Electronic Cigarette Vaping Equipment And E-Juice Tips For Inexpensive Puffing

If You Are Going To Do It For Pleasure You May As Well Make It Cost Effective

Written By James Allan | 8-15-2018

This article was written to help people who are just quitting cigarettes and making their attempt to transform over to vaping at the lowest possible startup cost. This switch over to vaping can be really expensive but once you get there the daily cost to maintain it can be under a buck.

My Story

Of course I smoked cigarettes for years. I really liked smoking beyond the addiction. Now I like vaping. I was forced to quit smoking even though I had tried to quit years before and transition over to vaping but the vaping equipment and flavors sucked in performance and price. The performance issue was I had ordered some equipment from a bad manufacturer before I knew who was good and who was bad. This vape equipment only produced good clouds for a few puffs then started to die out.  The price for store bought single vape sticks is outrageous and far more costly than an pack of smokes. The cost of trial and error until you find the correct vaping setup for yourself could set your bank account back seriously. If your going to vape it's always better to find an experienced person already vaping and copy them to start off.

I did not smoke store bought cigarettes. I switched back in the early 1990's to "Pipe Tobacco" and rolled my own cigarettes with it. 200 bags of single filters were available so I rolled them into the cigarettes. Tubes were available also and with a machine you can slide the pipe tobacco right into the pre made cigarette tube with the filter already attached. Vaping was no way cheaper than roll your own until you find the correct vaping values.

I was finally forced off of cigarettes altogether but I had saved several vaping sticks I had tried a couple of years before. I didn't finish the vape sticks and to my surprise they were still fully charged. I decided to try and vape them and after a few weeks I became accustomed to the flavor but not the price. I still didn't like the flavor but this is part of the game when you are experimenting. I got on the internet and decided to check out some online vape shops. I found out though trial and error that the price could be brought down to under $1.00 a day after I spent hundreds of dollars finding the vaping site I liked the best which is "Halo" and the flavor that suited me. It does cost a lot when you first start to vape. I was lucky and found what I was looking for after spending around $400.

How To Lower Your E-Juice Costs

First of all there are 4 sizes of electronic vaping devices. You have your choice of an "E-Cig", "E-Pen", "Pod And Mod". Always purchase quality equipment that is serviceable by you because it will generally last much longer with an emphasis on the "Coil".

Coils and refillable Cartomizers should last for months and only need a cleaning by soaking it in water or vinegar now and again to keep the wick viable and not gummed up. Companies state the batteries should last for about 300 recharges. If you are constantly having problems with the coils and batteries "Stop" buying from the company. A company may have a bad production run occasionally but most good companies will catch the badly produced product run and not send it out. The bad companies will send their faulty products out as their means for countering the loss on the bad production run.

The two problems you will have with vaping equipment is the gumming up of the wick and the battery getting weak over time. Vaping manufacturers will state the battery should get 300 charges in its lifetime but many times after 20 charges the battery will start to weaken and you can tell this by the amount of time you can get good clouds compared to your normal puffing time each day. A weakened battery will still give you good clouds for an hour or more before the clouds get weak and then finally quits on you. You can tell if the wick is just clogged up or going bad by cleaning it. If you get good clouds after the cartomizer is cleaned then it's good, if not and the clouds are still not that great the wick or coil is going bad and an new cartomizer is in order.

An Example of a bad deal is the "E-Pen" from "Blu" whom tells you the tank needs to be replaced every month is a really rotten deal. Then after a couple of weeks the "Blu" tank stops putting out good clouds? Hell, I have several "Halo" refillable mini tanks for my "Cig-A-Like" G6 and they have lasted for months now as long as I soak them in water or vinegar to remove the gumming up that happens. I still have and keep the "Halo" mini tanks that don't wick well anymore because they still work and can be used in an emergency. I have several "New" mini tanks but I still have the old ones. 

The E-Cig is the size diameter as a regular cigarette and holds about 1 ml of Juice which is the best value if you want to save money on E-Juice.

Standard "Cig-A-Like" Burns The Least Amount Of Juice And Is The Lowest Daily Cost Vaporizer With Decent Cloud Production

The "E-Pen" holds about 2 ml of E-Juice and is about the same diameter as a permanent marker. You can really start to produce some good clouds with a pen. The Pen does go through E-Juice much faster than the E-Cig because the vapor volume per inhale is much greater.

