Highbrow News — vaping

Using a rebuildable atomizer comes with loads of advantages.  It allows you to save money by creating your own coils while enabling you to experiment with a wide range of unique coil configurations.  Plus, this type of atomizer allows you to understand vaping technology on a whole new level.

However, when it comes to changing your e-liquid, things aren’t quite as simple as they are when using a conventional sub-ohm tank.  While sub-ohm tanks allow you to simply throw out the coil, rinse out the glass and refill, rebuildable atomizers require a bit more care.

The good news is that it’s fairly easy to change your e-juice while using a rebuildable atomizer.  The key is eliminating any trace of liquid that’s left behind before you add your new flavor. As you’ll see, this process varies depending on whether you’re using an RDA, an RBA or an RTA.

RDAs

An RDA is made for dripping, so it doesn’t require a ton of effort in order to try a new e-liquid flavor.  And because of the nature of RDAs, all that you have to do is simply remove the cotton wick as it’s saturated in the previous e-liquid.  This will ensure that you don’t taste any of the old e-liquid while trying to enjoy a new flavor.

Sometimes, little cotton fibers will be clinging to the coil after you’ve removed the wick.  These fibers will indeed affect the flavor of your new e-liquid. Luckily, getting rid of them simply requires that you fire your device a couple of times at a low wattage in order to burn them away.

RTAs

Because an RTA has a juice well, you’re going to need to put just a little more effort into ridding it of traces of e-liquid.  This type of atomizer closely resembles a standard sub-ohm tank; hence the cleaning techniques aren’t that different.

1. Just like you would with an RDA, completely remove the cotton from the atomizer.  The cotton is still saturated in your last e-liquid, meaning that it will affect the flavor of your new juice.  
2. Then, burn off any remaining cotton fibers by firing your device at a low wattage a couple of times.
3. Next, take apart the tank and gently run each piece under water for a few seconds.  To ensure that no traces of e-liquid are left behind, smell each piece of the tank in order to make sure that you can’t detect the scent of your last e-liquid’s flavor.
4. Finally, carefully dry each piece off and reassemble your atomizer.

RBAs

An RBA is unique in that it allows you to use conventional, pre-built coils while featuring a build deck so that you can make your own.  When it comes to changing e-liquid with an RBA, the process is exactly the same as cleaning an RTA.

1. Remove the cotton piece
2. Burn off excess cotton
3. Give each component a good rinse.  
4. Put your atomizer back together and you’re good to go.

Something to Keep in Mind

Many vapers experience some despair at the thought of throwing out a piece of cotton that they’ve only just installed.  If you hate the idea of wasting money, consider saving your cotton wicks for the next time that you will be using that same vape flavor.

Atomizer Cleanliness is Key

In order to truly enjoy the flavor of your new e-liquid, make sure that you thoroughly rid your atomizer of traces of old liquid.

Vaping is one of the fastest growing pastimes and hobbies in the world.  As it continues to expand, more people are exploring what our industry has to offer.  With that said, there are certain unwritten rules one should follow in order to have some safe, fun and productive vape sessions.  This list will imbue you, regardless if you’re a novice or "professional" vaper, so let’s get right to it.

Rule #1: Safety

E-juices consist of 4 ingredients:

• Flavoring
• Propylene Glycol (PG)
• Vegetable Glycerin (VG)
• Nicotine (though some juices contain 0%)  

For your own health and safety, seek out juice manufacturers that pledge to use only natural ingredients in their batches and make sure to figure out what ratio works best for you.  What we me mean is, for example, if you have a PG allergy, your best bet is to vape an e-liquid that is MAX VG.

Rule #2: Nicotine Strength
Nicotine levels in your e-liquid depend on your personal preference.  Heavy cigarette smokers trying to quit should start at the highest doses (typically 24/28g per hit) and wean themselves down as they see fit.  Nicotine can be toxic in high doses, so use these higher levels cautiously.

For very light-smoking users, vaping at a lower nicotine strength between 3mg-6mg is recommended.  Vaping at too high of a level that you’re not accustom to could have some negative effects. If you’re uncertain as to the nicotine content of your e-juice, for your safety, it is recommended you get new juice entirely.

Rule #3: Using Your Vaping Device
Read the manual that comes with your electronic cigarette, mod, vaporizer or even pod system!  There are so many means to vape today, that it can be difficult to gauge otherwise how to properly use your device.  In a unit that has modular temperature settings, the VV/VW applied are very important: too low, and you'll get no vapor.  Too high and the juice will burn, or worse, you'll blow out your coil.

