Ok here are a few thiings I noticed and have done myself. I still have that morning smoke but am down to 2-3 times a week and vaping the rest of the time.
Tip 1. Stay away from juices with high sweet levels (sugar cookie, custards, pie or cheeze cake flavors), pineapple, lemon or other high acidic citrus fruits and high VG bases (vg has natural sugars in it)
High VG or really sweet flavors can have a heavy feel like inhaling right from a steaming kettle and eexacerbate lung issues. HIgh acidic fruit flavors can have a harsh throat hit that can be too much when starting out. Give yourself some time before getting into the really rich flavors. Keep it simple.
Tip 2. Get a mild menthol or mint flavor.
Sometime the menthol can ease lung issues and make inhaling easier and if you get peppermint it can help heal some as well.
Tip 3 Take mouth to lung inhales but before inhaling to your lungs take a short nasal breath first, then lung inhale.
Tip 4 stick to 12 or 18 mg nic level at least.
YOur going from 24-36 mg nic from cigs to 6-12 mg liquid and thats probably too big of a drop for you right now.
Tip 5. DO NOT vape if you have had a cig within the las 15 min. Especially a high vg or sweet flavor. Your lungs will feel heavy more than likely if you do.
Tip 6. skip the cig alikes and work with the ego and a cartomizer tank, evod, iclear 16 or Ce5 tank. Cig alikes tend not to work well for heavy smokers.
Tip 7. Take short 2-3 second puffs and shallow inhales for a while. It took me a couple weeks of constant short puffs/shallow inhales before i could handle longer drags and a couple months before I could step up to the vape of higher end toppers and mods.
Tip 8. convince yourself to replace a few of your cigs a day with vaping. If you have to vape constantly for 20+ minnutes to make it a success then by all means do it.
Tip 9. Have a back up battery at all times. NOthing interrupts the transition more than having to wait a few hours for a battery to charge.
Tip 10. Don't give up. You had to learn to smoke in the beginning and you will have to learn to vape just the same
Now the set up that really worked for me when I started out is my ego twist VV and kanger mini protank. I still have it but don't use it anymore and am more than willing to PIF it to you if you want it. For a starter set up I found it hard to beat and even though I have better mods and Kayfun RTA's I still use a few of my mini protanks in my tank rotation. PM me if you want the set up and we can work out the details
