I want to start mixing

[chandlay275]

Hi,
I want to start mixing my own e-liquid flavours, I've heard of clyrolinx and there Pre mix vg/pg. Where should I start?

 

[RichJB]

I wouldn't start with premix, it limits you quite a bit. Instead, I'd get nicotine (36mg PG), 2l of VG, 500ml of PG, a bunch of flavours, a scale and some bottles. Head over to alltheflavors.com, take a look at their top rated recipes, find concentrates that are common to several recipes, mix them up. You will quickly get a feel for what works and what you like.

 

[Dolfie]

Hi,
I want to start mixing my own e-liquid flavours, I've heard of clyrolinx and there Pre mix vg/pg. Where should I start?

My advice will be the following.
1. Get a scale they are about R250
2. Nicotine (pg one)
3. VG 2 bottles
4. PG one bottle
5. 30ml bottles the ones like you get your concentrates in I use one off them for my nicotine a syringes is too much off a hassle for me also use a 50ml for my PG.
6. TPA Vanilla Bean Ice cream is it going to taste pepper to you. That you will have to find out.
7. Get 5 recipes that is very very good. And buy concentrates according to them. Here you have to do your home work everyone's taste is different.
DIY is cheaper than buying commercial juice but be prepared to spend in the beginning.
Hope this helps

 

[aktorsyl]

I'll quote a post I made a few weeks ago to a similar question (I've updated some of the info below):

-----------------
I can testify from DIY experience (although I started out with MTL mixes and moved to DTL mixes with higher VG later on only) that the first few mixes you make will.. WILL.. turn out nasty. My learning experience resulted in the following tips I could share:

1) If - like me, initially - you find commercial 3mg/ml Nic juices to be too weak, don't just assume bumping up the nic is going to make it stronger without having a flavour effect. It will make a flavour difference, even if your nic is of the highest quality. Personally I found 3mg to be way too weak. I bumped it up to 4.5mg and the taste was pretty damn disgusting. Bumped back down to 3.5mg and the taste normalised.

2) As was mentioned in this thread: steep steep steep. Pure fruit flavours usually require shorter steeping times (even shake&vape recipes should usually steep for at least 3 days or so in my opinion), but creamy recipes.. steep it for at least 2 weeks. Tobacco recipes - 4 weeks. Don't try to accelerate the steeping process: sometimes it works, but more often than not it messes up the juice. Personally, after mixing my juice I heat the bottle up slightly under a hot tap to thin out the VG just a bit, and then shake it religiously. After that I put it in a cool, dark cupboard and only shake it 2 or 3 times a day. No heating after that initial one. For creamy juices I take my first taste test after day 5, knowing full well that it's not nearly steeped enough yet but at least it gives me a slight idea of the flavour profile. Having said that, after that first taste test it goes straight back into the steeping cupboard for a week or more.

3) Be careful of overflavouring. Many people make the mistake of thinking the more of a specific flavour you add, the more you're going to taste that flavour. However, oftentimes the chemical reaction involved in mixing&steeping actually has the opposite effect. The same obviously goes for underflavouring.

4) Random observation: Strawberry Ripe without a sweetener doesn't yield a strong strawberry taste. Many Mother's Milk clones just have you add Strawberry Ripe to the creams. For me personally this is fine, as I prefer a very muted low-key strawberry taste in M.Milk juices.

5) When vaping your new juice, play around with the temperature/wattage. I found that a mixed-berry & yoghurt juice I made tasted like dishwashing liquid at 40W on an 0.3ohm coil. Bumping up the wattage to 55W brought out the flavour a little more. Interestingly enough, after steeping the flavour for another 4 days, it vaped just fine at 40W.

6) Don't give up just yet. It takes a long time and many, many mixes before you start making decent juice. It's part of the learning process. I'd suggest doing small 10-20ml sample mixes so you don't waste too many ingredients on your samplers. If you use nicotine, I actually disagree with the people saying don't add nicotine to your sample mixes. In my opinion you absolutely should. Nicotine can and does change the flavour of a juice. My first tests are usually 0mg, and subsequent tests (once I'm confident I have the right flavour profile) have nic in them.