Coils are replaceable, but coil blowouts can be a major frustration.  However, they can also be entirely avoidable, if you know how to properly use your device; meaning how far you can set the wattage level to and the kind of coil being used.  Also, the type of e-liquid being vaped with and the tank that it’s in make a difference. These are just some of the many factors that must be taken into consideration before vaping with a fresh new coil.

Rule #4: Being a Respectful Vaper
As we all know, vaping offers the user, and even the environment a better alternative to traditional cigarettes, but some people are still upset by vapers, especially from mods that billow out heavy clouds.  It’s always a good idea to ask those around you if they mind if you vape. If they do, or there are posted signs that unfortunately include no vaping in the establishment, you may need to step outside in order to vape. However, vapers aren’t confined to the length of a cigarette’s time when it comes to being outside, so you should be back indoors pretty quickly.

Also, always vape in a well-ventilated area and try and clear the air when you're done.  Be courteous and thankful when you’re allowed to vape indoors. Take note, do not vape near areas where it is restricted such as school zones.

Keep These Rules in Mind

By keeping these tips handy, you’re on your way to becoming the perfect and respectful gentleman vaper. 

If you’re trying to watch your weight, you might be wondering how your vaping hobby is affecting your weight loss attempts.  After all, e-liquids come in sinful flavors like cake, candy and cookies.  It’s not crazy to wonder if these sweet flavors are filling your body with unwanted calories.

The good news is that vaping won’t sabotage your weight loss endeavors.  As you’ll see, the way in which e-liquids affect your body can actually help you lose weight rather than add inches to your waistline.

Truth about Calories in E-Liquid

As it turns out, e-liquids contain approximately four to five calories per milliliter.  If you go through 2mL of juice a day, you’re getting about ten or so calories. Those calories come primarily from the flavoring agents that are used in the batch.  These flavoring agents make up only about 10%.

Needless to say, ten or so calories a day is absolutely not going to have an effect on your weight.  That amount is far less than even a small cup of coffee or a little glass of fruit juice. So, you really have nothing to worry about.  Even if you’re a chain-vaper who can’t put their mod down for more than ten minutes, you’re really not going to gain weight from the calories that are in vape juice.

Plus, scientists can’t really prove that those calories affect your weight on a biological level.  While the calories we digest do affect our weight, e-liquids aren’t digested. If the calories in the juice only sit in the lungs for a brief period of time, it’s unlikely that they trigger fat production at all.

How Vaping Can Actually Help You Lose Weight

Nicotine

If you’re vaping an e-liquid that contains nicotine, your chances of losing weight are higher than your chances of gaining weight.  Nicotine is a known stimulant that increases your metabolism while gently suppressing your appetite. Many people who vape regularly don’t feel the need to binge on snacks throughout the day, because nicotine keeps them satisfied.  

Another fascinating thing about nicotine is that it reduces insulin levels.  Therefore, it can actually curb sugar cravings as it doesn’t cause the user to desire sugar in order to get a boost of energy.  This is part of the reason why people who quit cigarettes cold turkey tend to pick up addictions to candies and other sweet snacks.

Goodbye to Cravings

Another way that vaping helps people lose weight has to do with all of the sweet flavors that are available.  Many have found that simply vaping a sweet flavor helps them ward off sugar cravings. If you’re the type of person who can’t control themselves around a box of cookies or a bag of candies, vaping might actually be helping you avoid engorging yourself.  

The Skinny on Vaping

Simply put, it’s clear that vaping will not sabotage your weight loss efforts in any way.

While dripping has been around for years, this alternative form of vaping has remained under the radar throughout its existence.  In fact, it’s gotten quite a bad rap because of people mistakenly believing that it’s a highly dangerous activity. The reality is that if you’re using the right equipment, dripping can be an incredibly fun way to enjoy your e-liquid that doesn’t put you at serious risk of harm.

Dripping involves pouring a couple of drops of e-liquid directly onto the coil of your atomizer and taking a couple of hits at a time.  Many believe that this produces a more satisfying vape overall. It’s known to enhance the juice’s flavor on a profound level while strengthening the hit of nicotine.  Another advantage of dripping is that it allows the user to enjoy a wide variety of different flavors throughout the day without having to constantly empty, wash and refill their tank.

Now, in order to drip properly, you need to know what you’re doing as this vape style requires certain equipment and a knowledge of basic vaping technology.  We’ve created this guide to help you understand how to do this activity properly.

Dripping 101

First, you need to purchase an RDA (rebuildable drip atomizer) and is specially designed to accommodate this style.  Without an RDA, you simply can’t drip properly.

RDAs are designed for dripping as they have large airflow ports and an extremely small juice well that’s designed to keep the e-liquid on the coil.  