The "E-Pen" Burns Much More Juice With A Larger Battery And Coil Which Produces A Satisfying Vapor Cloud

The "Mod or Pod" is about the size diameter of a cigar or larger. They also come in a square square box and both can create enough vape volume to produce a fog bank. This size can hold above 3ml of E-Juice. Most hold about 4 ml and above of E-Juice because your going to burn alot of E-Juice in one puff.

The Pods And Mods Hold And Burn Massive Amounts Of E-Juice With Intense Battery Power That Will "WoW"

If you want to lower your cost of E-Juice to under $1.00 a day use the "E-Cig" if you can get quality refillable cartomizers or mini tanks. If you get a good refillable E-Cig the vape clouds and satisfaction will suffice. With a fully charged battery and clean cartomizer the E-Cig can fulfill your puffing wants and save you cash. I use my "Halo" mini tanks to death and always clean them regularly in water and sometimes vinegar to remove the gum that builds up.

I am showing "Halo" pics because of course I have settled with "Halo" equipment for now. After I tried a few other brands and learned how to clean and maintain my equipment I was good with the "Cig-A-Like" mini tank "Halo" produces and sells separately from their standard "Cig-A-Likes". The manual batteries are not bad either with only one loss out of 12. I will not use the automatic batteries anymore with the "Halo" specialty mini tank because they didn't produce enough power for a good vape. The G6 manual batteries work "Great" with the "Halo" specialty mini tank and keep my vaping under $1.00 a day with a decent cloud production.

The Halo G6 Mini Tank And Battery "Cig-A-Like" Setup

The E-Juice will get to be a brown carbonized color in the mini tanks and cartomizers after several uses but this will not affect taste. The carbonation does tend to partially gum up the wick but most of the time good clouds can always be had until the coil stops working or the wick isn't viable anymore.

I myself do use the E-Cig for my regular puffing needs but also have an E-Pen for when I feel the urge to really do some mega puffing. The E-Pen really uses up the E-Juice and I do endless puffing at times. My endless puffing is financially satisfied with the E-Cig that doesn't use up all my E-Juice as fast as the E-Pen and Mods.

I have been thinking about getting a "Mod" but they are much bigger and I know they put out more vapor than I really would enjoy as I'm not young anymore. They take much larger batteries that you have to be careful with because if you get the batteries from a bad manufacturer they can explode. The batteries in E-Pens and E-Cigs are perfectly safe but when you get into the "Pods" and "Mods" the batteries can become an issue. Most past battery explosions are from novists building their own mods and putting bad batteries in them from rotten chinese companies. These batteries have walls in them and if these walls are not quality the battery can short and explode.

I've been checking out E-Juice web sites from people telling me which web sites they prefer to purchase their E-Juice from. Myself and the crowds of vapers who gave me feedback are on the same page always in search of low cost quality E-Juice. I have been purchasing my E-Juice from "Halo" and getting some decent deals when their E-Juice goes on sale. "Halo" doesn't do the discount all the time sales tactic, they use the "On Sale" method which means you have to wait for one of their sales. I was looking for E-Juice before I ran out this time and they didn't have any sales so I asked people in social media groups who they purchased from and received plenty of answers steering me to low cost E-Juice.

Manufacturers Of E-Juice And E-Cig Equipment

Of course manufacturers of E-Cig equipment in the U.S. get some of their parts from chinese manufacturers that now can reproduce the same parts for their brands. Chinese manufacturing of the same stolen part designs is still far below the quality of the parts that are manufactured in the U.S.

"Quote From Tobacco Control: 

Introduction - E-cigarettes are largely unregulated and internet sales are substantial. This study examines how the online market for e-cigarettes has changed over time: in product design and in marketing messages appearing on websites. 

Methods - Comprehensive internet searches of English-language websites from May–August 2012 and December 2013–January 2014 identified brands, models, flavours, nicotine strengths, ingredients and product claims. Brands were divided into older and newer groups (by the two searches) for comparison. 

Results - By January 2014 there were 466 brands (each with its own website) and 7764 unique flavours. In the 17 months between the searches, there was a net increase of 10.5 brands and 242 new flavours per month. Older brands were more likely than newer brands to offer cigalikes (86.9% vs 52.1%)

Most of the E-Juice internet outlets mix up their own E-Juice and are peddlers of another companies vaping equipment. Some appeared to just be middlemen for someone else's pre mixed E-Juice and equipment. It's hard to tell. Some dealers purchase another companies E-Juice and vaping equipment and just put their name on it. I ran across two internet places that sold gallons of E-Juice base and mixing supplies only. Many E-Juice dealers sell some E-Juice mixing kits as part of their inventory now to cash in on the growing number of people mixing their own juice. People mixing their own E-Juice is a very popular activity now. I can go across town to a place that will sell me gallons of pre-mixed juice I could repackage and put up for resale in all kinds of flavors. I see "E-Juice Flavor Shops" opening up in brick and mortar stores and all you have to do is walk in and mix your own juice in store.

