So i mixed a handful for the Hic’s Strawberry cotton candy without nic will low results. I’ll list all the elements and a few other mixes I tried.
70vg/30pg 4% Strawberry & 4% Joy. Upon vape I can smell a touch of cotton candy via my nose but upon inhale’n’exhale low to little flavor.
50vg/50pg 4% Strawberry & 4% Joy. Upon vape I can smell a touch of cotton candy via my nose but upon inhale’n’exhale low to little flavor. There was more flaver than the 70/30 and about the same at the 8% mix. I would say slight flavor increase.
60vg/40pg 8% Strawberry & 8% Joy. Upon vape I can smell a touch of cotton candy via my nose but upon inhale’n’exhale low to little flavor. There was more flaver than the 70/30 and about the same at the 8% mix. I would say slight flavor increase.
Ry4/Carmel Vanilla. All FA flavors. 70vg/30pg. 3mg nic. Carmel 4%, Ry4 6%, Vanilla 4%. Ry4 taste was the highest taste profile. I could taste the caramel but the profile was low. The overall flavor was still low but at least higher than the StrawCotCandy. I would lower the Ry4. However, there was still wasn’t what a call “flavor explosion” like I get with store bought ejuice.
Hic EggNog 70vg/30pg. 3mg nic 4.5% Vienna Cream & Carmel 1.875% Smelling the liquid it is almost like eggnog. The flavor was low or muted. As a noob I would say do something crazy like triple the percents…but I don’t think I am supposed to do that.
Hics Pot’o gold whiskey. Whiskey 1.5%, Carmel 1.5%, Cocoa 1%, Butter Scotch 0.75%, Custard 0.75%, 3mg nic. The whiskey was upfront, I am sure it would mellow. The remaining flavors were mellow. Just like with everything else there was not a flavor explosion, just low like I should double or quadruple the flavors. But again, I don’t think I should do that.
All the juices I vaped in an Atlantus 2 tank. 0.5 coil. Fresh Battery. Good coil (used a store bought custard before and after and tasted excellent). I tried heat stepping my first bottles…which didn’t work…hence making the listed above (70vg/30pg 50/50 and 60/40). I measured all attempts by weight (and because i was scared of the nic volume & weight measured as a safety double check when I did my first attempt). For the batch of three I made I measured by both volume (medical grade syringe I got from the pharmacy) and weight to ensure the scale was working properly (which was calibrated as well). I shook the juices prior to going to bed last night. Shook them at 3am prior to the gym. Shook again at 5:40am upon arriving at work. Did a warm water bath to loosen up the pg/vg and shook again 6:20am Bottle sat most of the day…shook prior to leaving work. Shook again…and vape tested all the bottles today at 4pm. All mixes where made using a juice calculator and verified accurate.
Environment factors. Everything was new from ecigexpress. I received the package at work and nothing funky happened there. When I opened the box and I could smell black licorice…and the anise bottle was dented…but no liquid mess…but I am guessing a touch leaked…but shouldn’t have affected anything else. Everything stays in the dark, in Tupperware contains. The mixed juice goes into the juice drawer. I did vigorously shake the vg/pg/nic/flavors the first go around…but who knows…maybe not enough…so on the test batch I shook vigorously each time adding flavor to each bottle. I did check all the FA bottles and they all say “concentrate.” The only environmental factor is that I don’t use the heat in my home and I keep the temp cool (like not warm…still haven’t ran the heat in the house living in the pacific northwest).
I have no experience with cotton candy but people on the forum say that it mutes flavours. As for putting up your percentages, if you find your flavours to be too weak than by all means do! Some people get plenty of taste with low percentages while others don’t. Have a look at the flavour list, http://e-liquid-recipes.com/flavors
You can look up the flavours you want to use and see the average mixing and single flavour suggestions. You will also see that there are a lot of differences in the percentage various people use. So just play around with it and adjust according to what tastes good to you. There is no magic number when it comes to how much flavour to use. As the old saying goes, taste is on the tongue of the taster, oh wait… I think it went a little different but the principle is the same.
