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DIY Liquid

I got tired of buying 30ml bottles for $16 and up at the local B&M, so I took the DIY plunge.

Starter kit:
1L VG
.5 L PG
125 ml of 100mg/ml nicotine solution in a 75/25 pg/vg ratio
TFA Flavors 30 or 15 ml each: Orange Cream, Strawberry, Vanilla Bean Ice Cream, Island Punch, Dragon fruit, Bavarian Cream, sweetner, can't remember any others right now.
30 ML glass bottles
Glass bottles for the PG & VG. Didn't want to leave them in plastic.
Droppers
50 ML cylinder
Luckily I already had extra blunt syringes for my pen ink.

First batches of roughly 70VG/30PG:
10 ML of ~ 6 mg Island Punch @ ~10%
30 ML of ~6 mg Orange Cream (7%) Vanilla Ice Cream (7%)
30 ML of ~6 mg Strawberry (~8%) Vanilla Ice Cream & Bavarian Cream (3.3% each)

I just shake 'n vaped the Punch at 10%. Not bad from the get go. Kind of reminds me of Hawaiian punch and Tropical Punch Kool-Aid. Tastes a little more well rounded today than it did yesterday.

I also tried the orange & vanilla. It needs more time to steep, but I think it will be ok.
The strawberry mix smells great, but probably needs some more time. Didn't test it yet.

I put the little bottles in a warm water bath (mason jar) last night. Hope it will help speed up the steeping. Will probably try a dragon fruit recipe like the strawberry one and just switch out the main ingredient.

It's pretty fun. Kind of like a chemistry set, but it seems difficult to get exact measurements. The syringes don't seem to account for the liquid in the needle, so a lot of the measurements had an extra .3 ML or so.

I was thinking about putting all the equipment into a mini fridge for storage, but I wasn't sure how necessary it would be. Currently it's in a basement closet.
 
Nice, £12 for a 15ml bottle at the local vape shop pushed me over the edge. My mixes are far from artisan bouquets but it's surprisingly easy to make cheap & decent juice.
 
DIY's the way to go,

Yeah, syringes don't account for liquid in the needle. It's pretty obvious why. You fill it without air, and you wouldn't want to push any air through, so the extra is wasted, left in the needle when you're done. The measurement refers to what gets injected, not how much is sucked from the bottle. If you use it the way it's designed, you'll lose a little because you need to draw a bit extra from the bottle, but you should get an accurate measurement for what leaves the syringe.

You don't have to worry about air, so you can use the leftovers, but you'll probably have to discover by trial and error how much extra you get for a particular syringe & needle. While you're at it, measure the syringe volume if you can get that accurate. I've always used the syringe as designed, so never bothered with this.

An alternative if you're making a few ml is to get a 5 ml graduated cylinder which you can eyeball to 1/20 ml, which is in the ballpark of one drop, so is accurate to roughly 1% for 5ml, or 2.5% for 2ml.

Nicotine in solution seems to have shelf life of a few months, and it's temperature dependent. People "freeze" the stuff to keep it longer. It definitely oxidizes at room temperature over a few months, turns brown, and maybe pics up a sour taste. In the past I bought 125 ml of 10%, and it's way too much for one person. I've decided to start buying a 3 months supply and also switch to a much lower percent next time. Might get 2 bottles and freeze one to try that out. It'll go in a freezer safe bottle inside a plastic freezer bag with a light-proof something wrapped around the bottle.
 
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DIY's the way to go,

Yeah, syringes don't account for liquid in the needle. It's pretty obvious why. You fill it without air, and you wouldn't want to push any air through, so the extra is wasted, left in the needle when you're done. The measurement refers to what gets injected, not how much is sucked from the bottle. If you use it the way it's designed, you'll lose a little because you need to draw a bit extra from the bottle, but you should get an accurate measurement for what leaves the syringe.

You don't have to worry about air, so you can use the leftovers, but you'll probably have to discover by trial and error how much extra you get for a particular syringe & needle. While you're at it, measure the syringe volume if you can get that accurate. I've always used the syringe as designed, so never bothered with this.

An alternative if you're making a few ml is to get a 5 ml graduated cylinder which you can eyeball to 1/20 ml, which is in the ballpark of one drop, so is accurate to roughly 1% for 5ml, or 2.5% for 2ml.

Nicotine in solution seems to have shelf life of a few months, and it's temperature dependent. People "freeze" the stuff to keep it longer. It definitely oxidizes at room temperature over a few months, turns brown, and maybe pics up a sour taste. In the past I bought 125 ml of 10%, and it's way too much for one person. I've decided to start buying a 3 months supply and also switch to a much lower percent next time. Might get 2 bottles and freeze one to try that out. It'll go in a freezer safe bottle inside a plastic freezer bag with a light-proof something wrapped around the bottle.

Good stuff! My wife is a bit wary of putting the nic solution in the freezer with the food, so I think the mini fridge may be my best option. With winter coming, I could probably just leave it out in the garage once it gets cold enough. I was hoping I could make the solution last 6-7 months.

Edit: Maybe by the time it goes sour, I won't need nic anymore. I already feel much better about 'quitting' completely now that I haven't smoked in awhile. Plus, I noticed that gum can help with vape cravings quite a bit, but it never worked well when I was on analogs.
 
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