What am I doing wrong (tobacco)?

[DistantDrumming]

Okay, I'm gonna lay it out in detail for anyone patient enough to listen to the woos of a noob diyer trying to come up with a tobacco base...I'm working with FA for the most part, and have read through the forums and know that many do get good results from FA. Also, I'm stubborn... and want to stick with my supplier (myfreedomsmokes) because they have done my right. So, please don't suggest another brand of tobacco flavors Anyway, here's my problem...after about a month of mixing/steeping/tasting I have yet to come up with anything even close to tobacco tasting. Here's my method for critique:

I've tried 4 so far. All at 2/4/6/8%. 40%VG, 60%PG, 12mg nicotine. 10ml batches steeped for a week and a half or so.

Black Honey Tobacco(TFA)-just plain sweet...
Dark Vapure(FA)-surprisingly this was sweet in lower %'s...tasted like soup in higher %'s.
Desert Ship(FA)-dry and throaty at 2-4%. Creates the sensation of smoking tobacco, but no flavor.
Ry4(FA)-kind of nice at 8%...vaping it now actually, but still not tobacco. Kind of sweet.

Have MaxxBlend and Dark Fire Tobacco steeping now. But not one of the four I've tried are even close to a tobacco base. After a month, well...I'm getting discouraged. Is there a flaw in my system? In my taste buds? Any thoughts?

 

[AzPlumber]

Try adding some Ethyl Maltol and see if that doesn't help out. It is powder that is mixed at 10% in PG or the same thing as TFA's original Cotton Candy (not circus)

 

[DistantDrumming]

Wouldn't that just sweeten it? Tobacco isn't sweet...not like cotton candy at least. I've got some Jamaican Rum brewing, and Kentucky Bourbon and Clove waiting as some bottles free up. To add flavor. But need my base. Maybe I'm wrong about EM, never tried it. But I'm not looking to sweeten things up. Want the nice strong tobacoo, then round it out with other stuff.

 

[DistantDrumming]

Ahhh...just read Danny's response to an EM post...not a sweetener, but used to thicken...maybe make it smoother and richer. I could try that on my Ry4. Can't hurt

 

[Just Me]

Cowboy Blend doesn't taste sweet to me, kinda sorta tastes cigarette-ish (I haven't used it in a while, so maybe I don't remember that well.) I like Maxx Blend in the mix I make. Maybe you will like it, too. If you're looking for dirty, ashy taste, you might look up some old posts of JimiD. He found something that suited him (not sure of the supplier or the brand, though).

Unflavored e-liquid is similar to a light cigarette. Lots of people vape unflavored.

Remember, your taste buds will probably change several times in the coming weeks.

Probably didn't help you much, sorry.

 

[David1975]

I'm also fairly new to DIY, been using the same site you do. I've also been trying to find a more "tobacco bland". Got some juice made with tobacco absolute from a brick and mortar store, and have been looking for DIY of this ever since. On the RY4 you have though, I mix it 15% in an 80%PG liquid at 15mg. I make 30ml at a time in an 250ml bottle and let it steep in there for a week 50% of the time with the cap off, before transferring into a 30ml dripper. Found that playing with the PG/VG affects the taste a lot with this RY4..... still, is a sweet vape though.

 

[hairball]

I, as a rule when I mix tobaccos (no you don't have to do this), add 2% em and 1% smooth. The smooth takes the harshness out while the em makes it taste "thicker" and tones down somewhat. Then it gets stuck in the cabinet for 4 weeks or longer (depending on when I get around to vaping it).

Also, I stay in the 3% range with the tobacco flavoring I'm working with unless it's something other than FA. TFA RY4 double, I go as high as 10-12% in some recipes.

 

[hairball]

Also wanted to mention that tfa smooth "rounds out" flavors.

 

[DistantDrumming]

No, just me, you did help. I'm looking for any input I can get, and maybe this MaxxBlend will come out to something...or Cowboy Blend (easy enough to order). I just need hope, cause I'm getting discouraged. I want a strong, kick you on the ......that's tobacco. I got all sorts of plans with it and there just falling away...I wanna make something, if you get my meaning. I'm just making crap right now...and whinning about it, lol.

 

[DetraMental]

I like using "Tobacco" in with my other tobacco flavors. It seems to give it that smoky ashy flavor. I know you wanted to stick with your own favorite brand but I don't have any experience with them so all I can recommend is TFA (TPA) flavors.

