DIY first order help

E-liquids Beginners
42

Exactly because they are new, they don’t need to complicate things by different pg/vg. You have one premixed 20/80 bottle and your average mix will be somewhere in between 30/70 and 40/60 (and the difference between these two even someone who is vaping 10 years wouldn’t know for a new recipe; not saying for your hundred times exploited recipe, but for a new recipe).

This makes everything simpler for a new mixer; dealing with one bottle instead of this scientific approach that just confuses them to get exactly 30/70 (which is least important at the end and neither they or most long time users would not recognize the difference). Making it simple(r) is important for newbies.

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For bottles… nearly every newbie has this wrong expectation and they mix too much (by quantity) instead of just enough or too little. Because mixing small quantities makes testing and finding best vapes possible, not mixing 120ml bottles. Because too many times you will end up with throwing away 115ml of liquid or be forced to vape that mediocre mix, which obviously doesn’t happen with smaller bottles. I would recommend getting big bottles only after a year or two, when you already have your adv or preferred mix that you already had dozen of times.

easier to work with smaller bottles
easier to adapt recipes to your liking (or add additional flavors to recipes you already know / to experiment / to get know the difference)

easier testing (testing 5 different variations instead of just one with the same amount of ingredients used)
allows you better vapes in average (it’s easier to throw it away if not optimal since only micro amount is used or to eventually ‘correct’ recipe afterwards; thus one can vape more pleasant juice than he could otherwise)
allows you try way more recipes (with the same amount of ingredients)

It makes sense. Just like it makes sense to not make 100 glasses of home-made marmalade when you’re doing it first time or 100L of home-made liqueur / moonshine when you start with that.

Yes, i do believe it’s wrong to say a newbie that he needs 10x 60ml AND 10x 120ml bottles when making first ever order.

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43

Quote my message and you’ll see the coding that i used. So proper code is needed and it will change it automatically.
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Trial and error is the best way to learn

or you can also use

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44

they can pre-mix a big batch themselves if they want when they get it. this isn’t complicated and OP seems intelligent.

they can click “max VG” in the calculator and as long as the ratio is acceptable you never need to worry about getting exactly 30/70 or whatever

but what if they would like to try 80/90 or they want 50/50 with a recipe that only has 8% flavor?
pre-mixed severely limits your options when thats all you’ve got

the bottles i sort of agree, they probably have too many 120ml it’s no big deal those are great for making vape ready base so you can mix quickly without taking nicotine out of the freeZer
using 10ml bottles isn’t fun and this is a hobby not work
30ml are a good comprimise for testing mixes. you don’t have fill them up all the way

they can get 10ml bottles when/if they decide to get flavors and not one shots

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45

Definitely need a scale that can measure to 0.01g especially for mixing 10ml testers. However for bottles, 10ml bottles were too small for me when I first used them. I got 30ml bottles and it was much easier to shake up 10ml in a 30ml bottle. Right now I have like 7 60ml bottles with 10ml in them lol. I never mix more than 60ml, and when I do it’s a known good recipe that I like. I also wouldn’t use premix VG/PG… The math was very confusing. I almost got premix when I started but I’m glad I didn’t.

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46

I guess one more thing, when trying flavors for the first time I always get the tiny bottles. Even those last a long time. I didn’t start buying the 30ml bottles until I began finding flavors I really liked. I actually only have 2 30ml bottles of flavors right now. I’ll be adding 1 more to that soon. I have a couple handful of testers that I didn’t like, but I refuse to throw away. Some can go bad, I only had this happen really bad with 1. I had a tres leches flavor for a year that smelled like something died in the bottle. Also, more expensive flavor isn’t always better. I got strawberry cream from flavorah and I think it tastes disgusting.

These flavors were originally intended for culinary use, some just don’t translate to vaping very well.

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47

Here’s something I took awhile to learn. First mix of a recipe is 15ml. If I like it then second is 30ml. Third is 60ml. I have stopped using so many before the 60ml is finished.

Also, at some point I’ll stop using a recipe. No need to have 300ml on hand when I stop. My max limit when mixing is 180ml, even for my two favorite ADVs.

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48

That sounds like a really good way to do it.

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49
Thank you!
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50

I’m

using

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coding

just gonna cross this out

BIG

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i forgot what this one does

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51

@Mikser

yup, I plan on getting a scale. And that makes sense but I should probably explain.
I had planned on using a one 120 bottle for my “working bottle” of nic that I’ll keep in the fridge, another for a “working bottle” for the PG and other of VG.
And I figured the others would be for the mixes (because my commercial juice comes in 120ml bottles). But it makes more sense to use smaller bottles until I get the hang of things. :blush:

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52

@warkwarth

Ya I plan on using three of them for “working bottles” of nic, PG and VG.
I think I also got ahead of the curve & was just thinking that my commercial juice come in 120 so I should get more. I’m gonna modify and drop my number of 120 bottles.

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53

Ya I plan on playing with the PG/VG ratio coz I vape MTL so clouds aren’t important and I’ve read PG @carries the flavor so I want to play around with a higher PG ratio.

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54

@Mediocre_Remedial

How long do the little bottles last?

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55

@natbone
I’ll make a note of that when I’m read to move one from one shots to mixing a recipe.

