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You can follow me as I make quick reviews of various vaping stuff here.

I'll be reviving my old Instagram account after years of being unable to due to my use of the Windows Phone platform. Huehuehue

Cheers and keep on vaping!

Quick Hit: Rapture Quality Ejuice

Rapture recently released two new flavors- Belgian Butter Popcorn and Raspberry Iced Tea.

Both flavors deliver what is promised: no more, no less.

The Belgian Butter Popcorn tastes like the very popular expensive popcorn we find in malls- not the movie popcorn, but the premium popcorn that people oftentimes give as gifts. The taste profile is on point with the slight hint of caramel and butter with a dash of salt.

The Raspberry Iced Tea is exactly like its real world counterpart: it’s the raspberry iced tea we all love in eliquid form. The flavor is so comparable to the real thing that you’ll be having urges to drink the juice and wouldn’t mind the spitback when you vape it.

Both liquids are worthy to be an all-day vape and would definitely work whatever nic density you prefer.

Quick Hit score for both liquids is a perfect 5/5.

The detailed review of the entire juice line is in the works so stay tuned!

Keep on vaping!

The Ninja Report: Blowby E-Liquids

Blowby E-Liquids

Where do I even start? Let’s try at the beginning of it all. I’ve known the makers of this e-juice for years since we were alongside each other as we established the vaping scene in our humble town of Antipolo. They are a team of car enthusiasts and photographers who are highly sought after for their skill in capturing moments (they are the official photographers of the Antipolo Vapers’ events) and I believe that they can now also add excellent juice makers on their resume as well.

To get this out in the open, even if the juice line was made by my personal friends, I decided to purchase the juices myself and not ask for samples for review for a more objective view of things. So with that out of the way, let’s get started!

To begin, the setup that I used in this review is as follows:

• Evic VTC Mini set at 316 SS Temperature Control, 40 W, 400-430 F.
• Chief Vapers’ Immortalizer Dripper built with 0.50mm 316 SS wire at 0.27 ohms.
• Wotofo Serpent Mini built with 0.50mm 316 SS wire at 0.27 ohms.
• Jaybo Theorem built with a 0.21 ohm Notch Coil.

As their Facebook page states, their juice is a simple juice line which delivers a clean taste of the flavors they offer. And deliver it well, they did.  As of this moment, their juice line currently consists of only two flavors- Coolant and Freon. The Coolant is their take on the classic strawberry mint while the Freon is their take on yet another classic: the minty strawberry RY4.

The Coolant:
It is a well-known fact that when it comes to my preference when talking about mint and strawberry combined, it’s the old Street Juice Blizzard Strawberry that holds my heart in its cold yet loving grasp. So while filling my Serpent Mini with this juice, my mind was telling me that the Coolant has a strong contender to go up against. Upon tasting this juice, it was nowhere near my beloved Blizzard Strawberry for it was unjustly and preemptively judged to be along that line, which it shouldn’t have been.

Its strawberry taste was that of fresh strawberries, not the medicine-like taste profile of the time that once was, and the mint was just enough mint to make things chilly and not the harsh cold of the blizzard that I once loved.

I give this juice a strong 4.9/5 because I still cannot dethrone the best strawberry+mint combination that I know and love, knowing that it has been spotted in the wild again recently.

The Freon:
To be totally honest, my expectations on this juice was very low to begin with because through the years, I have tasted many RY4 variants and most, if not all, were met with disappointment when mixed with fruits. And once more, this juice was unjustly and preemptively judged for when I tasted this, I seriously questioned by belief that RY4 should never be mixed with fruits.

When we talk about Strawberry RY4, we locally think about a certain juice line that rhymes with Swiss. But the Freon is, for me, better than that already established juice line. You can actually taste the fresh strawberries they chose to use on this and the RY4 flavor isn’t overpowering nor harsh to taste. Plus the slight hint of mint makes the whole mix dance in a peaceful blend of flavors sitting around a fire singing “Kapayapaan” by Tropical Depression.

I give this juice a solid 5 Baron Geislers out of 5 for the sheer strength, brilliance and perfection that this juice came out to be.