 

[AzPlumber]

Wouldn't that just sweeten it? Tobacco isn't sweet...not like cotton candy at least. I've got some Jamaican Rum brewing, and Kentucky Bourbon and Clove waiting as some bottles free up. To add flavor. But need my base. Maybe I'm wrong about EM, never tried it. But I'm not looking to sweeten things up. Want the nice strong tobacoo, then round it out with other stuff.

EM will sweeten but only at higher %'s. At lower %'s it's a great tool when working with tobaccos.

 

[Hoosier]

Well, you're a fifth of the way there. (I started mixing to get a great tobacco and it took me 5 months to get my first one and FA was #1 back then.)

DV, try some stuff at fractions of a percent, the flavor should get more dark cigar like. You need to get under the zone where it has mostly coca notes.

FA tobaccos can change taste so much that it seems bizarre that you used the same bottle, so keep track of those "break points" as I call them. All my tobacco recipes that use FA will have flavoring levels like 5.7% or 3.3% because going above or below that fraction of a percent completely changes them. They can be tough to work with because of that, but very rewarding when you do hit those puppies dead on.

I do not and will not vape a flavor that is RY-anything, so I couldn't help you there.

 

[Just Me]

No, just me, you did help. I'm looking for any input I can get, and maybe this MaxxBlend will come out to something...or Cowboy Blend (easy enough to order). I just need hope, cause I'm getting discouraged. I want a strong, kick you on the ......that's tobacco. I got all sorts of plans with it and there just falling away...I wanna make something, if you get my meaning. I'm just making crap right now...and whinning about it, lol.

I get your drift. I was whining last year when I started DIY. NOTHING was working out. I tried quite a few recipes here, but I didn't come up with anything I really liked. Kept working on getting a menthol vape I liked and finally stumbled on a formula that worked for me, and that's what I vape. Every day. lol It does get boring, but I haven't found any e-liquid in any vape store that I like any better (and mine is MUCH cheaper), so I just stick with it. It keeps me off cigarettes. I have bottles and bottles of different flavorings that I should try to use, but, oh, well...

If I can find it, I'll try to look up what JimiD did. He was on the hunt last year for a really ashy cigarette-y tasting flavor, and I think he found it. If I can locate that, I'll get back with you.

Keep trying, you'll get there!

 

[DistantDrumming]

Damn Hoosier, you pack a lot in there don't ya I'm not as finely tuned to the 0.1% yet...I don't know, I got the DV hint. Actually think they all could have potential. I just don't have endless time. Hell I'm 45, only have another 30 some years to come up with something here. And...yeah... I'm vaping an Ry4 teddy gram, cause it makes me feel like I did something. Don't hate on a noob vaping teddy grahams It's all I got. What's your steeping time? You'd think at 2/4/6/8% I'd come up with something to tinker around with.

 

[parrothead60450]

We stopped searching for a good tobacco flavor when we got "U.S.A. blend" from Mt. Baker. I have since ordered their flavor for it and it is our all day vape for about 2 months now.

I mix it at 10% and it steeps for at least 3 weeks before using.

 

[Str8vision]

Taste is very subjective. I was a heavy pipe/cigarette smoker for 40 years. When I started vaping I searched far and wide for a good, true DIY tobacco flavor. First I bought all the FA tobaccos and experimented endlessly with ratios, blends and mixes and while some of my early efforts produced interesting flavors none of them really tasted like tobacco. I then tried most of FW, TFA, Hangsen and Inawera's offerings as well as several vendor specialty flavorings including tobacco absolutes. Most tasted like various combinations of hay, pepper, grass, wood, cocoa and or cinnamon but none of them tasted like tobacco to me. Of the four dozen synthetics I experimented with, Hangsen's RY-1 and Indian tobacco flavors provided the closest replication and Inawera's Virginia absolute and DNB helped them along, but still the flavor wasn't actually tobacco, not really even close. I had spent nearly a year and hundreds of dollars seeking a true tobacco vape only to find that, for me, no synthetic flavoring could actually provide it. After lurking in many ECF e-liquid threads and just to see if there was anything available that had a real tobacco flavor, I ordered NETs (Naturally Extracted Tobaccos), from HHV, Ahlusion, Nicoticket and several other vendors. Compared to DIY synthetic tobacco flavoring NETs are very very expensive but some of them provided a genuine, strong, real tobacco flavor that I had been looking for. No doubt about it, NETs had the flavor and intensity I wanted and I've been vaping them exclusively ever since. Shortly after discovering NETs I ran across an ECF sub forum on "liquid extraction from tobacco" (DIY NETs), and after much reading decided to give it a try. Once I found out how easy and inexpensive it was to make my own NET I haven't looked back and now make all of my own genuine tobacco flavorings at a cost far less than even DIY synthetics.