All of my direction in this article will be towards Vaping Stores that produce their own E-Juice and Vaping Equipment. There's many vape shops and internet dealers that sell other brands of E-Juice and equipment at bargain basement prices. "Halo", the shop I purchase from sells other companies equipment now to draw customers into their web site. I run into way to many vape shops that sell 100 ml for $40.00 when $20.00 is a good profit for vape shops. People do pay the $40.00 for 100 ml when if they had waited could have gotten it for $20.00. I purchase from Halo who sells the 100 ml for $40.00 and I have to wait until it goes on sale for $20.00. A lot of E-Juice dealers will sell the 100 ml for $20.00 as their standard everyday price with even lower prices when they have a sale.

Wikipedia has a list of E-Cig manufacturers most of them chinese companies flooding the U.S. market with low cost equipment and E-juice. There's a vape shop on every corner now and tobacco shops that are the norm always stock a line of E-Cig equipment and juice now but it's mostly the shiny inexpensive stuff imported from chinese companies.

Wikipedia List Of E-Cig Brands

The largest and most popular vape dealers on the internet that manufacture their own E-Juice and vaping equipment are listed here:

Halo E-Cigs Nicopure labs - "United States Company"
(Halo was founded in 2009 and is very popular among vapors to the point they can be considered number #1. Many articles I've read on E-Cig forums and web sites puts Halo in first place. Juul is said to have 60% of the E-Cig market now in 2018 but this most likely is due to a new popular brand company startup people are trying. Juul's main popularity is among teenagers whom consume most of the vaping products. It will be several more years until the Juul popularity dies out some and people go back to their normal product purchasing habits so we can see who actually holds the number 1 spot.)

Juul Labs E-Cigs - "United States Compay" Sold online and Vape Shops.
(Juul is a popular brand with teenagers since it's founding in 2015. In 2017 Juul renamed itself "Juul Labs" replacing its old name "Pax Labs". Nielson 2018 states Juul has 60% of the E-Cig market but that most likely is due to a new popular brand startup everyone is trying which is dropping other manufacturers sales. It's also stated that Juul's popularity is with teenagers who consume the vast amount of vaping products at this time.)

V2 Vaping - "United States Company" Well know company in the vaping world out of Miami Fl.
(V2 has a lot of complaints about their products failures but is a very popular E-Cig manufacturer that many people go to for their vaping needs.)

South Beach Smoke - "United States Company" No affiliation with the South Beach Diet that I can see
(South Beach Smoke is owned by a past popular company named "Eversmoke".  Eversmoke is actively morphing itself into Vaporfi and selling E-Cig products produced by other companies for an extra profit source while manufacturing its own E-Cig products for "South Beach Smoke".)

Eversmoke - "United States Company" is morphing into "Vaporfi". Eversmoke owns and operates "South Beach Smoke"
(Eversmoke is morphing its web site into the new "Vaporfi" site that peddles other manufacturer brands to capture extra profits off of other brands.)

Blu E-Cigs - "Netherlands Company" This company was started in Florida, sold to R.J. Reynolds then sold again to Fontem in the Netherlands.
(Blu E-Cigs are sold now primarily in western Europe and the U.K.. You can mail away for them but mostly they are sold in retail outlets only around the United States. There E-Pens are nice but they have wicking problems and don't draw well after a month. They will tell you that you will have to replace the cartomizer every month.)

Njoy - "United States Company" Web site fills individual product orders but they mostly cater to retailers.
(NJoy was one of the first E-Cig manufacturers in the U.S. in 2006. They were very popular at the time but in 2016 they went bankrupt. There products can be found online and in many vape shops around the U.S. and Europe still as other brands surpass them in popularity.)

Vuse E-Cigs - "United States Company" R.J. Reynolds owns this company.
(R.J. Reynolds purchased "Blu" because of their rising popularity and then for some reason they decided to sell the brand off and create "Vuse". R.J. Reynolds sold "Blu" to a company in the Netherlands named "Fontem". "Blu" is a brand name that's far above "Vuse" and I would bet R.J. Reynolds is kicking themselves in their own butt for getting rid of the "Blu" brand in exchange for the unproven brand "Vuse" they created.)