So to wrap things up, I would like to take some general reviews about the juice line. The Coolant has a VG/PG ratio of 70/30 while the Freon has 60/40. As to why they didn’t choose to have the same ratio, I have no clue. The nic strength that I chose to get was 3mg because I was warned in advance that their nic quality wasn’t one to fuck around with- and they weren’t lying. Their 3mg hits and feels better than most 6mg or even 8mg in the market today. The juices also don’t gunk up that easily, though it may also be due to the fact that I run spaced SS coils under temperature control which really doesn’t give me gunking problems on most juices in general. Wicking is decent on the Serpent mini but not advisable when you are in cold places like an airconditioned office. The juices are viscous enough not to easily leak on the Theorem when placed sideways but also not runny enough to cause spitbacks or pops when wicked correctly. Flavor is decent on the Serpent Mini but I would strongly suggest using the juices on drippers or tanks that have large wick holes like the Theorem, Avocado 22/24, or the Vaporesso Gemini to get the most flavorful experience. Cloud production is decent to strong- as much as you would normally expect from 60/40 or 70/30 juices. Best to vape for standard vaping, not that advisable for cloud tricks or cloud competitions due to the VG/PG ratio.

Overall, this juice line is excellent and is a line to watch out for. I’m sure that they have more tricks up their sleeve to be released in the market and you can be sure as hell that I'll be looking out for those. You can visit their Facebook page at https://www.facebook.com/BlowbyEliquid/ for further inquiries and to find distributors near your area.

Cheers and keep on vaping!

The Ninja Report: Lite E-Liquids

So a few days ago, my dear friend Carlo (aka. Kablooie of PVF, one of the admins of the prominent vaping buy and sell groups on Facebook) hooked me up with an emerging e-juice line- the Lite E-Liquids by FD Mark, who most oldschoolers would know as Kram Cole.

As most of you know, I’m one of the few who chase flavor more than I chase clouds. Having been a bit active in the local channels of vaping in social media, I’ve been reading raves about this juice line’s flavor profile so when I realized that I was having a chance to experience this myself, I was psyched.

So after a very stressful day at work, I was so relieved to come home to a vape mail with the following flavors:

• Deepthroat - Minty bubblegum
• Overload - Minty watermelon
• Valkyrie - Strawberry daiquiri
• Abstract - Rootbeer float
• Starbucks - Vanilla Coffee doughnut
• Aphrodisiac - Roasted Peanut
• Melon Madness - Melon mint
• Mystery - Salted caramel

With what I’ve read, there was another juice flavor – Mango Deluxe which was a ripe mango flavor. Too bad my package didn’t come with it because my girlfriend and I really love ripe mangoes. But I digress.

As discussed with FD Mark, he mentioned that the juices were on a 70:30 VG/PG ratio and was at 3mg. Being the old school 50/50 6mg vaper that I am, I just shrugged it off and carried on with life.

On my initial run, I tested the whole juice line by dripping on my Immo+ RBA, built with 5 loops 0.40mm kanthal wire on 3mm guide at 0.85 ohms. Fired on my Sigelei 75W mod at 40-45 watts. Flavor was exceptional and lasting. Every inhale had that burst of flavor which stayed even after the exhale. 

I was so psyched about the flavor profile that I next used it on my Smok-E Mountain Airmaster, built with 5 loops twisted 0.40mm wire on 3mm guide at 0.35 ohms with dual coil setting. Fired on my Smok-E Mountain V-Rex 26650 mech mod. Vaping this juice line on this setup was heaven. The flavor was so solid, I managed to down the whole 10ml bottle tester of Starbucks on the first day. It was that good!

Driven by the earlier successful runs with the single and dual coil builds, I decided to use the juices on my daily workhorse setup: my Immo+ tank, built at 0.17 ohms with Ni200 for temperature control. It was set at 45 watts, set at a maximum of 450F. Sadly, things went downhill from there.

This juice line didn't seem to be temperature control-tank friendly. On my TC setup in my tank, it was mute city. I tried filling it with the all the flavors, I even tried dripping it directly from time to time on the coils but the flavor was gone. I was using an Immo+ tank for God's sake! Flavor should be all over the place but sadly, the only flavors I were able taste were VG and menthol. And it bummed me out. Big time.

I tried to find ways on how to make this work on my tank but I terribly failed to do so. I even thought it was because I configured my setup poorly. I tried different juices from other juice lines but all of them were good in my tank. So from there I deduced that the Immo+ tank didn't go well with the whole juice line. (Disclaimer: I really think it's something about the Immo+ tank on temperature control and thick juices that don't mix well. 50/50 juices work wonderfully on it and high VG juices are oftentimes muted as well.)

