How much do you vape?

[Karma]

My daughter visited last night and seemed quite horrified that i am vaping more than I smoked!

Now my philosophy on this is that if I keep my nicotine levels topped up with vape then I never even think about having a rollie!

i don't seem to be getting through much juice but it's difficult to tell as i have a few bottles and have been changing tastes around.

My daughter seems to think that I'm going to end up even more addicted to nicotine than I am already (not sure if that's possible,lol) Certainly seem to be a bit addiced to vape shopping at the moment but that is between me and this forum lol!

[leftfield]

The average vaper will use 2 - 3ml per day (see poll below)



It's pretty much confirmed that you get less nicotine through vaping than you do through smoking. It's mainly due to the carrier. With cigarette smoke the tar and heavy particles allow nicotine absorption through your lungs and throat long after you've inhaled and they've had many decades to perfect the absoprtion ratio with various chemicals.

If I can try to keep this simple (not that I think you're simple, just to keep it clear)...

One cigarette has around 10mg of nicotine in it, you absorb 1mg of that. That's where the 1mg rating comes from on the packet. That's a 10% absoption rate from something designed to get the most amount of nicotine as possible per use and has had years to do it.

If we assume the same 10% absorption rate from ecigs (though I suspect it may be less but there is no conclusive study to show a set absorption rate from ecigs as of yet) then we can work the numbers:

If you start with 24mg liquid, that means you have 24mg per ml of nicotine. There are roughly 20 drops of liquid per ml so we can assume around 1.2mg of liquid per drop. You can get around 5 - 10 puffs from one drop of liquid (highly dependant on what heating method you use, at what voltage and how much pg/vg you use).

So with all of that, one puff on the lowest scale "could" be equal to 1.2mg devided by 10 (assuming 10 puffs per drop), which is 0.12mg per puff before you consider the 10% absorption so you'd get 0.012mg per puff.

That's basically nothing and if you start with lower nicotine content, say 6mg, you'll only be getting 0.03mg per puff. That is on the same absorption rate as a cigarette however (10%) but without a set rate yet it's difficult to say what we really get.

So to be crystal clear, one cigarette = 1mg of nicotine absorbed. One drop of eliquid inhaled at 24mg = 0.12mg absorbed assuming the same 10% absorption rate. That means puff for puff if we assume one cigarette is around 10 good puffs, we would get 1/10th of what we did nicotine wise out of an ecig than we did out of a real cigarette as 0.12mg per drop could equal 10 inhales from an ecig.

If the average user is on about 2.5ml a day at say 18mg, if they absorped all of the nicotine that's 45mg. 45mg is a lethal dose of nicotine (40 - 60mg is considered a lethal dose in adults)! lol so yeah, we're definately not getting that because you'd notice if you were suddely getting 45 cigarette's worth of nicotine a day. If we however use the same 10% absorption rate, we actually get 4.5 cigarette's worth of nicotine per day based on the average user.

Those figures are not set in stone and can't be until there is a set absorption rate from ecigs, so I'm basing those figures from actual cigarettes. So it's no real brow raiser to be vaping more than you smoked as you are expected to be getting about a tenth less nicotine than you did before. Not to mention the lack of carcinogens and life threatening chemicals you're now missing out on your body was addicted to; easily making it understandable to be healthier even if you vape more than you smoked health wise.

Hope that makes sense

As a side note, that is why some vendors claim their liquid is worth so many cigarettes. They completely ignore absorption rates: they say because one cigarette is worth 1mg, then a 24mg liquid is 24 cigarettes per ml. It's obviously not now that you know but unless you knew one cigarette started with 10mg you'd probably believe it because your packet of fags says it's 1mg. You're actually getting two and a half cigarette's worth of nicotine per 1ml of 24mg, not 24

TL;DR version: you get 1/10th worth of nicotine out of vaping than you do from smoking a cigarette.

[DiscoDes]

EXCELLENT post Leftfield!

[bluemagnum]

What a brilliant informative post!

[womble]

Wow good post, I had to read it a few times, but I think I get the jist now.

To Karma, I noticed when I started vaping, I was doing it more often than I smoked, for many reasons.
It was novel.
It was convenient, I didn't have to go outside.
It was on tap, I didn't have to think about lighting up a whole fag, I could just take a couple of drags.
It was a hell of a lot better than smoking.

It's worn off after a bit and now I don't vape so much

[dave]

Really interesting post leftfield. I too would like to see some analysis of the nicotine absorption from vaping - but like you say it is unlikely to be as much as from smoking.

[Karma]

Thanks leftfield, very interesting.

Good observation Womble, also can I add that at first you have to try out your new stuff and all the new flavours of juice. i'm sure my consumption will go down in time, perhaps when I'm confident that I will not reach for a rollie!

[tizerbelle]

Jan 24, 2012 10:28:03 GMT leftfield said:

easily making it understandable to be healthier even if you vape more than you smoked health wise.

It's been a long day at work, brain is dying so this is the only bit that stuck. :-[ (Nothing to do with your writing Leftfield, purely me)

Karma, In answer to your original question I vape anywhere between 3 and 6ml a day but I have already dropped from 32mg+ to juices in range 20-24mg and am just starting out on 18mg juice as my main vape now.

[Perpetua]

Great post Leftfiled!

I guess I vape between 5-10ml in a day, depending on the time I have . . . but my mg's are pretty low now. Between 12-18mg, it's the lovely flavours that I enjoy so much.

[maccafan]

Great post Leftfield!

I feel enlightened and a bit relieved as I do seem to be vaping a lot more.

[Gordy]

even though it 'seems' like you are vaping alot more keep an eye on the actual amount in millilitres and you may be surprised that its not as much as you imagine

[Sandra (aka Chillax)]

I fiddle more with my stuff then I ever did with my smoking stuff, I really am not sure how much I vape because I change my flavours a couple of times a day and go from one device to another then drip a bit, then go back to a cart then the tank all with their own flavours in, so its hard to tell but I would say up to 3ml max but more like 2ml

[Karma]

Sandra, how do you go about changing flavours? I now have some strange tasting cartomisers!

[Sandra (aka Chillax)]

Just answered your other post :-) what timing eh :-)

[Karma]

Lol, thanks