yappycat
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Just thought I'd post this in response to a thread recently posted by a vendor which appears to malign the practice of selling short fill e-juice - or shake n' vape as it's also known. I blogged on this recently and wanted to post a more balanced and reassuring view of the practice. I'm going to copy and paste my text directly here rather than providing a link as my blog does appear on a commercial site and I don't want anyone to think I'm posting this to unfairly promote any specific brand or company 
Shake & Vape
On May 20th 2017 the Tobacco Products Directive came into force and the vaping industry was hit by some major changes. One of those changes was that retailers are no longer able to sell nicotine containing e-liquid at strength of above 20MG/ML. Furthermore, all existing e-liquids were required to undergo testing, including emissions testing. All submissions for new juices (and juices that existed pre-TPD) need to be made 6 months before sale is allowed.
The result of this was that many juice manufacturers cut their losses and folded, unable to afford the prohibitively high costs of testing every flavour. Many juices simply disappeared as manufacturers were forced to choose which juices were popular enough to risk spending the testing fees on, while less popular flavours were abandoned. The restriction in sales to liquids at 20mg and below, combined with testing fees, has also resulted in a decline in variety regarding nicotine strengths available.
The emergence of Shake & Vape
One result of TPD is the rise of 'Shake & Vape' e-liquids. Many e-liquid manufacturers have opted to sell their e-liquid flavours with no nicotine added, which means that they do not come under TPD regulations. Most often, Shake & Vape juices come in a 60ml bottle that contains 50ml of slightly over-concentrated juice. This allows for the addition of either nicotine/PG/VG by the customer, should they wish to tailor the juice to their own preferences.
The usual way of doing this is to buy a 10ml bottle of flavourless nicotine in whatever combination of PG/VG you desire and add it to your 50mls of zero nicotine juice. These are known as 'nicotine shots' and can be obtained in either a combo of PG + Nic, or VG + Nic, and are commonly available in 18mg/ml strength.
Personally I love the idea of Shake & Vape, as a frequent DIYer of my own juice prior to TPD I have a supply of PG/VG and nicotine at hand and a good understanding of how e-juice mixing works. I can tailor my fave S&V flavours to whatever nic level I so desire, and tweak the PG/VG ratio somewhat too.
For non DIYers and new vapers adding a 10ml shot to a 60ml bottle containing 50ml of e-liquid is straightforward enough...right? Well no actually, and this is what this blog is is gonna clarify.
Nicotine 'safety' measures back fired?
For many of you this is going to seem patronising, some of you guys will have forgotten more about mixing and DIY than I ever knew. If that's the case then feel free to ignore, BUT while this blog is mainly to clarify the S&V thang for new vapers it also carries a cautionary tale. It also serves as an important reminder to those selling S&V juices that what seems simple to an experienced vaper can actually be mystifying and confusing to some of their customers. Not every vaper is an enthusiast, some people just want something they can load up with e-juice and use all day to keep them off the ciggies. It is horribly ironic that the limitations enforced by TPD to make nicotine 'safer' have actually increased the margin for error for new and casual vapers.
Cautionary tale
So my mum vapes now...at 18mg nic, using a low wattage setup and a mouth-to-lung tank. Shake & Vape juice is fantastic if you vape at 3mg but unfortunately isn't suitable for her, but she does try stuff I have from time to time. She recently decided she liked a Bourbon Tobacco flavour I gave her to try but at only 3mg and with a high VG ratio it wasn't doing the job for her - not enough nic, poor throat hit and too much VG wrecking her coils. Using 72mg/ml PG based nicotine (bought prior to TPD naturally!) I transformed a bottle of said Bourbon Tobacco to an 18mg mix with a higher PG level to compensate for the increased dilution ratio on the flavour and facilitate extra throat hit. She says it's perfect, I cheer, and congratulate myself on being such a useful daughter.
Thing is, now I have 6ml extra in a separate little bottle. At 18mg I ain't gonna vape it and I know it's gonna be an age before momma gets thru the 60ml I just gave her. So I offered it to a friend who vapes, I ask what level of nic she uses and she assures me that its 18mg. Great I say, and give her the wee bit leftover to try out. It was only after I bade her farewell and was on my way home that a chance comment she'd made about adding 'little' bottles to 'bigger' bottles kept coming back to me.
With alarm bells going off in my head and in a state of complete freak out I rush home and immediately contact the recipient of my benevolent 18mg gift. Turns out that she thought that she vaped at 18mg because that's what it says on the little 10ml bottle. The one she adds to her bigger bottle of 0nic e-juice, which of course, results in a 60ml bottle of e-juice at 3mg!
