What tank do you run your gunky stuff on.

[ronchinoy]

Early days saw me using my gunk maker NET on all tanks.
But over time I have migrated to using just one tank for the gunk creating NETs.

And that is my Mini Atty.

It has a 400 SS mesh wrapped around a inner core of silica wick.
Two coils 1.4 Ohms. 35 gauge. 3-4 wraps. Fired at 15-20 watts on the mini atty works for me.

The coils and wicks do gunk up. But I rebuild it every other day.
Just dry burn the SS mesh and put in a fresh coil.

Am waiting on some .5mm ribbon kanthal.

Lets hear your gunk stories.
post some gunk porn. With how many days / hours / ml used.

 

[Bunnykiller]

I use my Stillare dripper for my VG based/extractions due to the gunk factor.... I pull the cotton and dry burn the coil and clean the coil off with a tiny brass bristled wire brush that was in my gun cleaning kit My VG extracts will gunk a coil/wick in about 1/2 ml ( its like vaping hersheys syrup) but.... my new method I have been messing with (PGA extracting) is a much cleaner juice....

 

[ronchinoy]

PG is the way to go it just leaches flavors off stuff. I made the same mistake trying to work with VG. Adding VG is the last step. I try to keep PG to bare min 10-20% max.
Think its time to get a dripper. Had my heart set on an Ithika for my NET smoking. But so many guys telling me its crap / too fiddly. etc.
Then the confusion get a Hercules or a Magoo or from fastech or the original.
Mine is no where as bad hersheys lol.

Even after you filter the hell out of it. The last and final step is let the bottle sit for a long time without moving it. Then use a syringe with a long needle and just pull off the top. I found this last step beats all my best efforts to filter. Something about gravity that just cant be beat. It helps if your liquid is not thick.

Thin it down with PG / Water / Vodka / IPA in that preference. I dont fully trust IPA. Even at 99.9%.

 

[ronchinoy]

Figured another thing that will cut the gunk down on your NET. Just don't buy Cigars / Pipe Tob / Analogues. Because they all have this one major gunk causing item. And it cant be filtered out no matter how well you filter it.

The only thing you should be the leaves which have been cured with out any additives.
Just confirmed almost every tobacco in the market has this stuff on it. Even the stuff the farmers cure.
Its very hard to get cured pure tobacco leaf but thats what you should be after.
Spent some effort in figuring out why almost all the Tobaccos I was using had this level of Gunk in it. And where the sweet taste was coming from. Found it in almost every cigar and pouch tobacco. This would explain the gunk.
I think we can get a net to looks and taste just as good as a chemical extraction. With the right leaf and process.
Filtering no matter how fine wont help with this.
The main culprit.
Molasses - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
There are others.

Ps: There is a way arround this problem. Just wash the leaves in water. More like a rinse. You dont wash it too much cause then you start washing away the good stuff.
A light rinse will make a huge diff. And wash away most of the stuff they added for taste. Just keep in mind that it may not taste as good. Once the taste additives are removed / reduced. But it healthier.

Other thing. How do you know your done with the extract. It should turn a light brown color. Once the leaf turns from its typical dark color to a light brown. You know your done.
Found amazing results by removing molasses and other additives from the equation. Just wish I had read about this before. Would have saved me a lot of time and hair pulling.

 

[Heabob]

The stuff I'm soaking now.
Don't know if it has anything else added.

Organic Tobacco Leaves - American Virginia Flue Cured Tobacco, USDA Certified Organic

Next batch I'll rinse first.

 

[Ease]

The stuff I'm soaking now.
Don't know if it has anything else added.

Organic Tobacco Leaves - American Virginia Flue Cured Tobacco, USDA Certified Organic

Next batch I'll rinse first.

That stuff looks clean man. Pls let us know how it turns out.

