Finding an e juice in Canada that you love can be hard, and some vapers have to search far and wide to find something they truly love. Some vapers even decide to make their own e juice for their vape pen, to take personalizing it, to the next level. There is nothing wrong with making you own e juice, but if you choose to take this route, make sure you’re doing it safely.
WHAT IS E JUICE?
E juice in Canada is actually quite simple, as it only has 4 basic ingredients, that are all food grade and safe and can be used in any vape pen bought in Canada. The majority of e juice is made up of:
- Vegetable glycerin
- Propylene glycol
- Diluted nicotine (freebase)
- Flavours
Each of these ingredients play a different part in making your favourite e juice! The nicotine is what helps you to make a shift from smoking to vaping and is the same ingredient in cigarettes, without the nasty chemicals that come in tobacco. The flavouring in e juice is what makes it taste like a cigarette, strawberry shortcake or watermelon strawberry blueberry punch! Where it gets a bit more complicated is with VG and PG, also known as vegetable glycerin and propylene glycol. E juice has a unique ratio of VG/PG and varies depending on what particular result the manufacturer wants to achieve. If the manufacturer’s goal is to have very flavorful juice with little vapour, with a strong throat hit, they will have a higher ratio of PG (propylene glycol). If the manufacturer wants to have huge clouds and is less focused on the throat hit but wants the e juice to appeal to those who are dripping since its less viscous and the cotton can absorb it more easily they will likely choose to have a higher level of VG (vegetable glycerin) in their e juice.
EQUIPMENT, RECIPES AND WHERE TO BUY THE INGREDIENTS
What you need
- A sterile work environment (this is key to safely mixing and making e juice)
- Propylene glycol
- Vegetable glycerin
- Flavouring (be sure to pick what flavour you want your e juice to taste like)
- Diluted nicotine (if you want to have nicotine in your e juice)
- Syringes (to measure the correct amount of each ingredient)
- Gloves (so you’re not absorbing the ingredients on your hands)
- Bottles (to put the finished product in)
Basic recipe
- Determine the level of nicotine you want in your e juice. You want to do this by determining the total volume of e juice you are making, and the strength of nicotine you want in each ml of your e juice. If you want to have 3mg of nicotine in your e juice, but you are making 60ml of e juice, you’ll want to multiply the nicotine concentration (3mg) by the amount of e juice you’re making (60ml) to get the total nicotine you’ll need to add to your e juice batch (90ml)
- Add nicotine to the bottle. Take the diluted nicotine from the container, and using a clean syringe measure out the amount of nicotine you’ll need, calculated in step one. It’s better to get less nicotine than more because you can always add more if it’s not strong enough.
- Add flavour to the bottle. You want approximately 5% of the total volume of your e juice to be flavouring, so if we are using our example from step one, you want your flavouring to be 3ml out of the total 60ml. Using a new, clean syringe, add the flavouring that you’ve chosen to the same bottle you added your nicotine to in step 2. If this is your first time making e juice, its best to stick with a simple, one flavour, and leave experimenting and mixing flavours until you are more experienced.
Add the base. This is the point where you need to pick the ratio of PG/VG that you want in your e juice. This will depend on what you prefer in your e juice. At this point you have filled your bottle with liquid diluted nicotine, and flavouring, so with the remaining volume in your bottle you want to choose your ratio. If you want an 80VG/20PG ratio, you’ll want to calculate how much volume you have left in the bottle, and figure out how many ml of that amount are going to be VG and PG. For example, if you have 50ml of your 60ml bottle, and you want an 80VG/20PG ratio, you’ll want to have (50×0.8 =) 40ml VG and (50×0.2 =) 10ml PG. Using new clean syringes for both the PG and VG, add you desired amounts to the bottle.- Shake it, shake shake it, shake it like a polaroid picture. At this point, you have all your ingredients in the bottle, and the final step is mixing it. Shake the bottle with all the ingredients thoroughly until you are satisfied with the mix.
* Remember this may take a lot of trial and error to get the exact flavour, consistency, throat hit etc. that you desire
Where to get the ingredients
Online is the best place to find the exact flavouring you need, make sure you’re buying from a reputable vape store that has supplied these products for making your own e juice. The most important safety tip in making your own e juice, is using safe and sanitary ingredients. Check out www.esmokercanada.com to get your ingredients today!