Freaked, but relieved, I was able to tell her that under no circumstances should she use the juice I gave her - seeing that it was 500% stronger than what she's used to. Thankfully calamity was avoided. I spent the rest of that evening being upset and really annoyed at the whole TPD thing and how it's made things more complicated than they ever were before. However, TPD did not anticipate the concept of Shake & Vape juices and it is up to the people who use them to understand how they work. It's straightforward maths, and very familiar to DIY mixers, but the incident described above brought home to me how easy it is for a casual vaper just to look at the bottle - see a nicotine strength and assume that's what strength their e-liquid is. We can't change the short-sightedness of the rules that are in place already, so Shake & Vape juice manufacturers, and retailers need to be making that extra effort to minimise misunderstandings between themselves and their customers.
How it works
So, for the new shake & vapers, the confused shake & vapers, and the just-take-my-money-and-gimme-the-juice shake & vapers - here's a straightforward guide to how it works...
Strength of nicotine containing liquid x amount of nicotine containing liquid / total amount of juice = Final nicotine strength of e-juice
18 * 10 / 60 = 3
Total amount of juice / Strength of nicotine containing liquid x desired nicotine strength = Amount of nicotine containing liquid needed
60 / 18 * 3 = 10
Or for the non-mathematically minded....
Easy as pie! Or easy as Blueberry Pie, which happens to be my fave Shake n' Vape juice right now. Add the little bottle to the big bottle, and shake it, shake it sugar, shake it like a polaroid picture...then shake it some more and you got yourself a sweet 60ml of tasty juice at 3mg nicotine strength. You can't go wrong, and I know from experience that the LV team are always bang on point when it comes to explaining the process to their customers. Nevertheless, it's worth understanding the basic science behind it all for peace of mind if nothing else.
So that was Shake n' Vape e-juice explained. It doesn't suit everyone of course, if you vape at 6mg and above then it's not ideally suited to you, but for many low nic vapers it's a welcome concept. It is also making a positive contribution in retaining diversity, and keeping alive the possibility of further innovation in an industry that current regulation is attempting to throttle.
So whether you're a die-hard DIYer, a Shake n' Vaper, or prefer the no hassle of tailor made juices, I hope you all got something tasty in that tank...or dripper!
Have fun, be safe, and as always - Vape on!
Shake & Vape
On May 20th 2017 the Tobacco Products Directive came into force and the vaping industry was hit by some major changes. One of those changes was that retailers are no longer able to sell nicotine containing e-liquid at strength of above 20MG/ML. Furthermore, all existing e-liquids were required to undergo testing, including emissions testing. All submissions for new juices (and juices that existed pre-TPD) need to be made 6 months before sale is allowed.
The result of this was that many juice manufacturers cut their losses and folded, unable to afford the prohibitively high costs of testing every flavour. Many juices simply disappeared as manufacturers were forced to choose which juices were popular enough to risk spending the testing fees on, while less popular flavours were abandoned. The restriction in sales to liquids at 20mg and below, combined with testing fees, has also resulted in a decline in variety regarding nicotine strengths available.
The emergence of Shake & Vape
One result of TPD is the rise of 'Shake & Vape' e-liquids. Many e-liquid manufacturers have opted to sell their e-liquid flavours with no nicotine added, which means that they do not come under TPD regulations. Most often, Shake & Vape juices come in a 60ml bottle that contains 50ml of slightly over-concentrated juice. This allows for the addition of either nicotine/PG/VG by the customer, should they wish to tailor the juice to their own preferences.
The usual way of doing this is to buy a 10ml bottle of flavourless nicotine in whatever combination of PG/VG you desire and add it to your 50mls of zero nicotine juice. These are known as 'nicotine shots' and can be obtained in either a combo of PG + Nic, or VG + Nic, and are commonly available in 18mg/ml strength.
Personally I love the idea of Shake & Vape, as a frequent DIYer of my own juice prior to TPD I have a supply of PG/VG and nicotine at hand and a good understanding of how e-juice mixing works. I can tailor my fave S&V flavours to whatever nic level I so desire, and tweak the PG/VG ratio somewhat too.
For non DIYers and new vapers adding a 10ml shot to a 60ml bottle containing 50ml of e-liquid is straightforward enough...right? Well no actually, and this is what this blog is is gonna clarify.
