This will surely come off pretentious and let me qualify by saying my mixing journey is really short perhaps 8 months or so in now. Nonetheless, I am still shocked as I browse through recipes on a popular recipe posting site that rhymes with eeeee elllll arrrrgghhhh....and just see loads of recipes with 10 percent this 18 percent that....35 percent total flavoring here...28 percent there.... Why do I care?...I don't know. I think it just mystifies me with all the information that is available perhaps in the 'golden' age of diy mixing that folks don't care enough to slow down and listen to top mixers who are giving you access to information acquired over thousands of hours of mixing. I will tactfully ask some of these mixers why they did what they did? And typically I get these super aggressive responses about how they like STRONG flavors and it makes their juice so much STRONGER. Its like a fun game of poke the bear. I literally feel like if I suggested skipping the whole VG/PG thing all together and just loading concentrate straight onto their atomizers-they wouldn't blink. I can see making these mistakes on day one or two but seriously it isn't rocket science. I'll tell you this; I don't want these folks putting air in my tires or administering medicine....a little is good...a lot is GREAT. Are we children?
It sounds elitist and why would I really care? I suppose I shouldn't as it is pretty inconsequential in the big scheme of things. With the MASSIVE amounts of information available on mixing techniques and recipes from some of the best mixers in the world it absolutely baffles me that folks don't care enough to do a little bit' of research prior to publishing these massive car crashes to be considered works of consumable art. Why even f$$$ with it if you don't care enough to pay attention? Get some one shots if you want to just save money and not worry about mixing?!?
Perhaps it is part of some cosmic balance whereby folks (like me) that obsess over and consume every available shred of information and torture themselves over the most finite of details get this huge middle finger from some guy DUMPING flavoring in their bottles like I dump creamer in my coffee. Maybe just maybe. Maybe it is a new art form...punk rock e-juice mixing?
I suppose on some level I should celebrate as I spit my coffee every morning seeing 18 percent tpa blackberry this and 12 percent TPA Honeydew that. Could be I am growing old and cynical but I just don't understand...I don't understand.....rant concludes......ahhhhhhh...breathe....feels better.
I love ELR.. there are some amazing recipes and notes on there as well as a ton of unattempted useless recipes.. if nothing else just the ideas and inspiration alone is great.. If you are an experienced mixer you can decipher through the junk easy enough as you know your flavors and percentages at which they work for you.. say I'm in the mood for a Apple vape .. even though a recipe may use 15% Fuji I know better and hey look at that pairing 🤔 hmmmm. Interesting, maybe I'll try that at x percentage... see .. good stuff
I get what you're saying but that's like complaining about low quality products while shopping at Walmart.
Eww DiyOrDie is leaking, this thread has that pretentious know-it-all-but-all-my-recipes-still-suck stench about it.
There's plenty of concentrates that work well at high percentages. If you think you can put every concentrate in the same group and say they should be under a certain percentage then you have a lot to learn.
That enyaklaw guy is such a knowitall. Its all hyped up and yet have to see a decent recipe. No ethyl vanilin,triacetin, pyrazines or any aroma compounds, just takes peoples recipes and tweaks them with random prepackaged ingredients while most of the time showing how uninformed he really is.
Oh lol how about that video with the best recipes of 2016 that he talked for 25minutes and there was no information to take out just a rumbling "oh the cookie comes out because of all the time he put in to this recipe" and nonsense like that.
At least we can see a person speaking to the camera, instead of staring at a nasty fish tank as we try to decipher broken English, all while being too far away from the actual mixing to see what's actually happening on the scale. At least DIYorDie is supportive of the vaping industry, of DIY mixing altogether, encouraging people to get involved and get creative with contests, mixing challenges, podcasts, and more. At least u/enyawreklaw has a sense of humor, a passion for mixing, and clearly has years of experience.
GTFO of this subreddit with that bullshit, dude. Go back to YouTube, where you came from.
I do like DIY or DIE, is that cool? I don't know anything more than I've done or learned. I've put in a fair amount of hours and I hope to learn more. My recipes may or may not suck-they are good enough to keep me from wanting to buy shop juice. I absolutely stand by my point that inexperience (could last for years) is the primary driver behind these recipes with crazy high percentages. You can certainly disagree with me but you cannot convince me that 18% blackberry tpa or 12% honeydew is a demonstration of skill or good taste.