 

[ronchinoy]

Looks clean. Man. Check out the pic of the leaves I used. It was much darker.
My street fighter cigar came out good. My Cugan not so good.
I poured the mix onto a steel plate to let all water evoprate. And guess what its the golden copper color Dvap talks about. I took pics just in case nobody believes me lol.

What process did you use for your leaves?. Still on cold ? You gota heat it my man.
What Id like to know is how well do the flavors and alkaloids dissolve in water or PG or VG compared to say water or Alcohol

Another tip for you guys suffering from gunk from flavoring and organics.
a. Don't obsess about the filtering. Let gravity do its thing. A week in a still bottle will get every bit to the base.
Second reason the causing stuff is disolved in the juice you cant filter it out unless you use an acidic solution to do it.

I have a large batch of Juice I extracted from about 4 Lbs off Hooka Tob my brother gave me. I have added yeast to it to see if the yeast will turn the extra sugar into alcohol. But enough of my silly testing. The tip I had for you guys.

Fill your tank with some commercial grade juice, or your DIY Say RY4 24 MG. Half tank.
Then add your net.
The net being heavier since I use so much VG. Goes and sinks to the base of the tank. The other flavor floats to the top.
Now vape. First you get the DIY / Shop flavor. Then they start to mix. At this point you get all your something missing alkaloids + the flavor from your tob. Keep smoking. After some time you will find smoke production drops off. What is left in your tank is a thick gunky dark fluid. Which is having a hard time climbing the wick.
Drain it throw it. Its almost like the clear shop / diy juice is mixing with the alkaloids getting smoked. The heavy organic matter gets left at the base of your tank. The key stuff has been pulled up thru the wick and smoked.

This was my discovery for today.
The tank is a Mini Atty. Dual coil 2 Ohms.
The wicks are 3.5mm Braided silica or elk wool. With 6 wraps of 35 gauge.
That SS mesh was my problem The second this coil was built I finally understood what the fuss was over Geney mods.
Still think my iClear30s tops it though.

Like this method cause it seems to be working so well.
Washed the tank in water. Added some of my RY4 double. Then added my NET. Its starting to mix and Im enjoying it.

The best way to describe it is guys who have been addicted to a particular drug. Example opiates for many years.
Their brains then become super sensitive to opiates. It can detect it the most minute levels. Its like the brain is super starved for a particular substance. Even the slightest hint one part per million and the brain just leaches it up. And you physically feel it.
This seems to be case with some guys and the alkaloids in tob.

I need to figure a way to also destroy these alkaloids and only keep the flavor. Cause the flavor is super sexy.

About your leaf weather it has that sweetener molasses or not. You will know when you see your juice. Color. The one with molasses has a very distinctive dark color. In fact if you let it sit you will see a layer of dark powder form at the base it will be the 2nd layer after the organic layer. If you let it sit long enough in a glass bottle you will see all the layers that form. Im talking about the liquid you extract from the leafs after you do your filtration process. No matter how you filter it. The layers will form. Th golden copper brown good .... will be at the top.

I have a nice distillation setup. Thinking of buying an autoclave. Can get them used cheap lol. But the doubt I have is that distillation means the temps will cross 100c. Is that good or bad for the nic and alkaloids. Guess I can try with my nic base and see what purity comes out after its distilled does it go up or go down. If somebody can confirm if flavor and alkaloids are retained post distillation it would be nice to know.
Expecting 8 types of leaf from the southern belt of the country Will post pics when they come in.
The fun bit is how they are cured. Some are cured using Coffee plant. That would be an interesting flavor.

The catch 22 here is. Its the curing process and additives that give us our flavor. Its also this that causes our gunk.
I think the best way to deal with gunk is not let it reach your coils. The two wicks sitting in a tank seems to be achieving that for now.
Do you name your tanks ?
My tank names are
1. Tobby Tank for Tob flavors. iClear30s
2. Fruity Tank for Fruit flavors. Kanger Protanks 2,3 t3d,
3. SM tank for something missing Juice. Ive named my net something missing. Cause it gives me that something missing I was looking for when I started vaping. lol. Mini Hell Fire / iatty mini.

