As many of the new folks around here coming because of flavor bans going into effect around the States, I finally placed my first order. I've been lurking here for a few months and I just wanted to say thank you all for being so helpful and kind.
The flavor concentrates I ordered I'm pretty excited about. Im wondering how well I'll do mixing them so they are actually good because they sound great in my head. Irish cream banana nut bread is hopefully going to be the first.
Thanks again DIY!
One of the things I noticed when I first started diy juice was how little sweetener there is compared to commercial juice. If you have not, you may want to get some sweetener. Don't get too crazy and make giant batches of a recipe until you know you like that recipe. Make small batches at first. Then move up to bigger batches. Some recipes do better with a long steep and some are great as soon as you make them. It just depends. Commercial juice is loaded down with sweetener. Im using 1% sweetener in my mixes. Alot of people don't use any. Alot of flavors are already sweet to start with.
Thanks!
I haven't ordered any sweetener yet, I figured I would just stick with what the first kit gave me and try it out. Learn as I go kind of deal. I'll only be making 10 ml at a time to start based on your suggestion, and many others found on this sub.
Looking forward to all of this however.
Every time I make a new batch of something, I can't resist but to try it right then, which is perfectly fine. With the steeping, alot of recipes get better, and more flavor notes come out with time. My first order, I did not get any sweetner and it was just a few days later I ordered some. With making small batches at first, you are not using up too much stuff in case you don't like it. Hope it helps! Happy mixing!
Welcome to diy. Something I didn’t see anyone else mention is to take notes on EVERYTHING. let’s start with when you are mixing a particular recipe and you go over a little with a flavor or two. Make sure you remember that. And if you don’t have a particular flavor and use something to sub for it, make sure to write it down. Also as you test the recipe at different times take notes. And last but not least, I always forget to do this is to take notes and write down the recipe you are buying a particular flavor for. I probably have at least least 50 flavors that I don’t remember why I ordered them😂. Good luck
Agree on this one, when starting I did a lot of individual tests to understand each flavor and what I felt a good application for them were. One thing I will say is once you know all the flavors individually by heart, it does take a bit to understand how they work incorporating with other combinations or how to bend them, especially if you're like me and keep expanding your collection. That just comes with time and practice. Definitely take notes on every iteration you work on for recipe development, even subtle changes can really impact your juices.
Another thing I like doing, write out before even picking flavors what you want to accomplish from your juice before making it, abstract ideas like color palettes, all nuances you want, top layers, base layers, thickness, etc... This helped a lot when I was making a juice inspired by the Rush song Xanadu lol
Good luck! Most importantly have fun ;) Don’t be afraid to ask the community with help or recipes, they’re great around here!
Thanks!
Yeah I've found 98% of the vaping community is just all around good people who really want to help. Glad to finally join the ranks here!
Yup. Myself and another guy make up the other 2%. You did good not getting sweetener. If you can make it two weeks without it you'll be free from it. It's not a joke. It's actually addictive. It would just be a crutch for you rn and actually retard your growth as a mixer. Anyhoo, welcome aboard mane!
My first order is waiting for me at home right now. I am sure this weekend will bring both exhilaration and frustration as I set out on the path of mixing my own juice.
Mix a bunch of SnV stuff. Also mix some steepers, but put them in a box labeled "open on Thanksgiving(or other date over a month away)' and put that box in a cool dark desk drawer and forget about it.
I have seen many comments about keeping nicotine in the freezer. I ordered 120ml of 100mg in pg. Should that go in the freezer? Thanks
Yes, put your nicotine in the freezer. The easiest way to work with it is to transfer nicotine into a smaller squeeze bottle (10-30mL) that you store in the fridge (not a good idea if you have kids around), and work with that. Otherwise, you'll have to let your nicotine warm up for a while before you can shake it and work with it, and I like to minimize how often I take my main supply out of the freezer and let air in to it.
Divide it up into 30ml bottles. Keep all but one in the freezer. Assuming you vape 3mg/ml or less, you won't go through much more than 30ml in a vouple of months. You don't want to be storing what you're using to mix currently in the freezer, but you also don't want what you're using to have been sitting out for months either.
I started last week and already have two new ADVs. It's not rocket science and it's pretty satisfying to figure out your own juice.
Also I placed my first order a week and a half ago and I've already placed 4 more so get ready to fund a new addiction
I'm not looking forward to this whole steeping thing lol. I want my juice to be ready now.
Plenty of good "shake and vape" recipes out there. I'm a poor planner so I've found what works for me is I have two or so really good recipes that take about a week of steeping before they're perfect, so I make them at the same time I make one shake and vape recipe that I also like. That way by the time I'm starting to get sick of my shake and vape my other two flavors are pretty much ready (or close to it) and I can switch between those for awhile. I really need to start planning ahead though lol.