I certainly never made the point that every concentrate has the same potency range. Obviously each one has an optimal range and perhaps some hidden ranges that do unexpected things. In terms of mixers I do like Wayne, Skittles, Koppel, Fresh, Botboy, Not Charles Manson, Jarvis, ID10T, Concrete River, Philosaphucker, etc...most of the recipes I've enjoyed fall in the 5-15 percent range thus far. Perhaps you misunderstood what I was trying to say. Essentially, that there are good number of folks that really don't give a damn enough to know they are throwing up over flavored garbage. I don't think that is pretentious.
> I do like DIY or DIE, is that cool?
Its the most misinformed, most fakely mainstream source for diy out there. If you listen to what people say there you will be infected with their mentality of its only this way because wayne said so. Thats a cult like environment.
Wait Wayne said if you upgrade to Triple Diamond membership you are assured eternal salvation...including the loins of a 1000 virgins...is that not right?? I'm a grown a## man I can decipher what I like and don't like. I heard a rumor that Kate is a robot and the dog is controlling the universe through Waynes glasses....get outta here with this cult stuff..hahaha ...entertaining though. I was starting to regret starting this thread last night...now I have a gift that just keeps on giving.
I will admit if you put Skiddlez in a white lab coat and he came at you with a hyperdermic filled with some elephant tranquilizer (and god milk) it could feel like a cult experience....hey has anyone seen NotCharlesManson...hmmmmmm.....perhaps he got out of line....
Well if 18% blackberry and 12% honeydew keeps me from wanting to buy shop juice, how is that a bad thing? It is okay for me to like strawberry over banana, but I can't enjoy it at different strengths? Taste is a subjective thing, in the end.
Taste is subjective and you are free to do what you like. I am not purporting facts just relating my experience. If it differs from yours that is cool. I do value the consensus of the community in developing things like optimal percentages and overall mixing approaches. Certainly no one is bound to these reference points but they sure do help.
Well to be honest I've only vaped commercially made juices and didn't know any better except that occasionally I would try ejuice that came from DIYers and initially found them to be quite weak/bland. I did an order from Best Damn Vape and to be honest at first I too thought it was a bit light but I've since grown to appreciate the flavor. I guess my taste buds were overstimulated with all of the ejuice I vaped previously. I can honestly say that the guys at BDV may indeed have some of the best stuff and I can definitely see a difference in my builds. I get great flavor and my coils never gunk up and my wicks last much longer. Not to put them on a pedestal all alone but I feel this is how ejuice should be. Not jam packed with flavors/sweetners but with just enough flavor and a nice clean vape. I will still occasionally buy the stuff at the local vape shop everyone is talking about to switch it up but I definitely see a remarkable difference. The amount of gunk on my coils after just 10mls is a testament to the extra 'stuff' that while making it taste amazing makes for a lot of extra work that I can definitely live without.
I think you make a good point about how your body naturally desensitizes to any sort of stimulation. I suppose there is an idealized level where you are getting enough of the flavoring molecules to get the flavor experience so that you can enjoy it for as long as possible before your brain starts to shut it off. There are completely other things going on chemically when excessive amounts of flavoring are dumped in that inherently cause muting and offnotes, etc. Some flavors are more friendly to coils than others and typically what I see in my local shops are highly sweetened juice and a LOT of tank users...leading to a lot of coil sales.
This is absolutely a thing. My roommate vapes exclusively candy fruit type flavors - after a significant period of DIY, I literally can't hit his vape because the cloying sweetness is so overwhelming.
At the end of the day, they all taste like sucralose. I don't mix with sweetener, so although the flavor isn't as "strong," as soon as you get adjusted to the less aggressive taste, the lack of sucralose frees you up to a whole new world of tastes that are pretty much impossible in commercial.
