Can You Share Your Whole Tobacco Alkaloid Success Stories?

I joined ECF back in August of 2017. I was sixty-five years old and had been smoking 25-30 cigarettes a day for 40+ years. I began vaping at the same time win the hope I could at least cut down. I dual used for months, continually cutting back on cigarettes. I smoked my last cigarette on May 11, 2018 - I am coming up on my three year anniversary. When I began, I vaped 24mg nicotine. Now I alternate between 3mg and zero nic.

Given how incredibly positive vaping has been for me, I am in shock at recent events. I was down to two working mods. I have ordered four mods, some tanks and a bunch of coils. I am still able to buy some eliquids where I live - but many of my favorites from Halo have been discontinued. I still have some outstanding hardware orders that I hope get delivered.

The treatment of vaping in the media has been a one sided disgrace, and propaganda works. Over the years when I have mentioned to people that I quit by vaping, they respond, ‘so you quit smoking by picking up a habit that is even more dangerous’.

I am set for at least a year. Fortunately I have kicked my addiction to nicotine - I recently vaped zero nic for a month. If I was just starting out, it would truly be panic time, and I would go back to cigarettes for sure. I suspect that many will do just that. Happy I started when I did.  

I would like to thank ECF, and every member here, for helping me to quit cigarettes as an involuntary lifestyle. The information gathered here has been invaluable. In no other group that I've been involved with, have I seen such a gathering of the most informed and intelligent people. Without all of you, my success would have never seen the light of day. I'd been absent for a long time, because I didn't feel the need once I had an expert handle on all of this, but the new developments have brought me back. Vaping has come a long way since I began here, and traded my cigalike in for an eGo, and ECF provided me with the arsenal to make informed choices on what works for me. Than you again.

For those who haven't read any of my posts, I have been free from cigarettes for 10 years, thanks to vaping. I wouldn't say that I'm smoke free, but it's now my choice, on the very rare occasion, to smoke a cigarette. I know some will say it's always been my choice, but for the enlightened, it hasn't been my choice since shortly after I started 37 years ago. There have been pitfalls, and strides, and today I can honestly say that if I can't vape, I will never pick up a pack of cigarettes again.  

I began vaping in 2013. It was a basic setup: Ego Twist with a couple of Vivi Nova tanks.
It took some trial and error but found a couple of juices that I liked and stuck with them. Started
at 18 mg and settled on 12 mg nicotine level. The Ego was nothing special, but it seemed to work well at the time as I quit smoking for an entire year with it. As time wore on, I began getting to get more and more burnt / dry hits. Seemed to be happening all the time. Went through countless coils and it became such an issue that I finally got tired of messing with it and quit vaping. Went back to cigarettes. Looking back, I believe I was using a High VG or possibly Max VG liquid which may have been the cause. Desperate to get off cigarettes again I tried again last year. Bought several starter kits including Innokin IO and Innokin Endura T22. Did not like either of these. Just seemed to give me a headache even after just a couple of puffs. I tried both with 12mg and 6mg. Did not notice much of a difference. I just did not get the satisfaction I remember from years earlier. So gave up on vaping again and went back to analogs.

It is now 2019 and I am really sick and tired of smoking cigarettes. I hate them but can’t stop.
Along comes the JUUL, I decided to give it a shot and just figured it would not work.
At first I did not like it. Seemed WAY to strong at 5%. Stuck with it for a week and thought - hey this is not bad. Mainly was using Virginia and every once in a while a Mango pod was nice (Maybe ½ to 1 full pod a day). I was still smoking a couple of cigs in the morning but after that I would use the JUUL the rest of the day. It was by no means great but good enough. I would constantly struggle to get a decent hit off of it though. There always seemed to be air bubbles in the pods causing a problem or I had to pull the pod out and put it back in just to get it to hit decently. Like I said just good enough. After about 6 months or I started have stomach issues. Mainly really bad gas and thought it might be due to the higher nic level in the 5% pods. So I dropped down to 3% for a month or so and noticed no difference. Finally decided to quit the JUUL altogether to see if it made any difference. Within a week everything went away and was back to normal. No more JULL for me. I am guessing something in the Nicsalts didn’t agree with me. I never had this issue with freebase nicotine.

