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Sweetener. A lot of sweetener. It has been said that commercial e-liquid is just a bad recipe with a lot of sweetener in it.
I don't know how much effort you have made but it has taken me six months to get to the point where I now have one WOW recipe and three OK recipes that I'm still working on.
They're all coil killers too. Coils last maybe 2-3 days with most liquid because the absurd percentages of sweetener in that trash. I can vape my own for a ridiculous amount of time and they are pristine. 2-3 days on store bought juice and my coil is completely fucked, gunked all to hell and crusty.
Depending how long you've been doing DIY, it might be your tastebuds!
Think of it like going on a diet. If you're used to extra sweet sweets, then fruit is kinda 'meh'. But if you cut out the added sugars, then real fruit is pretty tasty and sweet.
Best analogy I can come up with anyway....which leads me to:
I don't use any sweetener, but here's what I do (usually):
I go to https://www.steam-engine.org/juice to do the math for me and generally use:
PG Based Nicotine: 100mg/ml (used to mix at 6mg/ml, then worked down to 3mg/ml; finally cut down to 1.5mg/ml)PG Based Flavors: ~12-15% of total mix on average if just "throwing stuff together to see what happens".Fill rest of bottle with Pure VG.
Let steep. First few days will be rather lackluster at best. 3 days is about the minimum before it becomes worthwhile.
I typically mix 500-1000ml batches (meaning .5-1L of a single recipe) at a time. I find it's easier to work with larger volumes/greater tolerance. Big bottles last longer, steep longer, gets better with age. And lastly, I'm lazy, so I only have to mix every few months.
I know ATF has a decent dinner lady clone and would suggest trying it out.
A lot of times these companies potentially use heavy amounts of sweeteners which kill your coils quickly but can amp up the flavor of a relatively simple recipe (more overhead since you're not spending a lot on material cost). I personally, if I use sweetener in a recipe, only use 1%. I like to think of it the way my friend explained it to me, "You can bake a cake without sugar, but it's going to suck.." It can be a key ingredient, but that can be dependent on the recipe or the user. And of course, proper steep time can assist in developing flavors. Still, definitely helps to post some recipes here and we can workshop stuff~
Start with recipes that are really popular on AlltheFlavors.com. My favorite is "Dinner Lady (A lemon tart remix)" by dazcole.
That'll get you started on some you can make for yourself for a lot less. DIY doesn't necessarily mean you have to design your own recipes, which takes a lot of practice and patience.