It's similar to the 'Loudness War' in music. Everyone keeps mixing their music louder and louder to stand out from the crowd, compressing and limiting their songs more and more. Dynamic range is lost because everything is so fucking LOUD. But as soon as you adjust your volume for an album mixed quietly with huge dynamic range (Lido - Everything, for example), you come to appreciate a whole new aspect of music that gets lost in the loudness war
Beautiful analogy here I have thought of it that way as well. The flavors each represent a channel on your mixing board and each one occupies its' own frequency. Some sound good together ...some don't. Some frequencies require more loudness than others...and the more you do to alter that original source (in the form of additives/effects) the further away you get from that authentic experience. Chronic over flavoring can be taken to a point like 'digitial' clipping which is unpleasant and non-musical (for the most part). Your atomizer is like your reference speakers....your battery is like the power amp...it is one of the best fitting analogies. Songs that start loud and stay loud...your ear just turns it down and tries to filter it out. Thanks for your post man it absolutely translates conceptually to whats going on.
I try to stay under 10%...15% max. I just had one concentrate that used 30% =\ Still waiting on that to steep
I hear you. I honestly probably still over flavor but I try to stay on top of it. It does freak me out when I'm using Flv and my total mix is like 5% or less...and I sometimes feel guilty if a TPA/CAP type mix goes up over 15%. It certainly depends on the exact flavorings and profile (as I'm learning) but the type of mixing I'm describing is on a whole other order of magnitude.
12% dad's piss and you are good to go.
that's me.. :(
Is is really you though? If so it's an honor to pass you in the hallways of reddit.
I think it's laziness TBH. Plenty of people don't research/don't want to spend the time to research and just start dumping things in. They go with what "works" and never explore further.
I think that it's easy to port over culinary concepts when it comes to something that involves flavor. Want saltier food? Add more salt. Sweeter food? More sugar.
Doesn't mean the same approach is correct for mixing, but can explain why this is more prevalent among newer mixers.
Yes, that makes good sense. I think as well a lot of new mixers are probably vaping commercial juices as they are getting into DIY so that can possibly skew the perception of how much flavoring you might need as they tend to push the flavor ceilings so high so that the flavors translate well in thing like tanks at high wattages.
Uh ELR sucks. What do you expect?
Edit: the people on ELR suck. The site is fine
Personally I only use ELR as a calculator/note tool. I already made 90% of the top recipes for what I have from their's and ATF's top lists. It turns out I have odd tastes and no one really makes weird enough recipes.
Grack Juice isn't weird enough for you?
Interesting thing for me, and it kinda relates to the topic, was that when I had gotten INW Cactus, for whatever reason I've just smelled it and mixed at 3%. Have I read any notes about it I would never do that and I would miss out on amazing flavor.
But since I am used to strong Cactus Grack is not weird at all. I use it daily but just had to mess with it. Mainly I use INW Pear 1% instead of CAP Sweet Strawberry, just to push the sweetness and that cider feel I get from it.
i use elr as a calculator/note tool as well- i have an atf account but only use it to post my "definitely good recipes"- and almost all my stuff on elr is private. but i've definitely noticed the problem of not just stupid high percentages but like- some of the top rated recipes have literally 12+ flavors in them. it's absurd. i usually stop reading/close the tab when i realize there's more than 8 or so unless it's a mixer i know from here and/or trust. there's no way that many flavors are gonna do anything but cancel themselves out, it's a fucking waste of good concentrates. i've only been mixing for a few months and i know this already at least.
Yes, I have made plenty of those "everything and the kitchen sink" recipes when I don't have a plan on what I want to mix. I find that if I stop and kind of think it out that I can be more efficient. I feel like dessert recipes are the ones that are notoriously filled with ingredients. I think it can be justified if it works but your probably right that when you have so many competing aroma molecules that it turns into vomit.
I do like the functionality of the site actually. And to be fair, there are some good mixers and recipes being showcased. It amuses me as much as anything. Off to ATF I shall go....
Of course there are. But unfortunately it's overridden with a bunch of bullshit
I mainly started using ELR because kinnikinnik has a bunch of notes on tobacco flavors. Now I've got a bunch of recipes there and don't really feel like transferring them all. Would it be worth it to give it a shot even if I don't ever really mix any recipes that aren't mine?
Did you miss that thing where Lars (the owner of ELR) started selling off people's recipes without their consent?
I agree about the way-too-high ratios. But it could also depend on your vaping setup. If you're vaping through a Kanger Protank II, yeah, I can see you needing more flavoring. But if you are using a modern setup, then enjoy your perfume!