So, am now looking for a device to replace the JULL that does not use nicsalts and was hoping to get some recommendations. I do not need a big mod device to blow clouds or anything like that.
I want something very simple that hits well and does not burn. I am open to anything really as long as it works. I do prefer MTL style and have heard good things about the Joyetech AIO as well as the SMOK infinix devices. I am really open to anything that will work well. Prefer something small, easy to use and that fits in my pocket. Also, I prefer tobacco flavors and am planning to try out the Blacknote stuff which is a 50/50 PG/VG mix so looking for a device suited to that. Any advice or recommendations would be appreciated. Thanks!  

Sooo.
I lost my sigelei 150 watt at the airport in taiwan before security.
Noticed it was missing after security (early morning flight, hadnt slept, was on the phone, doing too much at once i suppose)
Anyways, tried to figure out how to get it back by going back out through security.... But apparently, that was impossible, and no one spoke english, so I got super ...agitated... and before I blew up at the next person, I went in to the smoke room and bummed a smoke off some dude. (Cuz i was seriously agitated at this point). Dont get me wrong, i had had a few puffs post vape, but this is the first real full smoke I had. I am not posting this because ive worked myself up in to some guilt trip because I failed myself, I dont really care in that respect...I dont regret having one, because I might have ended up ... doing something bad at a foreign airport out of sheer annoyance and frustration.
Anyways, I remember, when I first started vaping, there was always ...something missing. Something...no there that was there with cigarettes.
Now, The cigarette, Burning my eyes and tasting terrible, and leaving a smell on my fingers that lasted for hours ...all that aside... There is now something missing with cigarettes.
If I had to name something... I would say that the wattage in the cigarette seems too low... or the ohms too high.... Or both, Kinda kidding, but its like that feeling... That coupled with the fact that the airflow is not enough and unfortunately, its not adjustable.... And... I kept trying to draw like i do with my vape, long and slow.... and no... i could only manage short pulls.
The point... Is I just find it weird that I definitely felt something was missing when I started vaping... Something wasnt there, but now, when I went back to smoking, Its like... everything is missing.

Needless to say, the remaining 12 hours of my journey home and to my house from the airport, I didnt crave a cigarette at all.

BUT MAN, when I got home... DID I EVER CHAIN VAPE!

On the upside, I already rebought the Sigelei, This time in Red, And stuck on Mechs till it gets here.  

This past week marks 5 years since I smoked a cigarette. It honestly doesn't seem that long, it seems like yesterday I was huddled out in the cold at work with the smokers. I had been a smoker for 28 years.

Unlike many I see posting here, I cannot say vaping helped me quit. I quit cold turkey, and never tried an ecig until about a year after I quit smoking. At that point I was still doing well as a non-smoker, I didn't physically crave smoking, but I missed the 28 year habit of lighting up, having something to fiddle with, and just the relaxing feeling of the inhale/exhale. I had been eating a lot more to make up for the void, and having been underweight all my life I started packing on pounds (too many!). I sorely needed a non-food substitute for the comfort I was missing, but wasn't about to go back to smoking.

I tried a junky convenience store ecig after that first year, and thought "if this was what they were like than forget it". I continued on not smoking, but still missing the habit. About two years after that I began seeing the new advanced products coming out, and did a lot of research. I bought my first starter kit in 2013, and slowly advanced up to bigger and better gear.

People ask why would start vaping after I had already kicked the cigarette habit, and I say, "Why not?". Other than nicotine I'm not getting any of the negative things I got with cigarettes. And in my opinion, there's really nothing wrong with a little nicotine. Nicotine is not what was killing me, it was the smoke that was delivering the nicotine that was killing me.

So I'm 5 years smoke free, I no longer hack in the mornings, my chest never hurts and my clothes, car and hair don't stink anymore.
I have no intentions on giving up vaping, as it has no negative impact on my life, and i enjoy it, so why stop?

I have since gotten my son, my step-son, and his wife to all trade vaping for smoking, so bonus points for saving all their lives too!  

I smoked my last cigarette at 8:05am on May 5, 2014 . I didn't know then if it would really be the day I finally quit, but I told myself to really try to go 24 hours without smoking, a goal I had never achieved. And I made it! So then I told myself, if I could go a day, I could truly make it.