Kangertech E-Cigs - "Chinese Company" Sold at some E-Cig shops as an inexpensive brand.
(Founded in 2007 they were popular only because they were one of the earliest E-Cig companies out of china after the startup of Njoy in the United States. Not much is heard about them now. I'm sure they are still popular in china but the company is slowly losing market share in the U.S..) 

Smok E-Cigs - "Chinese Company" Owned by "Shenzhen IVPS Technology"
(This companies brand is sold online and in many vape shops around the U.S.. Smok advertises themselves as an international company most likely because they are a chinese company that wants people to accept their product. This chinese company was sued for "Trademark Infringement" 4 times and "Unfair Competition" 2 times which shows this company may not be to concerned about the quality of their products and purity of their E-Juice. This chinese company has a big rap sheet cheating people on "Ripoff Report" ) 

Eleaf E-Cigs - "Chinese Company" Cheap inexpensive brand sold through internet outlets
(This chinese company is owned and operated by "Joyetech" whom owns 43 E-Cigarette brands and several E-Juice manufacturing brands marketed throughout Europe and on the internet. There's to many brands for me to list here but here's a link "Joyetech E-Cig Brands". They operate out of the same city of "Shenzhen" as does their competitor "Smok" and import to Europe. I haven't found any connection between "Smok" and "Eleaf" except they operate out of the same city)

* "Ego" is a popular brand owned by the same chinese company as Eleaf which is "Joyetech"

* "Wismec" is a new brand owned by the same chinese company as Eleaf which is "Joyetech". This brand will tell you as customers their products are designed in the U.S.A. and made in china in an expectation that this "Line" will bring a good piece of the U.S. market to them.

Vaporresso And Vaporstar E-Cigs - "Chinese Company" Sold through internet outlets and vape shops
(This company is also located in the same chinese city of Shenzhen as the other two chinese owned E-Cig brands are with the company name, "Shenzhen Smoore Technology". This company also owns multiple E-Cig brands shown through this link, "Shenzhen Technology Brands".)

Aspire E-Cigs - "Chinese Company" Wholesaler to vape shops. Can be purchased online
(Founded in 2013 to be marketed in the U.S.A. and UK. Aspire has grabbed a piece of the U.S. E-Cig market to the point they almost seem to be an American brand in vape shops but they are not. Aspire has become a popular product with their image in vape shops.) 

Innokin E-Cigs - "Chinese Company" Sold through vape shops and online
(Founded in 2011 became a fast seller through vape shops. Located in the chinese city of "Shenzhen" like all the other chinese E-Cig manufacturers. Innokin has developed and maintained an clear piece of the U.S. market.)

Sigelei E-Cigs - "Chinese Company" Sold through internet retailers

(Founded in 2017 this company doesn't have much of a footprint in the U.S. market yet. They are starting to appear through online retailers.)

Health Effects

Vaping E-Juice is far less hazardous to your health than smoking tobacco. The negative health effects of vaping doesn't even compare to the major negative health effects of tobacco.

Many of the flavors do not come from natural sources and are man made through chemical processes that leave traces of the processing chemicals in the produced flavors. If you go with natural extract flavors these chemical remnants do not exist in the final flavor product. It's these man made chemical traces that anti vaping activists are shooting at. Most flavors you enjoy will be man made but there are natural extracts that can be found.

On a scale of 1 to 100 with 100 being the most harmful and tobacco ranking at the 100 mark vaping would rank at " 5 ". If you use a natural extract flavor vaping would rank around "2" compared to tobacco. The e-liquid base is neutral and will not effect your health at all positive or negative.

There is an anti vaping group in the United States whom do not complain about the man made flavors with the presence of trace amounts of the manufacturing chemicals but are more focused on children liking the vaping flavors and using vaping products for their pleasure.

There's another organization called the "Consumer Advocates For Smoke Free Alternatives" or "CASSAA" that basically is a "Vapor Cult" to resist the people resisting vaping. Yes, I joined it because it's free to be a member and there's no harm no foul. You don't have to do anything but be one name on their rooster of members that supports vaping.

We'll talk to all you future vapors in vaping forums and groups!

E Cigarette flavor research study

CASAA - Consumer Advocates For Smoke Free Alternatives