DIY Noob hoping for some guidance

[sameguy]

I've been vaping for a couple years, glad to be off the smokes. After reading some scary stuff about the ingredients in commercial e-liquid and tired of paying such a steep price I thought I would be prudent to get into DIY. I have read a lot on here and other sites and have a big order coming tomorrow. I'm excited to get mixing, saving some dough and hopefully reducing the harm present in some commercial juices.

I placed a big order with NicRiver containing the following:

FlavourArt Vienna Cream
FlavourArt Vanilla Tahity
FlavourArt Mandarin
FlavourArt Mad Fruit
FlavourArt Irish Cream
FlavourArt Apple Pie
FlavourArt Fresh Cream
FlavourArt Lemon Sicily
FlavourArt Custard
FlavourArt Coconut
FlavourArt Catalan Cream
FlavourArt Caramel
Vegetable Glycerin - 1 Liter
Propylene Glycol - 1 Liter
100mg E-Liquid Nicotine - 100mg / 150ml / VG Base

I picked up an AWS SC-501A scale, some nitrile gloves, eye protection, droppers, empty bottles etc. I'm confident in my lab skills as far as measuring and safety, documenting etc. I know many of the creamy, custardy flavors will need to steep and I have a very cool temperature regulated water bath setup that will do the trick I think.

I vape a dual coil RDA running around .25ohm from 50-80 watts on a few regulated devices. My normal vape is 6mg.

I was planning on making a few stand alone flavors to get a feel for what I've got first off. Probably 90%VG based. From what I've read on some of the flavors I have here is a good starting point is 5-7%, and up to 10% total flavor. Does that sound legit? I don't really have a plan for exact recipes, other than maybe an apple pie caramel, lemon custard, vanilla cream custard something rather. Would anyone care to make some suggestions for recipes for the flavors I have, or recommendations for others to compliment what I have? Thank you in advance for any tips you are willing to share.

 

[Markw4mms]

Welcome to VU, and congrats on your decision to take the plunge into DIY.
Looking at your list I would recommend browsing the DIY recipe section and take a look at some of HIC's (Head In Clouds) recipes as they are all very well done with notes on other things you can add to tweak it to something a bit different than the original. Another bonus is his recipes are almost 100% done with FA flavoring so you won't have to worry about subbing a different brand.

 

[sameguy]

Thanks Mark,
I chose FA because of the great notes HIC shared. I will spend some time in the recipe section before I get too ahead of myself, thanks for the tip.

 

[Markw4mms]

Once you branch out and buy some other brands I can highly recommend the recipes that @Squonk, @Deeks, and @Heabob post. I haven't tried one of theirs that I didn't like. I know you'll enjoy DIY, it's been a wonderful experience for me so far. BTW, I mixed almost 1200ml of juice last night for pennies on the dollar compared to the commercial stuff, and to me, it tastes better too.

 

[RonJS]

I Would anyone care to make some suggestions for recipes for the flavors I have

You may wish to take a peek and follow the advice in post #2 here....

http://vapingunderground.com/threads/ejuice-search-program.197589/

Useful not only for the flavors you have ordered; but you can add flavors you are thinking about to your "stash" and see what it comes up with.

I myself would be thinking FA Cookie.

Ron
---
"Imagination is more important than knowledge."- Albert Einstein

 

[Deeks]

Once you branch out and buy some other brands I can highly recommend the recipes that @Squonk, @Deeks, and @Heabob post. I haven't tried one of theirs that I didn't like. I know you'll enjoy DIY, it's been a wonderful experience for me so far. BTW, I mixed almost 1200ml of juice last night for pennies on the dollar compared to the commercial stuff, and to me, it tastes better too.

Aww shucks Thanks for the mention. Working on a few more of the sweeter variety lately, got a pretty nice watermelon jelly bean flavor rounding out quite well. Maybe worthy of a share eventually

 

[Foggz]

Hi Sameguy, welcome to VU!

I myself would be thinking FA Cookie.

plus one on the FA Cookie!