I’ve heard as well, that some people double HIC’s percentages. With the ones I’ve tried, flavor was fine!
I haven’t got any experience with the Atlantis 2, but the first Altantis had very little flavor for me. Very little. The subtank was a step up, but all my other RTAs were way better!
I have been finding with some of my FA flavors a bit of steeping makes a huge difference. Make some small batches and let them sit a couple weeks. You may be surprised.
When I first started mixing a month ago I was anxious to stop buying retail and start vaping my own juice. I was frustrated that I wasn’t getting as much flavor out of my recipes.
So I stopped, took a step back, and made some high rated recipes and tested them before putting away to steep for a month. When I tested them they were a tad weak as well. But I knew they required time to mature.
Now it is a month later. I have some killer juice in the closet. And I can now kick back and take my time and work on some of my own recipes.
If you want a really good shake and vape try my Twixted recipes. They are good after a day, but get a lot better after a week. Everyone I have let try them have raved. Not tooting my own horn, just trying to get you a very tasty recipe to make that will get your mind off vaping your own mixes right away. Because you sound like you are going through the exact same thing I was. Everything I made seemed muted.
Give the batches you have made a couple weeks and test again. Get a notepad and note the changes for each mix. Give it a couple more weeks and repeat.
One thing I have noticed about retail juices is a lot of them I am guessing are a good shake and vape. Because I have some retail juices that were good a month or so ago that I stopped vaping to try other stuff. Now when I go back to some of them they have really increased flavor. Which tells me a lot of them were made and shipped out to be sold with little to no steeping. So if they are good when you buy them it’s because they were formulated as a shake and vape.
I am no expert. But that’s what it seems to me. So let your recipes mature before giving up and trying something else. Because I am finding nearly everything I make changes with time. Even if it is good when you make it.
Have you considered a RDA to test the flavors? Could check out non subohm’g for testing?
RDA’s and type of resistance vaped at, can make a big difference on how you will experience the flavor. Might consider mixing a single/standalone flavor first, at the recommended ELR average single strength (as Josephine_van_Rijn pointed out) and see what the strength/taste etc. is like.
Take everything to an RDA. It’ll have more taste but at the same time you’ll have to make it a little more potent to get the same taste from a tank. I’ve not had any luck at all with HIC recipes. Shatner mixes a lot with FA, I would just haven’t had time. Been over a week since I got time and I was going to before hoping on here. I’d personally say go back to your 4% of each and work up 0.5 % each time and se where you’re at. Work at the pg/vg ratio you’l be working with normally.
My rules of thumb for using FlavourArt concentrates:
Always check the proportions each flavour has been used by others
Read HIC’s flavour notes to get a feel for what to expect and how it might work with other flavous
If tempted to increase (almost) any FA concentrate above 5%, re-examine the recipe as it probably needs rebalancing rather than more
Always allow juices to steep for 3 days (fruit), two weeks (dessert) or four weeks (custard and many creamy mixes)
If a test mix really has little flavour, try reducing the vg proportion.
Our sense of taste is extremely individual - what works for me may be revolting to you - and there are very few right answers that will work for everyone: study, experiment, review and repeat!
I am still in the retesting stage. After searching lots of sites and googling things like “low flavor from” FA I ran across a site that listed average percent of flavor to vg/pg and it finally clicked.
Although lots of recomendations to hic’s recipies say to double the flavors that was what was giving me the issue. Everything destroyed everything. Sticking to no more than a total of every flavor in the bottle to a limit of 5 to 6% max has done the trick. At least so far. Strawberrycotton candy also does not work for me… But bilberry and joy at 2% of each actually gives me blueberry and funnel cake.
Thank you to everyone putting up with me. I guess this post will hopefully benefit another first time diy person down the road.