Dont be afraid to taste test those steeping liquids! Steeping enhances the liquid, but you can still vape it. In fact i love making 2x of a recipe. One i vape immediately whilst the other steeps, gives you a good idea on what/how the steep enhances the recipe
Most of the recipes I mixed along the way I would just start vaping either that day or the next. Many times I liked the mixes better fresh rather than steeped even tho they were good after a steep also. Even when I would mix other people's recipes that called for a week, 2 weeks, a month steep I would just start vaping right away and if I liked it I just kept vaping it and made more. For me, I rarely needed to let a mix steep for more than 2 or 3 days. It just depends on you...
It's not a big deal as long as you plan ahead. It's not like a recipe that calls for 2 weeks of steeping has to be used right at 2 weeks, it can sit for a while. Just make a rotating supply, and mix up a new bottle as soon as you finish one.
Is it a bit of a pain doing that with a bunch of new recipes, though, that's true. That's why it's good to get in early so you can still get commercial juice while your DIY stuff steeps.
I'm actually looking forward to making a ton of recipes but as I said in another reply I've been cooking forever so it's going to be more like something I already know, but I don't know at the same time. Yeah I can look here and make what you are all doing but where's the fun in that.
I do hope you chose flavors after careful research of all the reviews here, the use of the on alltheflavors, and other such data, rather than just choosing them based on the name of the flavor. Otherwise, any success you have is likely to be accidental.
Congrats on your first order!
I already received my first order. My second order shipped yesterday. My CBD isolate which should have arrived around the time of my first order (two different companies) got delayed and will finally ship out tomorrow.
This evening I ordered a Voopoo Drag Baby Trio kit because of the on sale price, plus I liked how small it is, and because I wanted something small to carry around on days when I don't feel like carrying my Vaporesso Luxe S with Profile mesh RDA.
Guys I’m in the UK and really hope that flavour nonsense in the US gets ironed out for you all over there asap, we thought we were getting a rough deal when the EU introduced the TPD regs over here but you all have my respect doggedly carrying on the vaping fight there.
As far as diy goes I’ve been vaping nearly 10 years and have an idea of what I’m doing but I’ve been meaning to get as off grid as possible by making own juices for some time as well as building my own coils, but to be honest I keep putting it off with some excuse or another as much as I can’t wait to have a go I dread wasting a load of cash I can’t afford and getting it all wrong, and ordering the wrong kit and ingredients, and then there’s the ‘oh damn there’s going to be so much kit that will need to be kept in strict order and labelled with notes etc etc how the hell will I manage’. Does anyone have any advice on this and how to start simple and stay relatively simple, if that’s even possible?
Again good luck to all you US vapers I hope things get back to normal for you all soon. Cheers for any help or advice in advance.
You can get started with essentially the price of about 2 store bought juices. 120ml nic, 250ml pg/vg and like 3 or 4 flavours. You probably have some empty bottles already so just pick up a 1ml and a 10ml syringe and you are golden.
If you like fruits check through this sub and just get like a good raspberry, peach, marsh mellow or meringue and a cotton candy or sub the fruits for something you like. or get a cheesecake or a custard or even sub out the meringue for them.
They won't be as intricate as the flavours on here but they will do the job. You can then add about 5 more flavours later on and you will be able to make a good 10-15 different basic recipes. ez.
As for coils. It's pretty basic. to start off you can just grab like 50 premade coils cheap as maybe get like a smok baby tank and get the rba for it then just load it up with the premade coils. Later you can just get some wire and wrap it around an electronics screw driver to make your own it's not that hard at all.
Many thanks for answering! Cheers Coils etc are no problem I’ve been doing that a while but all that info on diy juices and what I’ll need to get started exactly what the sort of stuff that’ll help and yeh got dozens of different bottles all over the place nearly thrown them out so many times glad I didn’t now. I’m a big fan of caramel and maple syrup type flavours but open to new ideas as well, thanks for answering and your suggestions and advice mate cheers 👍
My advice to make things easier is to buy one shots (I buy from https://chefsflavours.co.uk/one-shots/?sort=bestselling and https://chefsflavours.co.uk/chefs-flavours/?sort=bestselling) I have had better luck making good juice buying from there rather than making recipes with many flavors that can be dissapointing. Also use a scale that measures up to 0.01g it makes things easier. But make sure your recipe calculator has a "grams set" setting in which you can enter the information found here: https://www.liquidbarn.com/pages/calculating-the-specific-gravity-of-your-nicotine-solution I use this calculator: http://www.ejuice.breaktru.com/
Thanks for this, I think overall this what I’ll do to start, cheers for the recommendations and links I’ll definitely be looking at the one shots as they sound relatively simple and I won’t be needing the nicotine content as I don’t need it any longer but I will check out those links and websites and sort out one of those scales your talking about. Many thanks for your advice mate 👍
As a postscript many many thanks to ALL of you that have given advice, currently I’m in the middle of moving but soon as I’m sorted I’ll start on my first diy juices and let you guys know how it’s progressing. Cheers to you all.