others?

4. How long do the longest juices need to steep? 2 months? I've noticed that when I buy them, they need to steep on average for about a week. The very least I've ever seen is 4 days, if a liquid needs to steep at all. So far its a least 4 days, or they don't need to steep. Cocoanut and butter popcorn from my local vapor shop do not need to steep. Razzleberry needs to steep for a minimum of 1 month before it tastes good, like it does in the samples at the vapor shop. I know its going to vary, but steepless ejuices are rare, aren't they?

 

[Wingsfan0310]

1. It's the flavoring, either too much, needs too steep, or the Alcohol in the flavoring needs to evaporate.
2. Mine ranges from ~1.50 to 1.75 depending on how much flavor. Most people use 5-15% flavor. You used 3.33%, that's pretty low imo. Compared to 30ml bottles at $20 or more, $2 is a huge savings in my book.
3. Yes - I tend to turn the voltage down on my fruit flavors more than some of my tobacco flavors
4. My longest, Honey Tobacco is best after 4 weeks. I think as a general rule, tobaccos and creams need steeping the most and fruits the least. There are always exceptions though.

Cheers,
Steve

Edit You can get an 8ml bottle of LA flavor from WL for $1.49

 

[Bennylava]

Is there a known best flavor company out there? Say on that is cheap, offers a ton of different flavors, and works well?

Also, what is the very best method of steeping? Just leaving the lid off of a small bottle doesn't seem like it would help much. What with the minimal exposure to the air, and all. Or is exposure to the air even necessary? Perhaps just sitting there in the bottle for a month, aging, does something.

 

[Wingsfan0310]

I think steeping is with the cap on sitting in a cupboard or drawer. With the cap off, I call that airing it out if it has an alcohol taste or smell. I only air out for overnight up to 24 hours to let the Alcohol evaporate and that's only been rarely. I've never had to do it for my DIY juice, only a few store bought juices.

I use Wizard labs for most of my flavors to try. They have TFA (which I like a lot) and LA, and a few Seedmans - 8ml for 1.49. I think it's very reasonable. If I find something I really like, I order a larger size directly from TFA. Most of my flavors are TFA. Everyone has a favorite flavor company though, tastes vary.

Cheers,
Steve

 

[Hoosier]

Wingsfan has given some great responses and I agree with everything Wingsfan has typed.

I usually recommend Capella's flavoring to new mixers. They aren't the cheapest, but they are some of the easiest to work with because they are usually difficult to get over-flavoring effects from them. (If you want to know the typical under and over flavoring effects click on that "3" just to the right of "Blog Entries:" under my avatar and pick the Flavoring Levels blog.)

 

[Bennylava]

What about flavors that seem to burn easily? I often buy ejuice from a local shop, and I tried coconut. For some strange reason, it starts out vaping fine at 8 watts on my vamo. And then it tapers down, where I have to keep lowering it by .5 or else the taste is burnt. So I'll start at 8 watts, then it starts tasting burnt after awhile. So I'll lower it to 7.5. Works for say 15 hits, then it has to be lowered to 7.0 watts. And so on, until it gets down to about 5 watts. What's up with that? Its fine but then it starts getting burnt. You'd think it would just taste burnt from the beginning. I ask because I don't want to make that mistake with my own ejuice.

 

[Hoosier]

Sounds like a coil gunking up.

Some mixes do that. If it's good enough, it's worth the hassle. If it's not good enough, then it's not worth the hassle.

If you want to avoid it with your own juices then only use flavorings that are clear, like clean water, don't sweeten or use any EM and minimize the amount of VG you use. That will greatly limit the flavors you can make and possibly how good you could make them, but it would greatly reduce the possibility of coil gunking.

Me, I don't worry about it too much. If a mix is a coil gunker and it's great, I vape it. If it's not great, I don't vape it so it doesn't matter if it's a coil gunker or not.

 

[Bennylava]

Ok I finally got around to ordering 4 flavors from capella's. All sweet food flavors. Are the mixing ratio's typical for all flavors? For example, should a strawberry kiwi flavoring be mixed at 10% flavoring, and a caramel cheesecake flavoring be the same? Or is it going to vary from flavor to flavor? This is going to be my first time mixing, so here is my plan. I like a heavy VG for bigger clouds.

