No nic to test recipes?

[Jerry J]

I'm very new at this DIY juice making. I would like to try out some different combinations and was thinking the most expensive component is the nic juice. So my question is....would it be best to just mix the portions of PG/VG and flavor? I would just leave the nic juice out since that it neutral, right?

 

[PONKAW]

Nic varies widely depending on strength and purity. You will find many opinions on whom to buy from, but generally all the venders have some variation per batch. Ideally you would want a very clear (almost water like) liquid with very little odor. Over time nic tends to gain an amber-ish color and the odor can get much stronger effecting the taste and appearance of your recipe.

 

[rustafar]

You got it. Then when you have the flavor right, just use the nic vg,pg. at the same % as the no nic.

Russ.

 

[Screamin Eagle]

All the liquid I make has no nic in it at all. But I can add it to any of my recipes if need be.
Check your nic juice to find out what the nic is suspended in (PG or VG). In most cases it is suspended in PG.
If your using a PG/VG base, and your nic is cut with PG, all you have to do is substitute the amount of nic juice your calculator suggests for that much of the stright PG you used in the test mix. So if your test juice used 3.5ml of PG, and your calculator calls for adding 1ml of nic juice, you would add 2.5ml of stright PG and the 1ml of nic juice. Most good e-juice calculators will already do this for you if you put the numbers in.
Personaly, I make 10ml batches at a time so it's easier to calculate the numbers in my head. 10%=1ml=20drops.

 

[Moogle]

The most expensive component is the flavor. By far. I tried an experiment using a small plastic box with 30 small threaded containers I got at a craft store. I started a thread on it and was going to get all scientific about it but it's just too time consuming. It's a great way to get an idea of what your flavors taste like initially. I did 2 ml samples of PG/VG no NIC with 5% to 10% flavor. I used the guidelines in this http://www.e-cigarette-forum.com/fo.../4658-flavor-apprentice-flavoring-thread.html This id for TFA. There are other threads for other vendors.

I recommend scanning this forum for recipes to try E-Liquid Recipes Try some you think sound good and adjust from there. Of course you can go 0 NIC to save your NIC but I generally do 15 ml batches based on others' recipes or variations of them and they taste fine. I just make notes about how I think they can be improved and go from there. It's overwhelming at first but I've been doing DIY 5 months and I'm starting to come up with good methods and a few of my own recipes based entirely on my subjective hunches and limited experience.

I say getting your feet wet is the only way to go. I've tossed a few batches but we're talking $1.50 here. Learn and improve as you go. Research and TAKE NOTES!!!!!!!!

 

[Jerry J]

Thank you for the recommendations here. I do appreciate it very much.

What I am trying to do is match a local vendor's offering. It is a 2.5 hour round trip for me and shipping for one bottle is $5.
So I've been wanting to try different proportions to see if I can get close. It's just much easier if I'm not adding the nic juice into the equation.

 

[Moogle]

I don't use one but there are E-Juice calculators out there too. Maybe someone can give you a recommendation on one. There are so many ways to approach DIY that it really boils down to personal preference which makes it daunting at first but every journey starts with a step, right?

 

[Screamin Eagle]

Here are a couple of e-juice calculators that I use.

eJuice Recipe Calculator
E-Liquid Recipe Name
e-Liquid Calculator

I'd also look through these pages and see what everyone else is chatting about to pick up some pointers. One of which is the special handling of strong flavors. Most mixes use a base point of about 10% flavoring. But with strong flavors like mints and cinnamon you need to start much lower like 1-2%. I've ruined batches before I learned this. Also, don't put strong flavors such as mint and cinnamon in a plastic tank. It will fog it and eventually crack it.

 

[Jerry J]

I've used the calculators like Dan's (scubadan?) but more of what I was looking for was how the nic juice or lack of was going to affect the overall flavor. I'm working with a 50/50 mix and no nicotine and am hoping that if I come up with something I really like then I can make a batch w/nic for the final product. I do know that it's trial and error and I just wanted to eliminate the nicotine from the equation until I get it right.

 

[Rickajho]

Make a small unflavored sample using your nice base at your regular strength and vape away. See what you get. It's true it won't be a perfect test since you will have no interaction of flavorings with your nic of choice. But it might give you an idea of any influence your nic base may have on a finished product.

 

[BlueMoods]

I agree, test the nic, unflavored. While it is SUPPODED to be neutral, it rarely is. My nic adds a bit of a peppery bite, so I have to account for that in the mix. I had one supplier that seemed to always have sweet nic, didn't care for that so switched suppliers. The peppery is fine, it isn't strong until I get above 18mg, then whatever it's in will be noticeably spicy.

 

[DeeDee1234]

Thank you for the recommendations here. I do appreciate it very much.

What I am trying to do is match a local vendor's offering. It is a 2.5 hour round trip for me and shipping for one bottle is $5.
So I've been wanting to try different proportions to see if I can get close. It's just much easier if I'm not adding the nic juice into the equation.

YOu can make 0 nic juice and it will be very similar to nic juice as long as your not using high level of nic. OR use nic and vape your samples. ALso, don't get too hung up on matching vendor x's b juice. TRying to match vendor x can lead you to miss the fact that your created a b juice thats better than vendor x

 

[Screamin Eagle]

I think the most important thig is to get the flavor right, and keeping track of what your putting into your recipe. Then if you add your nicotine, and it does change the flavor you can adjust it. But again I would suggest you make a 10ml batch to start with. This way you can adjust your flavors by drops (2 drops = .01ml). Change your recipe as you go. Then when you hit your mark write it in a seprate book of perminant recpies or save in a seprate file for finished recpies or, if you joined the one calculator I gave you, you can save it in there.
I don't think anyone ever worked out a complete recipe on the first try. If they did they got lucky.
Move slow and only change one thing at a time. Right now I'm working on a caramel apple flavor. It's got a light caramel tast but I can't really tast the apple as much as I would like. So what I'm going to do on my next batch is change my respipe and up the apple flavoring by 2 drops (.01ml). But I'm going to have to take that .01ml from somewhere. So I can get it from either my distilled water or my VG (I don't use PG in my mixes). Since the water is flavor inert I'll probably get it from there so it won't change it much. If something changes for the worse then I'll know it was more then likely the apple flavoring and I'll need to either baks off of it a little bit or add a little more caramel a see if that changes it for the better.
One step at a time.

 

[DancingHeretik]

I wanted to see what it would be like to vape 0 nic. I made my usual ADV. It was yuck! Nic definitely changes the flavor!

Besides, like someone said above, the most expensive ingredient is the flavoring, not the nic. So, I mix all my tests with nic.