Ps: all your guys who where looking for the ultimate in Tobacco Flavors with me in the DIY section. Take your best. / Fav one you have come up with. Then add 50% of any NET. And tell me if it doesn't blow your mind.

 

[Ding]

Got a kraken and AGA-T2 and am using 325 and 270 ss mesh.I run a 50/50 mix at 12-18 MGnic using the 325 mesh and and 70VG/30PG mix for a higher VG using the 270.Both work well,much better than the 400 plus mesh.Also use a few RDA/RBA's to drip it.Using 28 and 30 gauge coils @ .05-.08 and getting great flavors.Using cotton though.Sometimes use a couple bottom coil tanks,pro tank mini 2 and 3,but I rebuild em to about 1.6-1.8 ohms and they work fine and I rebuild em using cotton of course.

 

[ronchinoy]

Thanks for chipping in Ding sometimes I feel like Im talking to my self here. LOL.

I could not get the SS mesh to work. And just switched to the braided 3mm silica wick two coils in my Genny iatty. Much better than any mesh Coil I have built. Then again I only have access to 400 Mesh.

Yesterday a friend dropped over with a dripper. The Igo W. He loved my Net and I loved his dripper. Long story short. Im dripping now. So many things I had wrong about drippers. Like the first being that you need to keep dripping. This setup on my new dripper holds more juice than my mini iatty and lasts longer. Im going to buy myself a dripper.

I think its the perfect tank to test flavors, mix flavors, and use for my NET. Changing the wick takes all off 40 seconds. Pull cotton out. Dry burn. Brush. Shove in new cotton. And your off.

Ive been reading all the posts on this section.
Still think people are obsessing about filtering when the real gunk makers are dissolved in your juice. So you can never filter it out.
Next. The real gunk your trying to so hard to filter is anyway never going to climb a wick. So all you need is a genny mod or a dripper with the coil built high and the wick low. Then just dump / wash out you will know when with a few rounds.

Like when I do a 50-50 mix 50 shop tob flavor and 50 NET. Mix it up. I can tell in my iatty when most of the good ness is used up. The remaining gunk I just flush out. My wick which is hanging into the tank remains bone white. Only the bit where the coil is working gunkys up.

So Gravity and your wick is still your best filter.

Other things Ive figured out. PG is nasty nasty stuff. Want to piss off somebody just drop a few ML on his car. It will strip the paint off.

So Im going to be doing my next batch with that coffee plant cured kind of tobacco.
Used in Gold Flake Honey Dew Analogues. The kind I smoked for many years.

Im going to blog the complete process.
Before I start off here are issues Im struggling with.

a. I hate PG. But I know I need it to get the flavors out of the leaf.
b. Want to keep the PG ratio as low as possible low low low. Bare min that works for me is about 25%.
So say Im taking 100 Grams Leaf and Extracting 200 ML Juice. Thats 50 ML PG to 100 Grams tob.

That will not even Dampen the leaf. Forget about covering it. As you add the PG the leafs just suck it in and all you have left now is wet leaf. This is my first challenge. One counter is to use damp leaf.

Now say I add my Vodka or IPA. Its still not going to cover it. At this point I could add my VG but Id rather wait for the very end before adding it. Not only does PG not absorb flavors it blocks flow. So not at the end but half way thru the steep process. Cause in the end we want the PG to have some flavor at least.
Another option could be to add distilled water. But then you have the headache of extracting that water out again.
One advantage of using Everclear or IPA is that the .... dries off really really fast i.e. boiling point 70.
One hot bath and its gone.
As to distiling the final stuff. Our process is very similar to making your own Whiskey or Run.
So why not just distil it just like how you make moon shine.
So many questions so little time.

Today Im doing 2 batches one batch with washing the leaves. One batch without washing the leaves.
Washing will remove any dirt / pesticides / molasses / and other tobacco casing.
My gut tells me the washed leaf is going to be less gunky. Lighter in color more clear. But also less nic / flavor / alkaloids.

