Nervous (perhaps unnecessarily) about juice poisoning...

[sk8man121]

Hi guys,

Forgive me if this is ridiculous (I have terrible anxiety problems; one of the reasons I'm trying to quit smoking), but I'm very new to vaping and am dealing with terrible fears about nicotine poisoning ever since I read how toxic the juice is.

I'm using Smokeless Image pre-filled carts and one of the plastic caps (connector end) has a little prong on it, which I'm assuming was in contact with the juice. I used this to cap the mouthpiece thinking that the prong was supposed to go inside the mouthpiece, but now I'm wondering if really what I did was get raw juice on the mouthpiece itself.

I've been using this all day, taking the cap off and replacing numerous times. Do I have anything to be concerned about? Would I be having symptoms now? What might they be?

Again, sorry if this is absurd.

 

[Strigoi]

Unless you're drinking a bottle of liquid you have nothing to worry about.

I'd also look into refilling your own cartos since pre-filled carts are a waste of money. Carts (not cartos) are one of the worst delivery devices out there as well.

 

[The Ocelot]

Hi and welcome! You'll be fine. I was paranoid about it too at first, but you get over it. I keep a box of wet wipes nearby, to wipe my hands with, but that's about it. If you get it on your lips it will tingle a bit, and if you get some in your mouth (which you will) it may irritate the back of your throat. You were putting far more hazardous materials into your body smoking cigarettes - and with juice you can rinse out your mouth - your lungs didn't have a choice.

 

[sk8man121]

the reason that i haven't gotten into filling my own is probably because i'm so nervous about coming in contact with the juice itself. also, what is the difference between a cart and a carto?

 

[cactus71]

Not a doctor (disclaimer) but do you feel ill/poisoned? If not, and if "you've been using [it] all day", I'd assume that if you'd had a toxic level of nicotine, you'd know by know.

 

[sk8man121]

No I feel alright; a bit like I've had a lot of nicotine, but I kind of have simply from vaping a lot today. My pulse is normal, though, and I'm not throwing up or anything.

 

[JC Okie]

the reason that i haven't gotten into filling my own is probably because i'm so nervous about coming in contact with the juice itself. also, what is the difference between a cart and a carto?

I don't know what kind of pv you have, but "cart" is short for cartridge. It is a little plastic piece that has polyfil in it that holds juice, and it fits down on top of the atomizer (or atty) that heats up the liquid. A cart is part of a 3-piece system. Some systems are 2-piece: the have a "carto" (short for cartomizer) which has the heating element in it as well as the polyfil that holds the juice. The whole thing screws onto the battery.

EDIT: Don't be afraid of the juice. At the concentration you're using, it won't hurt you at all....even if it gets on you or in your mouth a little. Nicotine can get petty dangerous when it's in way higher concentrations....like when people make their own (DIY) juice. They usually start with a much higher concentration of nicotine then dilute it and flavor it. That can get dangerous if you're not careful with it, or if you don't know what you're doing. In normal use, the nicotine won't hurt you unless you do something crazy (like drink it or something!!)

 

[sk8man121]

Ah. I'm using a Smokeless Image Volt 78mm.

 

[Groth]

Here in Australia everyone has to DIY their own juice, often getting quite high concentrations of unflavoured nicotine, people have even reported spilling 100mg/ml on their skin and not suffering any major effects, perhaps a racing pulse and insomnia, that's about it. If you get premade juice it's likely 12-18 mg/ml. Some even say if they get a drop on them they just rub it in! I wouldn't advise that, but I would definitely advise not worrying about it.

 

[The Ocelot]

No I feel alright; a bit like I've had a lot of nicotine, but I kind of have simply from vaping a lot today. My pulse is normal, though, and I'm not throwing up or anything.

You're okay. It's just a new experience. If people get too much in their systems, they can feel "nic sick" in different ways - feeling buzzed, headache, upset stomach, etc., but it's not like major poisoning. It also passes far more quickly than the feeling of having smoked too many cigarettes - like the dreaded cigarette hangover after a night on the town.

Keep in mind too, you're not coming in contact with 100% nicotine. For example, if you're vaping 18mgs, that's 1.8% by volume, and you may not not actually be absorbing that much; you also control how much you vape. Based on the info from drugs.com (just the first one I looked at, it may not be exactly correct) if a person smoked more than 25 cigarettes a day, the dosage is 4mg nicotine gum, one piece every 1-2 hours for the first 6 weeks.

I think that you now have enough posts to read the blogs. Baditude has a nice one explaining some of the basics of vaping gear: http://www.e-cigarette-forum.com/forum/blogs/baditude/3230-proper-terminology-carto-tank-what-juice-delivery-attachments.html

 

[T41CK]

Also try drinking some water more through out the day. Most vapors have experienced the urge to drink more water. This may ease your stomach quite a bit

 

[94civic3door]

maby a lower nic level juice would be safer....ive relized some flavors just taste amazing and i smoke the crap out of it.....i quickly got warm,and felt a little sweat on my head.....i put it down,the fruity flavors i tend to get a lower nic level of juice because i smoke the crap out of it and dont no when to stop...the other flavors like coffee ones tobacco ones i get around 18 and heck if u can smoke the heck of out there your a beast in my book i no when to stop with them...you will get it all figured out im sure just a learning curve everyone im sure has been down this road u will figure it out and im sure be fine....also good luck!