Nicotine 'safety' measures back fired?
For many of you this is going to seem patronising, some of you guys will have forgotten more about mixing and DIY than I ever knew. If that's the case then feel free to ignore, BUT while this blog is mainly to clarify the S&V thang for new vapers it also carries a cautionary tale. It also serves as an important reminder to those selling S&V juices that what seems simple to an experienced vaper can actually be mystifying and confusing to some of their customers. Not every vaper is an enthusiast, some people just want something they can load up with e-juice and use all day to keep them off the ciggies. It is horribly ironic that the limitations enforced by TPD to make nicotine 'safer' have actually increased the margin for error for new and casual vapers.
Cautionary tale
So my mum vapes now...at 18mg nic, using a low wattage setup and a mouth-to-lung tank. Shake & Vape juice is fantastic if you vape at 3mg but unfortunately isn't suitable for her, but she does try stuff I have from time to time. She recently decided she liked a Bourbon Tobacco flavour I gave her to try but at only 3mg and with a high VG ratio it wasn't doing the job for her - not enough nic, poor throat hit and too much VG wrecking her coils. Using 72mg/ml PG based nicotine (bought prior to TPD naturally!) I transformed a bottle of said Bourbon Tobacco to an 18mg mix with a higher PG level to compensate for the increased dilution ratio on the flavour and facilitate extra throat hit. She says it's perfect, I cheer, and congratulate myself on being such a useful daughter.
Thing is, now I have 6ml extra in a separate little bottle. At 18mg I ain't gonna vape it and I know it's gonna be an age before momma gets thru the 60ml I just gave her. So I offered it to a friend who vapes, I ask what level of nic she uses and she assures me that its 18mg. Great I say, and give her the wee bit leftover to try out. It was only after I bade her farewell and was on my way home that a chance comment she'd made about adding 'little' bottles to 'bigger' bottles kept coming back to me.
With alarm bells going off in my head and in a state of complete freak out I rush home and immediately contact the recipient of my benevolent 18mg gift. Turns out that she thought that she vaped at 18mg because that's what it says on the little 10ml bottle. The one she adds to her bigger bottle of 0nic e-juice, which of course, results in a 60ml bottle of e-juice at 3mg!
Freaked, but relieved, I was able to tell her that under no circumstances should she use the juice I gave her - seeing that it was 500% stronger than what she's used to. Thankfully calamity was avoided. I spent the rest of that evening being upset and really annoyed at the whole TPD thing and how it's made things more complicated than they ever were before. However, TPD did not anticipate the concept of Shake & Vape juices and it is up to the people who use them to understand how they work. It's straightforward maths, and very familiar to DIY mixers, but the incident described above brought home to me how easy it is for a casual vaper just to look at the bottle - see a nicotine strength and assume that's what strength their e-liquid is. We can't change the short-sightedness of the rules that are in place already, so Shake & Vape juice manufacturers, and retailers need to be making that extra effort to minimise misunderstandings between themselves and their customers.
How it works
So, for the new shake & vapers, the confused shake & vapers, and the just-take-my-money-and-gimme-the-juice shake & vapers - here's a straightforward guide to how it works...
Strength of nicotine containing liquid x amount of nicotine containing liquid / total amount of juice = Final nicotine strength of e-juice
18 * 10 / 60 = 3
Total amount of juice / Strength of nicotine containing liquid x desired nicotine strength = Amount of nicotine containing liquid needed
60 / 18 * 3 = 10
Or for the non-mathematically minded....
Easy as pie! Or easy as Blueberry Pie, which happens to be my fave Shake n' Vape juice right now. Add the little bottle to the big bottle, and shake it, shake it sugar, shake it like a polaroid picture...then shake it some more and you got yourself a sweet 60ml of tasty juice at 3mg nicotine strength. You can't go wrong, and I know from experience that the LV team are always bang on point when it comes to explaining the process to their customers. Nevertheless, it's worth understanding the basic science behind it all for peace of mind if nothing else.
So that was Shake n' Vape e-juice explained. It doesn't suit everyone of course, if you vape at 6mg and above then it's not ideally suited to you, but for many low nic vapers it's a welcome concept. It is also making a positive contribution in retaining diversity, and keeping alive the possibility of further innovation in an industry that current regulation is attempting to throttle.
So whether you're a die-hard DIYer, a Shake n' Vaper, or prefer the no hassle of tailor made juices, I hope you all got something tasty in that tank...or dripper!
Have fun, be safe, and as always - Vape on!