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56

Ok, so that can depend on how much % you require when you make a recipe, and how often you use the flavor. It’s been a while since I’ve had a flavor in a tiny bottle I liked enough to run out, if I see that trend of use I order a larger bottle of flavor. As far as the tiny bottles go, it’s a win win because you can mix plenty of juice and if you decide you don’t like a flavor, you’re only out about 2$

Another thing is too, some of the flavors do actually go bad. Some in a sense of actually smelling like death, and others just lose potency.

As far as to start, the tiny bottles should last plenty. It’ll just save a lot of money. You can get Multiple 60ml mixes out of one. You can always re-order too, which gives you an excuse to try new flavors lol.

I’ve actually re-ordered with exclusively tiny bottles for the past couple years until just recently when I saw I was going through Bavarian cream and sweet crunch and decided to step up sizes.

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57

Welcome to the community and your first order looks darned good. Remember, it is your first order and you can (and will) be ordering more of what you use, more of what you need and more of what you don’t need. This mixing thing is a journey…and it’s a blast. Enjoy your journey.

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58

OP is asking what should be his/her first buy, explicitly mentioned they would want to take ‘baby steps’ and there he has 20+ required things listed… That’s nonsense, jumping into vaping to quit smoking should be simple – and our goal should be to make it look easy, not difficult. Yes, i know you need all that and several additional things on top too and same do i, but this doesn’t make it required for newbies.

I know i would never try it if i came to this forum and there would be these 20+ things lists (and especially if that would eventually cost me 200$ before i even had my first vape) and especially if people would be talking to me about chemistry and Ohm’s law and similar. All that is BS and the last thing a newbie wants to hear – the only reason he’s asking for our help is to help him quit smoking, not learning or mastering things that they know nothing atm; he’d want to get a simple answer what to buy, where and why (and get that as cheap as possible) and he’d want to get an easy affordable vape that he can make in 5 minutes without reading encyclopedia or watching YT to be able to understand.

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Here’s how i started 8 years ago. I bought a simple Eleaf Pico/Melo III online for less than 20$. Then i went to a local vaping shop; i smelled about 20 liquids, picked up 2 that smelled terrific and asked an employee to mix it for me in front of me since my first time.

They took 100ml premixed base 20/80 (without asking me what do i want, because a newbie of course has no idea what he wants, so asking newbie that question is, well, stupid), the base already had 15mg nic mixed in (they asked me if i want normal amount for existing smokers and that’s all they needed to know; they didn’t ask me if i wanted to have 6 or 30mg in it because that would be stupid question since newbie can’t know that), and then they mixed that with my chosen 20ml bottle e-liquid and finally poured it into my tank. 5 minutes of work in total, no effing wicking and i got an idea how easy it is and what to do without all those stupid questions that are not helping a newbie, but rather just confuse him.

And when i finished that 120ml bottle i had zero problem to mix the next one by myself and importantly, it took me 5 minutes to do that - by using 2 things only, premade base with a nic and e-liquid. Done. Every 12 years old could do it properly without any studying. And when coils were bad, it took me about 30 seconds to change them since they were prebuilt. That’s why i stayed. It didn’t take lots of time, it was extremely easy, i was never confused if i’m doing it right or needed to study and it didn’t cost much. Perfect! This is the reason why disposables are popular and not DIY now; because most people don’t take this as a hobby (and ofc no newbie takes this as a hobby, like we do).

IF the shop keeper would instead gave me a 20+ list of what i need to start vaping (and all that shit would cost me 150€), then i would never started vaping, that’s for sure. IF they would be asking me ridiculous questions that would just confuse me, like what percents would i want my pg/vg to be (WTF is that and how should i know that) or asking me about Ohm’s law (omg, really?) i would never start vaping.

What i want to say is that we should make it simple, explain it in a simple way when talking to newbies, so they would understand. That would help them. Only later down the road they can start realizing the difference between 20/80 and 40/60 and testing that on their own, and not before their first buy. Buying things they don’t need is wrong advice imo (1L of nic is also ridiculous for a newbie who clearly expressed that they would want to make ‘baby steps’). Rather help him make their first step comfortable, easy, not difficult, not expensive and they will soon run with us. There’s a reason why half of vapers use disposables = because they are so convenient, easy to use, zero time needed to study and make it similar to this should be our goal too instead of making it more complicated than actually is.

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59

your aggressively trying to make it simple
and paradoxically making it sound more complicated than it is
its pretty clear that OP has a good idea of what they are getting into based on their list
they are not new to vaping either. they don’t need to be treated like a total newb

I bought 1 litre of 100mg my first order and it worked out great
however if they are REALLY unsure if DIY is for them this list could
probably be cut in half across the board or even 3/4 depending on their confidence level

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60

I believe you’re right. It’s easy to forget the stress, frustration and general pain in the ass our journey was. I liken it to buying your first guitar. If you were to ask on guitar forum the responses would be overwhelming and a bit discouraging. Whereas the best response would be to buy one that has six strings and makes noise. If you stick with it for a year then dive into the rabbit hole.

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61

@warkwarth
Yup, I’m not new to vaping but based on what I’m reading I probably am going a bit over board on my first order especially because I’m going to start out with one shots.
I’ll drop my bottle number down to probably about 4 each except for the amber bottles (because I think the vendor I’m thinking of getting them from 24pack is the smallest number they sell them in).
I normal rotate between four flavors and I’m figure I’ll do the same with diy but maybe a won’t.
Every options and suggestions have been very helpful.

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