 

[sk8man121]

Currently using 12mg cartomizers. Once i started pulling and waiting until i'm done to inhale, the burning sensation in my throat went away. Does this sound familiar to anyone?

 

[94civic3door]

me myself i pull then when im done i inhale.....seems to work good for me but everyone is diffrent if that ways better i say keep rocking it that way!



that sounded kinda nasty lmao!

 

[The Ocelot]

Currently using 12mg cartomizers. Once i started pulling and waiting until i'm done to inhale, the burning sensation in my throat went away. Does this sound familiar to anyone?

Let's see if I can explain it. Everyone vapes a little differently, but many vape like I do. You take a long, slow drag - using your mouth muscles, rather than your lungs. You continue to breath through your nose while taking the drag. Then I take a beat, inhale a bit with the vape hitting the back of my throat and exhale through my mouth; others through their nose.

Anyone else want to chime in? I think there are a number of threads about "How do you vape?"

 

[tnt56]

Your doing fine by asking this question. Oh Welcome to ECF BTW. Your body will tell you when youve had enough nic. Headache, upset tummy, feeling like puppy poop. The main thing you HAVE to remember is to Hydrate. Hydrate, Did I say Hydrate. Vaping dries out your body from the PG. Drink water. Not coffee, or soda. Give your body what it needs. Trust what your body is telling you. If you start to feel sick, put it down and drink a glass of water and rest for a bit. It will pass. I drink on the average of 1,5 gallons, yea that's right gallons of water every day. Gee I wonder why I pee so much.

 

[sk8man121]

It's true I have noticed sort of a dry mouth feeling since I started vaping. I drink a fair amount of beer also, which probably contributes to this. More water, then!

 

[Ahoy]

It sounds like are going to be just fine, while nicotine is also absorbed through the skin, the amount of nicotine needed to send the body into shock is actually pretty substantial, you would literally either have to drink nicotine in its liquid form or drink upwards of 20mls of ejuice. And smoking cigarettes you would have to literally smoke close to 7 packs to get nic poisoning to the point you need the ER.

Pretty crazy if you actually think about it, there have been hundreds of cases of nic poisoning, i know one reported case i read in a health book was a guy smoked almost 12 packs in a day (W..T...F) that's insane and that is so much time spent smoking.

Anywho, you seem to be fine if you haven't experienced anything yet so good luck man!

 

[Darthpistachio]

Nicotine in it's purest form is an extremely toxic substance and also classified as a pesticide. As such - a substance like this has various COSHH guidelines that must be followed - one of those is labelling of ANY nicotine product with a toxicity label and the standard warnings about it which tends to appear everywhere and that includes the warning about it being very toxic when in contact with skin.


This can freak out anyone new to vaping and rightly so - HOWEVER - the nicotine we are dealing with is FAR from pure and very Diffuse.
The highest level you could theoretically encounter were you making juices yourself is probably around 7.6% by volume

In juices that we buy ready made and use the maximum you could realistically encounter is 3.6% by volume or roughly 36mg per ml.

Should you worry if you get a few drops onto your skin or in your mouth? No - to be frank

I wouldn't recommend that you drink the stuff or wash your hands in it - but if you get some on your hands just quickly wash off or wipe with a damp towel or wet wipe. An issue I get when refilling my mini vivi nova is I always get a splurge of juice when I tighten the top cap down. I just dampen a paper towel and give it a wipe - never had any problems.

By far the only serious issue you may need to contend with is overdoing the nicotine consumtpion - many new vapers tend to overdo the vaping at first with high Level NIC juices and thus get some of the symptoms of NIC overdose - and overdose is a bit of a strong term really even though it is grammatically correct -it's not going to be like a painkiller overdose for example!

If you want to vape like a steam train cos you like it - then reduce your NIC level in your juice - simple!

 

[Darthpistachio]

Oh whilst I think about it - I keep dogs - have done for years - One of the things we always get told about is that Chocolate is very poisonous to dogs.

The toxicity of the chocolate is proportional to the actual size of the animal though - so I did a bit of research when my pet Sprocker ate a chunk of chocolate off my coffee table (thieving little sod) and discovered that she would need to consume about 2lbs of the stuff to encounter poisoning related symptoms.

She'd have puked up before that happened - so although it IS posionous and needs to be reported - you MUST put things into context.

It's like those warnings you get on tools and such that indicate that some utter fool has done the mentioned act and thus it now has to go on the warning as a disclaimer for the manufacturer - the favourate one of mine is the one that appears on a russian chainsaw box? - "warning do not stop blade with genitals"