I started smoking at a very young age, and smoked 35 years. I made numerous attempts to quit going back to my college years. I tried cold turkey, cutting back, the patch, gum, a nicotine inhaler, Wellbutrin and Chantix. No matter what, I couldn't break that 24 hour goal. I would go through ashtrays and light up every disgusting butt for 1 or 2 nasty drags.

My last few years of smoking I was under a PAD, but only due to financial reasons. I just wouldn't let myself have more than 1 cigarette per hour, but I certainly smoked the heck out of each one. The filter would be collapsed by the time I was finished.

Thank you, ECF. I was so clueless when I started vaping. I didn't know which was 510 and which was ego threading on my batteries. I didn't know an atomizer from a clearomizer. I didn't know what rebuildables were, or that the ones I saw online were clones. I kept googling different things, and kept ending up here to read. Finally after 3 months of lurking, I joined.

The journey has been amazing! The technology changes alone in the 14 months I've been vaping are mind boggling. And I've met some truly kind and generous folks here, from those who give their time all day to help others, to those who give hardware and juice to those in a financial crunch. Thank you, all  

"Cheap is small and not to steep, but best of all, cheap is cheap...
I'm on a low budget!
I'm on a low budget!
I'm not cheap, you'll understand;
I'm just a cut-price person in low-budget land"
--Ray Davies, "Low Budget"--

A few months ago, I got back into vaping after a two year absence. I figured that I wouldn't really need to buy much more gear than what I already had from 2014-2017.

Well, a lot that old gear still works and I use much of it frequently. I was using it, doing just fine, when I decided to get a new high power mod to replace the ailing eVic-VT, whose built-in battery is dying a slow and agonizing death. Can't run subohm coils on a Provari.

So I decided to buy a mod...

I'm good at finding closeouts, liquidations, etc. It's one of the ways I keep costs low for my guitar business. Much of which comes from China. With vaping, we have a whole industry located almost entirely in China. Most of the major manufacturers seem to introduce new gear and discontinue "old" gear on an almost weekly basis.

"Who still wants that old piece of junk mod we were making last month with a measly 95 watt output. Now, for just $5 more, you can have the new totally badass mod that looks almost the same as the old one, but in new colors and...get this...105 watt output!"

So for low power me, there was all kinds of cool stuff. I don't care about TC, 'cause I vape too cool for it to work. Just give me variable wattage or even VV. Last month's model is OK.

So I'm finding all sorts of cool stuff, and started seeing a lot of good stuff for under $50. A lot of good stuff under $35. Some really cool stuff for under $25...so of course I can buy that mod. Doesn't cost half as much as that carton of cigarettes that I didn't buy this week.

So here's a cool starter kit (mod with tank) for under $25. About half of the list price that nobody paid in the first place:


The Sigelei Sobra is a cool looking, long lasting, 200W monster. I love the Moonshot tank it came with. I added the heat sink all by myself. But it has a fatal flaw for tootle-puffing me. Minimum output is 10W! I frequently vape at 7W, so this setup just won't work for me all of the time.

So I really needed to get another mod, this time a high ouput device with a minimum output of no more than 5W...

I can't deny it--I quickly developed a bad case of low budget shinyitis. Not too hard to click on "Buy" when it's so cheap--such a good deal--and what's another $25, anyway? If it's less than $15, I swear, sometimes the "Add To Cart" button clicks itself.

Here's a bunch of low budget gear that looks cool, works well, and none of it cost more than $35. I also bought all of it in the last 3 months:
Low budget shinyitis is a common affliction. Some folks collect different pod systems in all of the available colors. Some folks just can't resist a good $20 RTA. Some people start collecting mech clones...
HCigar "Turtle Ship" clone with a custom built Subtank. Good quality, really. The only thing that gives it away as a clone is the engraving, which was left rough. Of course, I sanded and polished it, and now it's much smoother.

So low budget shinyitis is real, it's dangerous (to your wallet), and is perhaps a far more widespread affliction than previously thought. Now somebody please show off your low budget (under $50) shinies, so I know I'm not alone!  

I just felt the need to share a short version of my journey to date:

I had been vaping part time you about 2.5 years before my new (now ex-) girlfriend got me to walk into what was pretty much the only vape shop in town. After trying the V3 eGo setup, I bought a tank to replace my older eGo-T crap tanks and some juice. the next weekend, I bought an entire new eGo kit and gave her my old batteries so she too could start vaping. We both cut down on smoking by 50% in a couple of days. It took me a total of 12 days to decide I was done with cigarettes and by the 4th week, I was the owner of a Provari. This all started a year ago now. The Russian 91% followed quickly after that. Next wednesday will be my TRUE one year vapaversary. I since acquired a second Provari for a ridiculous price and 2 more Kayfun clones.

