Is it weight by weight or weight by volume?

Hi guys,

I’m making my own sweetener and acid solutions. On nude nicotine site I’ve use their descriptions to help me.
https://www.nudenicotine.com/product/erythritol-solution-5/#reviews

In driving along I was thinking how difficult it was to dissolve my erythritol powder in solution. I was doing 5% in VG but weight by weight. Do 5g in 100g of VG, but I thought maybe they are talking about weight by volume. Which would be 5g in 100ml or 123g

Do you guys know for sure which way they calculate there percentages. I only thought about it because 1 the difficulty of dissolving & 2 they talk about mg/ml on their site when referring to various things. That is weight by volume. I’ll send them an email but in the meantime it would be awesome if you knew. TIA.

I do 6.2 g in 126g of vg (a smidge under 5%) and it does take a long time to fully disolve over an hour on the mag mixer at 55C but as you can see it is totally disolved

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Yeah, cool I’m going at 6.5% then but don’t have the mag stirrer. Using a milk frother in container then lowered in a water bath. I’ll persist more still crystals.

What do you think about the commercial stuff. w/w or w/v?

I am really not sure which they use or which is more correct.
Calling any chemists here?

I’ve sent an email off to nude nicotine. It’s not a big difference for PG based stuff as the SG is damn close to 1 but VG could be a 25% difference depending. Big! Probably not in the grand scheme as we only use small amounts.

I reckon it’s volume at a guess and I also think your solution is probably very close to full saturation, on gut feeling. Nice to know that your able to get up to 5% w/w I’ll have another go at trying to get it dissolved. Appreciate it.

Though I don’t have a degree nor do I claim to be a certified chemist I was a chemistry major in college. I would take that calculation as weight by weight so I would do 5g of powder in a 95g of liquid that to me seems like 5%… Just my 2cents :slight_smile:

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Yes it’s the call I made from the beginning. I did biochemistry. I’d assume the same. However, the w/v is not totally unconventional and on the NN website they refer to the mg/ml Measurement frequently. Definitely murkied the waters for me.

I think only those in the industry or inside knowledge will truly be able to confirm. Luckily this is only an issue for me when creating erythritol solutions as it needs to be in a VG base. Looking forward to nude nicotines response.

Here is some interesting reading on this subject that can help to confuse more this issue:


Although the wiki it more about cooking, I think that is what DIY is considered. Measurements are more accurate W/V but to get “close enough” you can go the other way. Try both, but if you still see crystals after mixing I suggest using a syringe to draw out that solution from the middle of the column leaving behind the upper and lower parts of the solution.

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I’m 90% sure it’s weight by volume, I started going through Nude nicotines solution pages looking for a clue.

It’s here - https://www.nudenicotine.com/product/citric-acid-solutions-5-15/

Extract from "PG can attain a max solubility of ~100mg/mL (10% solution) of citric acid, while VG can only obtain … " here they refer to w/v as a 10% solution. Pretty good clue I think.

So a 5% solution in vg is 5g to 100ml which is 123g. Should make it easier to make that solution & also be consistent with other products. I also am confident as it’s the standard for buying nic as well.

For your reference @woftam your solution is ~23% stronger. Ok guys. Whilst not conclusive it’s strong evidence.

Neither method is more accurate than another that’s determined by your equipment used. The benefit of w/v is they can use the same containers. So a 5% nic solution whether VG or PG base can fit in one of the 45,734 100ml containers they bought

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For accuracy sake you may be correct but in the larger scheme I don’t think I will remix right now I use a max of .4% in a mix so while 23% seems like a lot on paper in the large picture with a 100ml mix we are talking .092g or about 3-4 drops.

I am thinking after years of smoking my taste buds while a lot better than they were are not going to know the difference.

But good info none the less.

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Agree for sure.