Bummed out by the results with the tank setup, I decided to reconfigure my Immo+ tank back to the RBA. Flavor was still missing so I cranked the temperature limit to 550F and there it started to appear again. 550 to 600F seemed to be the sweet spot of this juice for flavor to appear (on my setup at least) but with that being too much of a battery drainer on my setup, I decided to just let it go and not use the juice line for my daily workhorse.

So in summary, the Lite E-liquids are a good bunch of juice to vape on high wattages and temperatures, but sadly disappoints on lower wattages and temparatures. I really love the line's no non-sense flavor profiles where you really do get the flavor they say. The flavors are not too complicated, like the ones that are flooding the markets today and it was a very refreshing experience to vape. And at 150 pesos per 30ml, I'm not one to complain. :)

I would very much recommend this juice line to those who prefer vaping at high wattages and multiple coils but I would discourage anyone who vape at a mellow level since the juice lacks flavor when vaped cool.

TL;DR - Lite E-Liquids are good, cheap, and flavorful on high wattages. They don't work for me on my TC setup but I highly recommend them if you prefer to cloudchase.

Cheers and keep on vaping!

The Ninja Report: Royal Mist Premium E-Liquid

If you’ve been active in the PVF Facebook group, you would have definitely have seen me post quite a few rants about the local juices that gets released nowadays. As I’ve mentioned on my old posts, I’ve been out and about trying the new juices but most, if not all, were met with utter disappointment. Most of what I’ve tasted lately had weak flavors because they were designed to cater to the cloud chasers more than the tank users- they were good on multi-coiled atomizer builds but almost had no taste when placed in single coil tanks or atomizers. Some juices were good at first, but as days go by and as they steeped, they lost their flavor. Other juices had weak nicotine strength that even their 11mg didn't even have throat hit that could match a proper 3mg juice. So with those repeated experiences, I was afraid of trying new juices because the failure rate was so high that I limited myself to the old juices that I have proven to be good in the past.

But as fate would have it, I was approached by my dear friend Carlo, who you might know as the admin of the Box Mod PH group admin. He told me that he’ll be hooking me up with a fairly new local juice line that has been garnering positive reviews. I was a skeptic at first but in the spirit of fairness, I gave it a shot.

Enter the Royal Mist Premium E-Liquid juice line.

I met up with brother Dom of Dreadtac Vaping Rigs, the connoisseur, who gave me samples for me to experience. I was given a bottle of each flavors which I will be going into further detail in this review. The juices given to me were a 50/50 PG/VG mix in 6mg strength, vaped an average of 3 days per flavor on the Kanger Subtank Mini built at 0.60 to 0.75 ohms and was fired at 25 to 30W using the Cloupor Mini.

First up is the Rameses. As it is described, it’s a creamy butternut tobacco blend. It is reminiscent of the RY4 blends that we have all grown up with. But their twist is it’s a bit sweeter and more butternut than tobacco. It’s a 3/5 for me because I personally prefer a leafy tobacco blend, even on the RY4 variants.

Next is the Horus which is a nutty pastry that is roasted to perfection; and the description cannot be more spot-on. It’s as roasted as any properly roasted peanuts are and is damn good! It’s nuttier albeit less sweet than the other local juice that is also known in our community. It’s a 4/5  and it’s a pleasant all-day vape for me.

Third on the list is the Amon-Ra, which is a sweet, minty chocolate blend. This juice is my favorite of the whole juice line and I managed to run through the whole bottle in just 3 days. It is very reminiscent of the US-made juice that is normally associated with the Irish and leprechauns and whose brand is named after the rings on the heads of angels and saints. The flavor on the drag is of a fairly sweet chocolate where you taste and feel the minty chocolatey goodness on the exhale. And with me being the lactose-intolerant ninja that I am, I indulged myself in this sweet, sweet chocolatey goodness without fear and guilt. It’s a perfect 5 in my books and I will henceforth be keeping a bottle of this goodness in my stash at all times.

Fourth is the Pharaoh. It is a refreshingly sweet mixed fruit blend. Its taste profile can be compared to that of a certain local blend that’s named after the concoction used to remedy snake bites. However, Royal Mist’s mix has a stronger, more intense, flavor in it and is a more tank-friendly blend. The most dominant fruit flavor in this mix is the watermelon but some would contest it and say that it’s more toothpaste than watermelon. But whatever it is they say, it’s a strong 3.5/5 in my books.