7) Another tip on nicotine base.. I'm not saying this is the golden rule to follow, just what works for me. I have a 100% VG nicotine base at 36 mg/ml. I store it in the fridge in 100ml glass bottles. I take out a bottle about 2 hrs before mixing so the VG can thin out a bit. Then shake the hell out of that bottle. There are mixed schools of thought on this.. some people say it oxidises the nicotine too quickly, others say you end up with hotspots in the nicotine if you don't shake it. I haven't had any noticeable oxidation with the shaking method, and much prefer that to having hotspots. Shake, shake.. and shake again. (Bearing in mind that shaking VG is like running a marathon with weights attached to your ankles.. it takes time, patience and therapy).

7b) Also shake your flavour concentrates before using.

8) You don't really need a milk frother or electric mixer to mix your juice when you're done.. just shake that bottle like there's no tomorrow.

9) Make notes. Religiously. I have a Google Sheets spreadsheet listing all my mixes. On it I note down the following:

- Recipe name/link
- Bottle number (I number my bottles instead of naming them)
- VG/PG ratio
- Nic strength
- Date mixed
- Remarks while mixing
- Remarks during first taste
- Remarks after steeping

It may seem excessive, but it does help when you refer back to a recipe to see how your remarks/findings change over time as the mix matures. Or to identify simple remarks such as "Strawberry Ripe smells very concentrated but has muted taste unless mixed with sucralose". Or whatever.

EDIT: Since writing the initial post a few weeks ago, I started using JuiceCalculator instead of Google Sheets.
The JuiceCalculator software contains all my recipes, notes, and most importantly - my inventory. Whenever I mix a recipe, it tracks steeping time and subtracts the concentrates, VG, PG and nicotine from my "stock".

10) Be extremely careful with nic bases. Respect it. It's dangerous. It can make you very, very sick and can even be lethal. It also absorbs through the skin. I never go above 36mg/ml nic base, and even then I'd ideally prefer to use nitrile gloves (nicotine can on occasion get through latex gloves) and a hell of a lot of care and focus. Many people call me overcautious, but I'd much rather be overcautious when it comes to nicotine. I don't care who thinks it's amusing or weird. It's effectively a poison and should be handled with great care. Also check and double-check your recipe calculator to ensure that you're adding the right amount of nicotine to your mix to get a 3mg/ml (or whatever) end-result. Adding too much can be dangerous or at the least taste like you're sniffing sriracha salt.

Don't get me wrong: I don't mean to scare you, just to emphasize the care required. Don't be scared, just respect the substance and handle it with the necessary precautions, focus and care.

11) I found that I mixed my juice recipes much more accurately when I started mixing by weight. A gram scale is relatively inexpensive and much more accurate than weighing by ml or by drops. You also don't need to spend money on syringes, needles, beakers, funnels and all that rubbish. And there is little to no cleanup required when you're done mixing - you just mix straight into your bottle.

12) Strawberry is actually a bit weird in the sense that not all people can taste it equally. You'd be surprised how many people just can't taste it properly when it's in an ejuice - no matter how strong it is or which strawberry concentrate variant it is. This is usually the first trap people fall into when they start DIY'ing - they mix a strawberry-based juice (like Mother's Milk, Strawberries & Cream, etc) and when it tastes bland, they start to lose confidence.

13) There is a common myth that sweetener (sucralose) is a "lolsimple" way to sweeten juices, and that you should rather try to sweeten juices in the recipe instead of using an additive. While this is true in some cases, sucralose got a bad reputation due to people overusing it. It is actually very handy, and not just to sweeten your eliquids - but to liven them up, make them brighter, and make you taste them sooner. It varies, in some mixes it will completely ruin the rest of the recipe. Experimentation is your friend - but start without additives and only add them when necessary. Wayne Walker (Enyawreklaw from DIYorDIE) also had a video about this recently, I believe. Oh, on that topic:

14) Follow DIYorDIE on YouTube. He has great tips - not just for beginners, but also for mixing veterans. The DIYorDIE site is also quite handy. I personally also follow "DIY Vapor" (https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCHO1jqaOgPVWlHYwGMhJaBA) who is pretty good at mixing and especially cloning, even though he uses ethyl maltol way too often for my liking

15) Use reference recipes. AllTheFlavors as mentioned in this thread is very good. ELR (E-Liquid-Recipes) is okay as well. Personally I sometimes dig around VapingUnderground's forums and I pay special attention to HIC (HeadInClouds) recipes. He has a firm belief that less is more, and you'd be surprised how many of his recipes taste great with less than 10% total flavouring.