 

[gopher_byrd]

I was planning on making a few stand alone flavors to get a feel for what I've got first off. Probably 90%VG based. From what I've read on some of the flavors I have here is a good starting point is 5-7%, and up to 10% total flavor. Does that sound legit? I don't really have a plan for exact recipes, other than maybe an apple pie caramel, lemon custard, vanilla cream custard something rather. Would anyone care to make some suggestions for recipes for the flavors I have, or recommendations for others to compliment what I have? Thank you in advance for any tips you are willing to share.

With FA flavors I would start out lower like around 1 to 2% or so. Sometimes less is more... Especially with FA...

Welcome to VU and the world of DIY.

 

[Deeks]

My biggest advice would be to not be afraid to branch out into other flavor companies once you get a feel for mixing with what you have now. I started off with all FlavourArt myself which was fine for learning, but the real pleasure of mixing began once I got into some of the other companies (Capella, TFA, Inawera, etc.) and started combining them into the same mixes!

 

[freemind]

I'll second what @gopher_byrd said. Start with lower percentages with FA flavors.

I will also second trying other brands of flavors. TFA makes some good ones, and there are MANY companies making flavors. Just keep an eye on the mixing section to keep up with them. That doesn't mean you have to try everything, but sometime it takes combining different companies flavors to make say a grape or a apple, that you REALLY like.

ALWAYS avoid oil based flavors.

 

[sameguy]

Thank you all for your suggestions, Often on some boards noobs get a bit of a bums rush, mainly because they don't have much to add or are asking questions that have been asked so many times before, I greatly appreciate how welcoming you have been and I look forward to learning a lot here and maybe even contributing to the brain trust some day. I spent a few good hours looking at recipes and found quite a few I am going to try with what I have and have already placed an order for some more to compliment what I have. I am amazed at all the recipes out there and the dedication people put into tweaking them and making them great. Also noticed that as mentioned above almost every recipe I saw used a lower percentage of flavors than I had previously thought. The mailman can't get here soon enough!!!!

 

[Heabob]

My biggest advice would be to not be afraid to branch out into other flavor companies once you get a feel for mixing with what you have now.

+1

Or if you're having problems getting good results from just using FA alone.

 

[Trail]

Hmm you can find several good things here: http://e-liquid-recipes.com/list?q=&exclsingle=0&filter=14536&sort=score&direction=desc

First of all, you can add the flavors you own to that site and the site can tell you which recipes you could currently create with those.

Second it has a ejuice calculator, but there are so many out there, i use eJuice-Me up local on windows.

Third, the user i linked on that site has delicious recipes, and you can find other recipes there.

Another feature i like is when i buy flavors and i cannot decide which brand of "Cream" to choose, i go to that site, select 'flavor list" at the "resources" tab, and i type in "Cream" and then click the "Recipes" column to sort it according to most used, and i get to see which brands and what kinds of cream are most often used in recipes, and also the rating of that flavor. Then you can click that flavor and read the notes to get an idea about that flavor.

Very useful indeed /me thinks

 

[skiball]

My advice for noobs is research alot! It's really easy to buy flavors that are complete duds. That can quickly turn people away from diy. Also like others say start mixing in low %s it's prob the #1 mistake. When you mix in to high of % it gives the opposite effect and will lessen flavor. If you have any ?s feel free to ask lot's of experienced helpful people here.

Sent from my LG-E980 using Tapatalk

 

[Trail]

Another tip is steeping flavors in seperate bottles at about double the recommended single flavor percentage.

Then you can mix them up inside your tank and taste a tank full of the mix.

For example:
If a FA flavor is recommended at 5% standalone and 3% when mixed on average. and you mix a BASE bottle with 10% you can add about 20 to 30% to a tank filled with other flavors like this and experiment with combining them. You mileage may vary and you have to develop a feel for this, but this sure is a way to get that feel quickly without wasting too much liquid.

 

[AlbyKortoona]

Idk, some of these recipes have no flavor to my tastes. Don't hesitate to up the percentage of flavor to suit your preference. Perhaps my taste is jaded, but I can't tell a bit of difference with adding .5% of most flavors. Most of my mixes are ~15% flavors, a bit lower if I'm using pg nicotine. You'll find your happy percentage, getting there is more than half the fun....

 

[MD_Boater]

Try the Mad Fruit at 1-2℅. It's a very nice vape. That'll get you started with at least 1 success story.

15ml bottle - .15 to .3ml of MF.