Just a light rinse took the leaves from black color to light brown. Off to add the first two items to the mash. The PG and the Vodka.
What site to use for uploading pics ?.

Ps: Those on NET. Driper is working the best for me. Next would be a Genny i-atty mini.
Im learning and evolving. So nothing I say is worth arguing over.

 

[Heabob]

Some dilute their 100% VG with 10-30% Distilled Water, for those that can't tolerate PG...

So at least some of the DW being used for extractions can be left in.

So maybe use PGA/DW only for extracting, then filter and slow heat for evaporation.

The PGA, (I think), will evaporate faster than the DW, leaving mostly a DW/flavored base.

Add 20% of finished extract to your 100% VG, might be too strong tho.

BTW I can change out my rayon/cotton wick and dry burn my BCC way faster than I can do my Genny's.

Got an Igo-L but dripping at work is a PITA.

 

[ronchinoy]

Wow I like my Dripper maybe new toy syndrome.

Ok here is another tip for the day.
Im not sure how often you guys mash your stuff. But this batch Im doing it everyday. Or at least every other day.
Big Glass Bottle. Everything in it.
Use a potato masher and mash the hell out of it.
Also hit it with the hand blender. Now the leaf material looks more like fine tea leafs / grains This is the optimum size to extract the best flavor from tea.
Based on what a mate who works in a Tea Factory tells me. (We can learn a lot about extracting flavors form the tea trade).

I have started to add two components to my method. Pressure and Vacuum.
The feeling is we need to suck stuff out of the leaf taste / alkaloids . We need to get stuff into the leaf i.e. PG / VG / Vodka.

So would it nor make sense to cycle pressure and vacuum. While its steeping ?.

To me it made perfect sense.

Only problem was how do you do that at home. Without an autoclave or fancy equipment ?.
We are not talking huge pressure or vacuum here. Just a bit over atmospheric. This falls under my speed steeping tips and tricks bag.

This is how Im doing it.
Cover lid off the glass bottle with a thick gauge cling wrap.
Now when you toss your bottle into the microwave for its heat cycle for the day / week 20% on a 950 watt megatron.
When you take it out. You see the rubber / balloon / cling wrap has swollen up. If I where to take a wild guess. Id say its hitting about 4 PSI at least.
Take out bottle and put it back in the shelf. Next time you check it out. You notice. That as it cooled. The cling wrap / rubber which had ballooned out under heat is not being sucked into the glass bottle under vacuum.

Id post pictures if I knew an easy way.
So in effect we are cycling pressure / vacuum. On our mash.
Neat eh ?

Im going to figure out a way to get that pressure and vacuum cycling to go a wee bit higher.

 

[Bunnykiller]

for a more intense pressure/vacuum try to get the container as full of fluid as possible and use a large syringe along with the best seal possible. "Inject fluid ( preferably the solvent you are using)" into the sealed container, and reverse the syringe ( pull on the plunger) to create a "vacuum" effect... the hardest part of this configuration will be sealing the syringe to the container and keeping air volume to an absolute minimum....

 

[MikeNice81]

I use any of my Kanger tanks. If it is a T3D I just fill it to 1.5ml. When I'm done I pull out the head. I rewick all of my heads. So, when I get a pile of four or five I just rewick and keep rolling. I can do six wicks (including dry burning the heads) in less than 90 minutes. So, it isn't a big time expenditure. Plus, the Kanger's are a better size for hauling to work.

 

[ronchinoy]

Thats what I did when I started out. Problem is the little rubber grommet would get cut and we cant get em here so easy.
Drippers work a treat as do Genny's. Genny's do a neat trick. They form a ball of varnish at the base of the tank. Which you just throw.