I will not hide that there have been temptations, even lately, to try an actual cigarette, but I have been keeping strong. I did smoke a small cigarillo at the company Christmas party last December and resisted the urge to ask for one or two more from my coworker.

I have not felt the need to stop and take a 5-10 minute "breather" for about a year now whenever I do just about anything physically demanding and I have to thank vaping for this. I also now have a great vape shop minutes away from where I live and have been into various vape shops halfway around the world (work related travels... I'm not that rich and I can get great juices 5 minutes from here) I still get one or two juices form that first vape shop I visited, which now has 4 locations, all of them at least a 30 minute drive from home.

Remembering last year, I do miss my ex (we left each other on good terms) and I really wonder how she's doing on her side with vaping. I know she's got a great shop near where she now lives and hope they have been able to help her. I have been to that shop, but was on a business trip and it was hard enough to know she had to go back to her hometown, so I didn't call her to let her know I was going to be in the area. It's probably better that way, although I still think about her.

It's been a great journey and I now can't wait to get on my old hybrid bicycle to see if I can now keep those racer owners behind me for good; during one of my last rides last summer, 2 of them took the better part of a mile before they finally passed me, and that was on the slope uphill on my way back from my 1 hour ride. I still weight over 250 pounds, BTW and will train hard to make those snobs eat my dust with a definitely inferior bike like I used to 10 years ago

Thank you ECF for helping to keep me on track and enjoying vaping so much!  

Background: I started vaping years ago when the technology was relatively immature and rapidly changing. I was an avid participant in this forum at the time. I used 808s and 510s with all sorts of atomizers, cartomizers, clearomizers, and tanks (and most of them were awful by today's standards). Some of you who have also been around for a while may remember cutting up air conditioner filters...

But when I found the Eleaf iStick Pico and paired it with an Aspire Nautilus tank (1.8 Ohm coils) I was done. I have used that same rig for years and have been very satisfied. I even quit coming to this forum because I thought there was nothing left for me to learn.

But I know the technology has continued to advance and I am now wondering if I am missing out on the next great leap in vaping. I have come back to this forum (a little surprised my account was still active) seeking updated knowledge.

To be clear, I am not interested in creating giant thick clouds of vapor. In fact I generally prefer to keep my vaping clouds as thin and inconspicuous as possible when I am anywhere outside of my own home (which sadly is not too much these days). It is throat hit and flavor that I am after (so I try to find low VG juices, for example).

So I am hoping that some kind forum members will help me quickly get back up to speed on the state of the art for vaping. Maybe point me to some good resources that will explain the more recent advances. I tend to think of sub-ohm mods as being only for those giant clouds, but maybe I am full of it. But I have been told that rebuildable atomizers offer better flavor, so that interests me. I don't even know what I don't know at this point. Please help me learn.

Thank you in advance for your help.  

Whenever i go out for a drink on the town with the lady, I'll see vapsters here and there with their sub-ohm setups. And here i am with my Nautilus Mini and whatever low-wattage mod I decided to pair it with.

Honestly, each day I seem to enjoy using these low wattage devices, such as the VV4 and a Nautilus Mini, more and more as opposed to my sub-ohm gear.

With my Nautilus, the flavor and throat hit is always spot on, and the vapor is nice too for what it is. I seem to be using this setup more and more lately... And when subbing, it's rare for me to get that satisfying hit, i just find myself vaping more and more to feel satisfied thus burn through a ton of juice. With a Nautilus, I get that satisfying hit right away and vape here and there.

With my sub-ohm gear, juices can be a hit or miss at times in terms of flavor and hit. But i can always count on my Nautilus Mini to give me exactly what I want each and every time.

I even bought a MVP20 at a killer price to perfectly compliment the Nautilus Mini. I wouldnt be burning through nearly as much juice, thus saving me money in the long run.

It's nice to blow crazy big clouds in public, but im starting to fall back on mimicking a standard cigarette with vaping rather than chase clouds.

Am i crazy for shying away from sub-ohming? Maybe it will be fun again after i take a break from it?