Once you’ve selected a good RDA, you can begin your dripping adventure:

1. First, take off the drip tip of the RDA.  
2. Pour about four or five drops of e-liquid directly onto the coil.  
3. Then, put the drip tip back on and take a hit.  
4. Take in a massive, thick cloud of vapor that tastes delicious.

You should get only one or two hits out of each dripping session.  When you’re ready for another hit, repeat the process.

What Not to Do

Always be careful not to pour too much e-liquid onto the coil.  This will cause your coil to flood, ruining your vaping session and causing unwanted spit back.

It is also important that you don’t hit your atomizer after that second hit.  Each four or so drops of e-liquid is really only good for a hit or two. If you try to stretch out that vape juice, you’ll likely get a nasty dry hit.  You may even burn out your coil, meaning that you’ll have to get a new one.

Lastly, always make sure that you put your drip tip back on before taking a hit.  Otherwise, you’ll severely burn your mouth.

Have a Safe and Proper Dripping Time

When done right, dripping is an extremely fun way to enjoy the flavor of your e-liquid.

For those who recently switched from smoking cigarettes to vaping, you have many reasons to celebrate. Besides the fact that you’re now free of those toxic chemicals that can cause cancer and other deadly diseases, you have just improved your oral health in a variety of ways.

As we all know, cigarettes are no friends to your teeth and mouth. Their tar turns teeth yellow while the many toxic chemicals in cigarette smoke lead to gum disease, tooth decay and other oral health problems.  

Additionally, cigarettes are notorious for giving people bad breath. Besides the fact that the smell of cigarettes seems to linger in the mouth for hours, the damage that it causes to your teeth can lead to an overgrowth of bacteria that gives breath a truly rancid smell.

Now that you’re vaping, you might be wondering how this activity affects your breath.  While the answer isn’t as simple as you may think, it is safe to say that it’s easier to avoid bad breath if you vape rather than smoke cigarettes.

Say Goodbye to Cigarette Breath

As soon as you quit smoking cigarettes, that awful tobacco smell will no longer dominate your mouth. Smoker’s breath is a huge turn-off to everyone, made worse by the fact that it seems to last for a long time. Plus, vaping isn’t known to cause tooth decay or gum disease, two conditions that can cause bad breath as the result of excessive bacteria in the mouth.  

Therefore, you can vape to your heart’s content without worrying about what it is doing to your oral health. Of course, that doesn’t mean that you should skip those regular dental appointments.

Why Vapor Doesn’t Linger

One of the main reasons why vaping doesn’t cause bad breath like smoking is because of the fact that vapor and cigarette smoke are two totally different substances. Smoke is a substance produced as a result of fire. It’s extremely heavy and clings to everything around it.

Meanwhile, when you inhale e-liquid through a mod or basic electronic cigarette, it turns into, obviously, vapor. High in water, vapor evaporates within seconds. That is why you can vape indoors without it creating a lingering smell. When you take a hit, the vapor that sits in the mouth essentially disappears almost immediately. Therefore, it’s impossible for there to be a lingering smell.

Watch Out for Dry Mouth!

Cigarettes can cause dehydration due to the chemicals that deplete the body of water.  While vaping is a better alternative to smoking, it can still cause dehydration, although a much milder case. For a chain-vaper, however, you’re at a high risk of developing dry mouth as the mouth doesn’t get a chance to replenish its level of moisture between each puff.

Dry mouth, as most of us know, can lead to bad breath. That’s because saliva washes away many of the germs that cause bad breath. When the mouth is dry, the bacteria hangs out in your mouth for a prolonged period of time, leading to an unpleasant odor.

The good news is that combating bad breath caused by dry mouth is very easy. All that you have to do is drink a glass of water and the problem is solved.

Improve Your Oral Health

By switching from cigarettes to vaping, you can greatly improve your oral health virtually overnight. This alternative to smoking makes a huge difference in terms of the smell of your breath.

If you have been a sub-ohm vaper for a while, you’re used to the fact that selecting the right coil for your device is just as important as finding the best-tasting e-liquid or the most powerful mod. When it comes to pod-based vaping, however, the variety of coil designs that you’re used to just doesn’t exist.

Because of the nature of salt nic e-liquid, pod systems are a little stricter than sub-ohm devices. In order for the liquid to properly vaporize, your coil’s resistance level must stay within a fairly small range. This means that you can’t really experiment with different coil builds like you can when you’re using a sub-ohm tank or an RDA.

In fact, pod cartridge coils and tank coils are dramatically different from each other in basically every way. As you’ll see, each have unique properties that promote two totally different vaping experiences.

Resistance Level

While vape tank coils tend to have resistance levels below one ohm, pod cartridge coils are often 1.2ohms or higher. This is because of the fact that salt nic e-juice must be used with a mouth-to-lung (MTL) device. A higher resistance level and a lower wattage level help preserve the integrity of the salt-based nicotine, allowing the juice to be turned into smooth, satisfying vapor.