30% PG
60% VG
10% Flavoring
0% Nicotine (i don't use nic)

Is this a good start? And what if I mess up? What if I under flavor? Do I simply add more flavor on the fly?

 

[Wingsfan0310]

It's better to start low on the flavor then to start to high. It's easier to add a little more flavor than to have to add more base. I use mainly TFA flavors so I'm not sure what the best % is for Capella is but I found a link for you that may have them in there:
http://www.e-cigarette-forum.com/forum/diy-e-liquid/427782-list-capella-flavor-percentages.html

Cheers,
Steve

 

[Crunktanium]

What about flavors that seem to burn easily?

Sounds like wicking issue maybe the juice is a bit heavy on the VG or to much wick on the coil. You need the right balance when it comes to coils or you get issues with certain juices. Other juices with differing viscosity may work fine but a well made coil should handle anything.

 

[Bennylava]

What types of measuring equipment do you guys use? I was thinking of going to tractor supply co. and seeing what types of needles and measuring stuff they have.

Also, would it be a good idea to just make 10ml bottles at first, until I get the ratio's perfect? Then let the 10ml bottle steep a week and see what happens. What is you guys' process like?

 

[pamdis]

I use syringes - 1ml, 3ml, and 5ml

I use luer lock because I have read that the luer slip needles can pop off the syringe when emptying it into the bottle

Needles - can't keep the guage sizes in my head, but the lock ends are colored:
Green is largest - I use for VG
Pink and Purple - I use for PG
Yellow - I use for flavors

I empty right into the bottle.

Typically, when testing flavors and/or recipes, I'll make 5 ml.

When I have a recipe I like, I usually only make up 10ml at a time. I get bored with flavors quickly and can use it up within a week or two and then have the bottle to reuse quicker. When I bought my supplies, I got a bunch of 10ml and 30ml bottles. I haven't used even one of the 30ml yet

 

[Hoosier]

30% PG
60% VG
10% Flavoring
0% Nicotine (i don't use nic)

Is this a good start? And what if I mess up? What if I under flavor? Do I simply add more flavor on the fly?

Yep, most of Cap's flavorings work between 10 and 15% for me. You can always add more or cut with your base to reduce....that's what notes are for.

What types of measuring equipment do you guys use? I was thinking of going to tractor supply co. and seeing what types of needles and measuring stuff they have.

Also, would it be a good idea to just make 10ml bottles at first, until I get the ratio's perfect? Then let the 10ml bottle steep a week and see what happens. What is you guys' process like?

1ml syringes Luer slip because they don't need needles. They fit in the flavoring bottles so a needle is just something else to clean that doesn't add anything useful. Graduations every 0.02ml and I bought 100 of them years ago and have a bunch still unopened. Just use them for flavoring.

A 5ml syringe with an ink jet printer cartridge refill needle. (I bought this because my son loves one of my recipes and when I mix it for him I make 2-4 bottles and each one needs 4ml of one flavoring. It's just to make this one recipe easier to batch up for my boy.)

10ml oral dosing syringe with a matching wedge stopper. Stick the stopper in the PG/VG bottle. Stick the syringe in the stopper. Flip, pull, flip, pull syringe out and dispense. The tip is wider than luer so it sucks up VG without any real finger strength. Use one in my PG/VG and one in my nicotine.

Yeah, 10ml is a good size to experiment with. Large enough to play around with a recipe and small enough to have baskets of steeping bottles stashed around the house without aggravating the neat-leaning members of the household.

 

[Bennylava]

Thanks for all the help everyone! I really appreciate it.

So you guys don't use any funnels or anything? Only syringes? I'm a chain vaper, and as such I'll be mixing up larger quantities. 100ml will likely be my small bottle lol. By the time I'm done with 100ml worth of liquid though, its usually time for a change. But it takes me that long to get bored of it. But I'll likely want to mix up 250ml bottles of my favorites, so they can be well steeped by the time I get to them.

This was all making me think of larger equipment.

 

[shynsly]

I would recommend amber glass bottles especially when you start mixing larger batches.
Glass is much better in my opinion, and it keeps it from getting too much light or UV rays.

Good Luck in the Laboratory!!!