How to Make Your Own E-Liquid
The vaping community is all about creating a personalised vaping experience and the best way to do this is through your choice of e-liquid or e-juice. There is a huge variety of flavours available so whether you are new to vaping, or you are an experienced vapour you will eventually be able to find an e-liquid to suite your tastes. While you are progressing through your vaping journey trying to find your perfect e-liquid taste sensation do you ever think “I wish I could just make my own flavour”? Well now you can and listed below is exactly how you can achieve this.
When creating a DIY e-liquid it is similar to following a recipe to one of your favourite dishes. You will need a list of ingredients as you would a recipe, the necessary tools and equipment, and instructions to follow. Once you have these you will have everything you need to start experimenting with your personal e-liquid flavours and save yourself some money.
Propylene Glycol or Vegetable Glycerin – Often abbreviated to PV or VG. You will need to choose one of these to dilute your e-liquid for a better vaping experience. So either of these will be the carrier fluid to make up the majority of your formula.
PV and VG - There are differences in PV and VG. They have different thickness, tastes, and throat feel when vaping. A lot of e-liquids have a mixture of both PG and VG often presented as a ratio. Both PG and VG are fine to use for vaping, however you may want to try out a few different ratios to find the one that suits you.
- PG is widely used in food, personal care products, and tobacco as it is an organic chemical compound. PG will not alter the flavour concentrates as much as VG. If it is an intense throat hit you are after, then PG will deliver a stronger hit then VG.
- VG is slightly thicker and sweeter than PG and takes a bit longer to soak into cotton wick. VG e-liquids alter the flavour concentrates slightly but that may not be a problem depending on your individual taste preference. Higher VG concentrates are often preferred by drippers as it has a smother throat hit and produces a more visible vape cloud.
Flavours - You will need some e-liquid flavour. There are a huge variety of e-liquid flavours out there all available from different sources. So it’s up to you to get creative and make your own flavour sensation.
Diluted Nicotine – You can choose to add nicotine to you e-liquid or leave it out its entirely up to you what you prefer. It is better to use a diluted nicotine. 100mg/Ml is generally used within the industry as it is safer to handle than pure nicotine and easier to control the specific volume you use in your e-liquid. You should take into consideration that diluted nicotine can alter the flavour of your e-liquid as it has a flavour of its own. It is important to take safety precautions when handling and storing diluted nicotine.
Bottles – You will need some bottles. Plastic drip tip bottles are the most common bottle used when experimenting with your e-liquid as they are a more cost effective option as it is better to not re-use bottles when creating new flavours. It is easier working with larger bottles of 50ml as oppose to 10ml when creating your e-liquid as you are already working with small quantities.
Syringes – Syringes or pipettes are ideal for measuring the precise amount of PG/VG and nicotine you need to create your own e-liquid and transfer it into the mixing container. This will help you replicate or alter this formula so the e-liquid is to your personal taste.
Containers – If you are making large quantities of e-liquid then you will need some measuring cylinders or beakers. These are helpful in preventing cross contamination in your e-liquid.
Gloves – As nicotine can be absorbed through the skin it is important to wear gloves in case of the occasional spill. If you can, use powder free gloves to prevent contamination of your e-liquid.
Listed below are step by step instructions to create your very own e-liquid. It is important to make sure your recipe is reproducible so that when you create an e- liquid flavour that you love you can make it again. It may take a few goes to create the perfect flavour for you but once you find it is important that you wrote down the exact process and measurements of ingredients you used to create it so that you can reproduce your e-liquid over and over.
The first step to creating your own e-liquid is to figure out the strength of nicotine you want to use in your e-liquid to determine how much nicotine you will need. If you are creating your own nicotine free e-liquid, then skip straight to step 4. It is important to get the maths right to avoid an unpleasant e-liquid experience.
Determine how many milligrams of nicotine you need for your e-liquid.
(Strength in mg/mL)(Volume in mL) = Amount of nicotine in mg.
Example: You want to make 50mL of 8mg/mL e-liquid. So you need 50 x 8 = 400mgs of nicotine for your 50mL formula.
(Amount needed)/(Strength of diluted nicotine) = Volume to use.
If you have 100mg/Ml of Diluted Nicotine, you will need 400mg/(100mg/mL) = 4Ml If you have 25mg/mL of Diluted Nicotine, you will need 400mg/(25mg/mL) = 16mL
First you need to put on your gloves so you can safely transfer the nicotine into your bottle. If you are using a 50ml drip tip bottle and want to make 8ml you should use a syringe/pipette to extract exactly 16ml from your container of nicotine. To ensure you get an exact measurement make sure there are not air bubbles and fill the syringe/pipette slightly over 16ml so you can push out the excess leaving the exact amount you need to put into your bottle.
Push the syringe/pipette so it squirts directly into your 50ml drip tip bottle for your e-liquid.
Now you need to choose an e-liquid flavour combination you would like to use.
The recommended dilution of e-flavours is around 10%, so if you are making 50ml then you 5ml of flavour. Make sure you use a clean syringe/pipette when transferring the e-flavour to the e-liquid bottle just as you did the nicotine. It will just be trial and error getting the right mix of flavour and concentration for your e-liquid.
Now you need to measure and add your PG/VG to the bottle you are creating your e-liquid in. So if you have used 16ml of diluted nicotine and 5ml of flavour there is a total of 21ml so you will need 29ml of PG/VG to make it up to the 50ml e-liquid you are creating.
Now you have all your ingredients in the bottle put on the drip tip lid and shake for several minutes to allow all the ingredients to properly mix together. Then it’s time to try out your new e-liquid.
You may not get the flavour you were hoping for on your first attempt to keep altering your recipe until you get it right then you can vape away with your perfect e-liquid flavour.
If you are interested in creating your own e-juice flavour then contact us on 0151 203 5844 or visit our website www.thevapourman.com