Size

If you’ve recently gotten a pod system, you may have struggled to locate the coil. Pod cartridge coils are extremely small. That’s because they don’t require a huge amount of e-liquid in order to create vapor. Sub-ohm coils, on the other hand, need to have enormous wicks in order to absorb a lot of juice at once.

Material

If you’ve been using sub-ohm coils with a conventional mod, you know that organic Japanese cotton is a must if you want to experience smooth, clean flavor and massive clouds. Surprisingly to many, pod cartridge coils typically don’t contain a cotton wick.  That’s because cotton is so absorbent that it can cause the pod cartridge to flood. Pod mods are low-wattage devices that don’t require that their coils stay extremely saturated with e-juice. Therefore, they tend to have wicks that are made from synthetic fibers. This material absorbs just enough liquid to turn each hit into a satisfying experience.

Purpose

Many people who prefer sub-ohm devices are cloud chasers who crave abundant, thick vapor and high wattage levels. Pod systems are designed for vapers who want to experience a good throat hit and a nice nicotine buzz.  

Sub-ohm coils are made to accommodate the needs of those who want to chase clouds.  They’re specially designed to absorb a massive amount of e-liquid so that each hit produces a ton of vapor. Pod cartridge coils take in a small amount of liquid since the vaper wants a nice hit to the throat more than anything else.

Longevity

Because sub-ohm coils are heated to such high temperatures, they tend to die out pretty quickly. The average heavy vaper will go through one sub-ohm coil every two weeks.  Because pod cartridge coils are exposed to lower wattage levels, they tend to last for long periods of time. Many vapers can go a month or so before it’s time to invest in a new cartridge.

The Differences Are There

As you can see, pod cartridge coils and sub-ohm coils are extremely different in every way. If you’re new to pod-based vaping, it is crucial that you understand how pod cartridge coils differ from the coils that you’re used to.

If you’ve just gotten into salt nic e-liquid, you’re probably wondering about the role that the VG/PG ratio plays in terms of your overall vaping experience. Those who have been using sub-ohm systems for a while are used to the fact that the ratio has an enormous effect on everything from cloud production to the intensity of an e-liquid’s flavor. When it comes to vaping a salt nic e-liquid using a pod system, things are quite different.

Salt nic vape juices have slightly different formulas that affect the way in which the liquid is turned into vapor. Plus, they’re used with pod systems, meaning that the size of the clouds, the throat hit, and other aspects of vaping are largely affected by the device itself.

Before you start getting nit-picky about the ratio of your nic salt juice, allow us to explain exactly how the ratio affects your pod-based vaping experience. You may be surprised.  

Up until recently, vapers could only purchase e-liquids that contained freebase nicotine.  This type of nicotine is chemically altered in order to be more potent. However, it wasn’t created for systems that reach high wattage levels. As a result, those who wanted to take in a good amount of nicotine experienced throat irritation when using powerful devices.

Now, thanks to salt-based nicotine, vapers can enjoy a potent nicotine hit without burning their throat. This type of nicotine has revolutionized the vaping industry by providing intense satisfaction to those who crave that buzz.

Because salt nic e-liquids must be used with pod systems, they must contain a fairly strict ratio of ingredients. While freebase nic e-liquids tend to come in a wide variety of VG/PG ratios, salt nic e-liquids are typically only available in 50/50 ratios with the occasional exception.

So, how does the same ratio differ?

Throat Hit

Many people who vape a high PG freebased e-liquid do so because they enjoy the strong throat hit that comes with more propylene glycol (PG). When you’re vaping a salt nic e-liquid, you’re going to get a stronger throat hit no matter what due to the nature of nicotine salts. Therefore, you don’t necessarily need to go for a PG level that’s above 50 percent.

Flavor

Another advantage is a more pronounced flavor. However, salt nic e-juices are only compatible with mouth-to-lung (MTL) pod systems. These pod devices have set output levels and coil resistance levels that already promote a stronger, richer flavor.

Cloud Production

Because of the nature of nicotine salt e-liquids and pod systems in general, your cloud-chasing abilities are a bit limited. Therefore, even if you were to vape a nic salt juice with a very high VG level, you wouldn’t get the same clouds that you get with a big sub-ohm device. Plus, nic salt liquid requires a certain PG level in order to vape properly, meaning that a high VG nic salt juices would probably not deliver a satisfying vape.

See Which One Works for You

It’s safe to say that the ratio is less important when it comes to vaping a salt nic e-liquid with a pod system. However, you should still feel free to experiment if you believe that playing around with the ratio will allow you to find your unique sweet spot.