And last on the list is the Cleopatra. It’s a sweet berry and taro pudding. An explosion of flavors which has a dominant strawberry taste to it. It is very much like the old strawberry-filled Rebisco cracker sandwich but sweeter and in e-juice form. It is too sweet for my taste and is too much for me to be able to chain vape, even so to be an all-day vape. It’s a 2.5/5 for me but other people will definitely appreciate it more than me.

So to summarize all this, the flavor profile of the Royal Mist juice line is more on the sweet side. Its flavor is intense but unlike most new juices in the market, its flavor didn’t fade over time but even improved as it steeped. It tastes good on any setup your atomizer is on and will not fail you. The throat hit and nicotine hit of the 6mg was spot on and very satisfying. I can say this with confidence – this juice is at par with the 2011-2012 quality of juices and it left me feeling nostalgic of the time that once was.

However, as with all things, the Royal Mist line also has a few flaws: namely the gunk build up on the coils. This is a common flaw on juices that have a sweet profile and also on the dark-colored juices so I don’t believe it to be a fatal flaw.

But all in all, the Royal Mist juice line is exceptional and went beyond as I expected it to be. It is a high quality juice line that I would very much recommend to anyone who’s looking for something old, yet something new. And oh, did I mention that it’s only 250 per 30ml and is available almost everywhere? Yeah, you read that right.

TL;DR: Quit your slacking and get yourself some Royal Mist juices. It’s damn well worth it.

Parents Consulting Their Underage Children to Vape?

I strongly disgree to parents who consent their children to vape, even if they are smoking. It's definitely reponsiblity that's needed in this area but let's face it, not everyone is responsible and parents are included in those "everyone". Vaping is a form nicotine replacement therapy, not a hobby, not anything else. There is a line where anything beneficial becomes bad; and in vaping, we all know where that line is drawn.

So who is this hypocrite, you ask? He has the guts to say this but he's someone who has a lot of mods and consumes unreasonable quantities of juice. I admit it, I'm already addicted to the culture of vaping- collecting mods, trying different juices and spending time and money improving my vaping experience. But the question is- if you're a parent, would you consent your child to share the same fate as this dude? We all know that it's going to be the most likely path that one who ventures into vaping will tread. Especially when you become deeply immensed in the community, right?

So there is no grey area here - vaping is and will always be a negative vice. And if ever I'll be having children (for some reason), I'll never introduce or promote to them any kind of vice, even the one that I'm doing. And anything that you spend serious money on that isn't a necessity is a vice. And if ever I catch my child smoking, screw him and I won't be giving him more allowance to spend on vaping so he'll have no choice but to smoke until he's of legal age. By then, he can apporach me and then we can talk about the alternative of vaping for nicotine delivery.

FAQ: Battery Amperage Limit?

Electronics Review Class: Batteries 101

Amperage limits of the commonly used batteries:
source: ecf and candlepowerforums

AW IMR 18650 (Li-Mn) - 10A
EFEST IMR 18650 2250mah (Li-Mn) - 10A
Panasonic CGR18650 2250mah (Li-Mn/Li-Ion hybrid) - 10A
Panasonic NCR18650 2900mah (Li-Ion) - 5.8A *common type of laptop battery*
EFEST 2600 mah (Li-Ion) - 4.2A

Pag mas maiksi ang batteries (18500, 18350, 14500, etc), mas mababa ang amperage limits nun. Which means that in theory based on chemistry, the batteries were designed to have a certain discharge limit which could cause it to malfunction.

Sample equations: you can check via http://ohmslawcalculator.com/ohms_law_calculator.php
Let battery charge = 4.2v (fresh off the charger)
10A minimum resistance is 0.42 ohm
5.8A minimum resistance is 0.72 ohm
4.2A minimum resistance is 1 ohm

When the mod gets shorted, the resistance becomes very close to 0, if not 0. If we put it even at 0.01, the amperage drain becomes 420A (on 4.2v charge) which is way off the charts for any battery to handle. And explosions or violent gas discharge percentage is greater when your batteries do not have safe chemistry (not Li-Mn batts. source - ecf and candlepowerforums).

What does this mean on lay man's terms? May certain resistances lang na kaya ang mga baterya. Going beyond this amperage limit can and will damage your batteries and could cause it to die or worse, explode.

This friendly reminder is brought to you by your fellow vapers. Safely keep on vaping!