You could be right in some situations but I tend to think that if you are mixing your own juice, your probably vaping on something current. You can get a decent vape for $30-$40 no problem with the glut of Chinese products we have. They are practically giving some of this hardware away. I will admit when I started mixing I was still using an EGO AIO but honestly with the .5 coil you can get a decently saturated vape off it...I would make adjustments to flavoring right in the cup, put the cap on and give it a shake ...hahahaha.
Im new to this, and some recipes do look wild to me. You have to remember though that for different reasons, not everyone detects tastes at the same level.
Just because your palette detects a 2% strawberry note, the guy sitting beside you may barely pick up 12%. It isnt much surprise that his recipe would have 12% in it. Im not going to do that, but how he spends his flavor budget and has fun vaping his mix isnt my business. Im glad he is happy.
My own palette gets killed by sodium levels most people barely detect. I can barely eat out because of that. Being a baker for a decade also has me at a lower tolerance for sweets. I enjoy them, just dont want to add sweetener to a berry mix.
I can appreciate that everyone perceives things differently due to physiology, exposure to aromas, etc. I am actually interested in increasing happiness not lessening it. If the way flavoring molecules worked in vaping was the same as eating it would be much easier. It is counter intuitive that using the least amount of flavoring possible to achieve the effect you are looking for actually produces a more vivid perception of flavor then if you are assaulting your senses with these same molecules. Lets say you like the smell of cinnamon when your baking some cinnamon rolls. Now take that raw cinnamon and stick two thimbles up your nose. Your experience of the same molecules in a much higher concentration is going to radically alter your enjoyment and perception of those molecules. There is a general approach and method to the madness that's all I'm saying. I might vape 20 percent menthol and find it enjoyable as a novelty to clear my sinuses but I'm not going to publish it for 'peer' review. I assume if folks are posting recipes they are inviting constructive feedback. If someone gives me some feedback on a recipe that might increase my future enjoyment I consider it a win. I am making the assumption that if someone is contributing content on a recipe site that they have an interest in inviting feedback with regards to their recipe? I could lie and say looks awesome but that would be doing someone who is legitimately trying to get more enjoyment from their mixes a disservice.
And I agree with you. All Im saying is that the higher flavoring percents may really be what tasted best to that individual and they are proud of it. You and I both may think it is overkill, but they may have hit their own personal sweet spot. If that were the case I can totally understand them going to a public site and trying to publish their findings. Therein lies the beauty of DIY juice.
Short of them straight up vaping the flavor concentrate, they may not be wrong.
I hear you man. Perhaps it will just provide food for thought for someone who is looking to get more out of their efforts. Parts of my rant were purely for fun and self indulgence. I still am guilty of being heavy handed so perhaps in a way it was as much for me as someone who is mixing up them 35% total mix juices. I am completely surprised as I keep dropping my percentages and in most cases getting more from less.
Around 10 months ago and before I aimed for 7.5-8% total flavour (I don't use fancy Fa, cap, or INW which are know for being extra concentrated, I'm tpa whore and out of ~120 concentrates I own maybe 3 which are not tpa) but recently all my blends are 5% total or less. I get random people not believe me when I say it's 5% total and they still mix 15% strawberry and 10% cream flavour and are surprised they can't taste nothing after around 1ml of this.
Interesting. I feel personally like TPA's strength varies quite a lot from flavor to flavor. Something like blackberry or honeydew from them in my eyes is every bit' as concentrated as INW/FLV whereas something like blueberry extra is relatively weak. They certainly have a ton of workhorses in their line.
I depends what you're mixing with, not all concentrates have the same concentration and/or potency.
~20% for an all TFA recipe isn't so bad usually.
No doubt. I'm talking about recipes where they are just reckless 10% of this 15% of that...including flavors we know are crazy gnarly at high percentages like TPA blackberry @ 18%....really of the charts kind of stuff. You'd be surprised how much of that is being published.
I notice 10%+ recipes workout better in larger batches. I tried a 12% recipe in a 30ml and it tasted like straight flavoring. Technically it shouldve tasted the same since its a % of the liquid and the size shouldnt matter. But for me at least, size does matter.