A bit off topic. But I am sitting on huge qty of NETs which have a lot of Molasses how can one remove the molasses. Without taking out anything else. Acid / base extraction would take out all the organic stuff and leave behind just the WTA. I need to remove only the Molasses. Or reduce it. These days I just use leaf which has been cured without molasses. But it would be a shame to waste so much NET.

 

[MikeNice81]

Thats what I did when I started out. Problem is the little rubber grommet would get cut and we cant get em here so easy.
Drippers work a treat as do Genny's. Genny's do a neat trick. They form a ball of varnish at the base of the tank. Which you just throw.

A bit off topic. But I am sitting on huge qty of NETs which have a lot of Molasses how can one remove the molasses. Without taking out anything else. Acid / base extraction would take out all the organic stuff and leave behind just the WTA. I need to remove only the Molasses. Or reduce it. These days I just use leaf which has been cured without molasses. But it would be a shame to waste so much NET.

How did you filter them originally? I don't think you'll get all of the molasses out, but running them through a 2.6 micron filter may help tremendously.

 

[sparalis]

I am also trying a thousand different methods of "cleaning"my homemade juice,I will soon try homemade centrifuge,But the reason I replied was,During extensive reading either pg or vg becomes poisonous when it reaches near its boiling point,which i high,so water or alcohol distillation would be the way to go.I actually found a patent description on net it said "distillation"periods of steeping,use of chemicals acetone,alcohol.I will keep trying till I find their secret.I have built both water and steam distiller, with parts from the habitat for humanity and the salvation army stores,start with crock pots,old water steamer, metal coffee pots,a metal icing decorating dispenser used for a press with screen inserted, a caulk gun with empty tube,must be wellllll cleaned ,i'm going to try homemade buchner funnel,which uses vacuum ,and a homemade centrifuge.will post any findings.

 

[ronchinoy]

The problem is most of what makes the flavor is disolved in your PG/VG.

I have a few tips.
1. Google Nicotine Extraction from Tobacco. Review of various methods used. In that it says the best most efficient was is to use a microwave.
My testing also showed that a microwave is the best way to extract everything from flavors, alkaloids, nicotine.
The key here is to not let the temps get to high. How do you achieve this ?. You play with the settings on your microwave dont use it at 100% like most e-cig guys are.

2. I have tried the a high level centrifuge in a friends lab. It dont help much. The problem is that most of the flavoring is dissolved you cant seprate it unless you use a chemical process. The best way to get clean burning juice is to start with clean leaf. i.e. just virgin leaf.

Now I got this on ECF

NET
Natural Extracted Tobacco, or---more correctly---Extracted Natural Tobacco.
NETs are usually made from macerations of chopped or ground tobacco, meaning suspensions in PG, VG, or a mix of those two base liquids, that are steeped (cold-process) or cooked (heat-assisted), then filtered...

Cold-Process

Heat-Assisted

Other methods include Steam-Distilled (SD), Alcohol-based, and Carbon Dioxide Gas (CO2).

NETs produce copious quantities of extract from very small amounts of tobacco. A maceration using 15 grams of natural tobacco (less than a single pack of cigarettes) yields enough extract to make 500-800mls of NET eliquid.

I dont know who wrote the rules for net. But for me its the other way around. 500-800 Grams of leaf give me 50 ML of Juice.
Maybe this is my problem I need more liquid.

molasses dissolves in your e juice. Its a bit like saying you can extract sugar dissolved in water by passing it thru a very fine strainer.
Not going to happen.

 

[Ease]

What microwave settings have you found to work well? I know different microwaves different wattages etc, but what would you say would be a good starting point? I did try once at 100% power, the shot glass method, results were poor.

 

[Bunnykiller]

i found that short time periods work... like 5 second shots 2 or 3 of them.... be careful tho VG and PG can get very hot and melt the plastic bottle.

 

[Bunnykiller]

Ronchinoy... you are using 1 - 1.5 lbs of tobacco and getting 50 ml of extract??? Im seeing 100ml of extract from 1 - 2 oz of tobacco.... what methods are you using for extracting??