16) Remember, if someone else (or even whole crowds of people) like a particular recipe, it doesn't mean that you will. For instance, I'm one of the very few people who absolutely HATE Unicorn Milk, even though it's one of the most popular e-liquids on the planet.

17) Ask! If you're stuck, or need advice, or require critique - there are people right here on ECIGSSA to help.

 

[chandlay275]

Okay cool thanks ...so where is the best to get the nic and the concentrates as well as the PG and VG from?

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[KZOR]

@chandlay275
The Flavour Mill sells a starter kit which I did a video on.
Maybe this could help you.

 

[chandlay275]

Thanks will check it out

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[playa4life]

Nice thread and what seems to be invaluable advice @aktorsyl
Many may have picked up that I'm a research junky... which means, I sometimes over research and over think things which could put me off from ever starting.
Therefore, expect loads of questions from my side in the very near future.
I like to do my own research before asking the, seemingly, stupid questions while trying not to ask someone point blank to hand over their entire recipe. Tact should be used I think. Intellectual property is a very personal thing after all.
Said it once. Will say it again. Great Community here on ecsa!

 

[Silver]

Nice thread and what seems to be invaluable advice @aktorsyl
Many may have picked up that I'm a research junky... which means, I sometimes over research and over think things which could put me off from ever starting.
Therefore, expect loads of questions from my side in the very near future.
I like to do my own research before asking the, seemingly, stupid questions while trying not to ask someone point blank to hand over their entire recipe. Tact should be used I think. Intellectual property is a very personal thing after all.
Said it once. Will say it again. Great Community here on ecsa!

Kudos to you @playa4life for doing the research and asking all the questions
Your questions and the answers that get provided help other vapers too
And this vaping hobby is multi-faceted with so many nuances - and is changing all the time, so hopefully we can all help each other to figure things out

 

[Puff the Magic Dragon]

Okay cool thanks ...so where is the best to get the nic and the concentrates as well as the PG and VG from?

I stand to be corrected, but I think that Clyrolinx sells the cheapest nic, PG, VG, particularly in larger quantities. As you live in JHB you can pick it up and save on the courier fees. They offer great service and are always helpful.

I agree with @RichJB , don't go with the premix as it limits your options. If you want to use their flavours there is a dedicated thread with great recipes.

Basic juice mixing is really easy. Use one of the calculators and double check the nic amounts.

Enjoy the ride.

 

[Taytay]

This sums up what I would tell anyone starting to diy. Well said

Don't give up just yet. It takes a long time and many, many mixes before you start making decent juice. It's part of the learning process. I'd suggest doing small 10-20ml sample mixes so you don't waste too many ingredients on your samplers. If you use nicotine, I actually disagree with the people saying don't add nicotine to your sample mixes. In my opinion you absolutely should

 

[Taytay]

This sums up what I would tell anyone starting to diy. Well said

That and to start off with some simple recipes that others have tried. It takes a while before you start getting a feel for the flavors

 

[Kuhlkatz]

No. 1 tip would be repeating what the others said. Start with a few simple one or two flavour recipes that are popular. Don't get inventive from the word go, as that would likely lead to some very horrible tasting stuff.
Start with something that you know is 'unpossible' to bugger up, even if the mix percentages are not 100% accurate, as long as they are within spec, i.e. a few drops out here and there. It might taste a tad weaker or stronger, but will not scorch your nose-hair and/or shrivel up your tonsils.

@Quakes started a thread dedicated to Cly flavours which you can find over here.