Monthly Archives: December 2015

Mission Elixirs Review

Mission Elixirs Review

Mission Elixirs is another company I discovered while in North Carolina for the Vape Mania convention.  They are an up and coming New York City based eliquid company with a very interesting mission (pardon the pun) that I’ve been seeing more and more companies do as of late.  Mission Elixirs chooses a charity every month and donates 10% of each bottle sale to that charity.  The past charities include the Breast Cancer Research Foundation and NotBlowingSmoke.org

Flavors

3 different flavors are currently available.

  • Benefaction – A sweet yet tart take on a blueberry parfait. The creaminess of a vanilla yogurt swirled with the natural goodness of blueberry and subtle hints of granola.
  • Contribution – The crisp taste of your favorite lemon lime soda enhanced by natural strawberry flavoring
  • Endowment – A modern twist on a strawberry ice cream cone. The combination of natural ripe strawberries with the sweetness of marshmallow and sugar cone flavors

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Hardware For Testing

I’ll be using a Snow Wolf 200w mod with a Vulcan Vector RDA.  24 gauge dual coil @ 0.32 ohms running at 60 watts using 316L stainless steel wire.  I recently started using stainless steel wire due to it’s quick ramp up time and cleaner flavor compared to kanthal.

Benefaction

First comes Benefaction.  At first the description reminded me of another blueberry yogurt flavor that I liked quite a bit (The Downside by the Schwartz) but since it’s a parfait style flavor, the added granola flavor seemed intriguing.  I tend to have a blueberry parfait for breakfast quite often and this seemed like a good pairing.

The granola is a bit more forward than I expected and comes through much more clearly than the blueberry.  Not that it’s a bad thing, but based on the description I expected the blueberry as the main flavor.  The vanilla yogurt is subtle and is balanced well between the granola and blueberry.  The vanilla comes out on the exhale nicely.

This is a very well flavored liquid and is easy to vape all day.  Other than a slight description change, I don’t have anything negative to say about Benefaction.

Rating: 9/10

Contribution

I always jump at the chance to try a new lemon or lime eliquid.  Since I vape Placid by Adirondack Vapor daily (and have for the past couple years), a liquid along the same flavor profile always interests me.  So lemon, lime, and strawberry…yes please.

The lemon and lime are extremely well balanced.  The balance is pretty much perfect.  The lime doesn’t over power the lemon and vice versa.  It’s a symbiotic blend that when you add the strawberry on the backend makes for an extremely delicious, easy to vape eliquid.  You get all the flavors on both the inhale and the exhale.  If you like lemon and/or lime flavors, you will love Contribution.

Rating: 10/10

Endowment

It seems that a lot of companies are moving away from the strawberry custards and moving towards more complex strawberry creams with subtle notes of different flavors.  One of the more popular blends I’ve been seeing is strawberry ice cream flavors.  I previously reviewed &Drip’s Red Label which was a strawberry ice cream and cone flavor.  Endowment is similar but with an added marshmallow layer.
From the start, the strawberry ice cream and marshmallow comes out clearly.  The strawberry is natural tasting, the ice cream has a good creaminess to it, the marshmallow adds just the right level of sweet sugary flavor, and the cone comes out on the backend subtly to top it all off.
Overall, this is a great liquid.  The flavor is on point and well balanced.  For you strawberry and cream lovers, this is a great choice.
Rating: 9/10

Final Thoughts

When I look back at my thoughts on the Mission Elixirs line, I realized I rated each liquid on the higher side.  But it was not without reason.  Benefaction, Contribution, and Endowment all are excellent liquids.  You can tell off the bat a lot of hard work went into each and every flavor.

On top of how much I enjoyed these flavors, the choice to contribute 10% of each bottle to a different organization every month really helps set Mission Elixirs apart.  Most companies do not do this and it’s a great way to show that the company happily gives back to their community or other charitable organization.

Pricing starts at $15.99 for a 30ml while a 120ml bottle is a very reasonable $45.99.  They also offer all 30ml bottles in one package for $35.99 under their Donator’s Package.  This is a very good price point and for the quality of the liquid, could easily command a $20+ per bottle price.

In the end, go buy this liquid and know that each and every bottle you buy will goto a good cause.  You’ll also enjoy it so why not buy from a company that gives back as well?

Mission Elixirs Website

Recent Diacetyl Posts On Facebook

It seems every time I refresh my Facebook feed, I see an article posted or shared that talks about a recent Harvard T.H. School of Public Health study that references high levels of diacetyl and acetoin in the liquid used by electronic cigarettes.  People are posting it who I can imagine never really read more than a couple sentences about it but posting huge warnings about how much worse vaping is compared to smoking.  That article is here.

Vaping is not worse than smoking.  It’s been shown to be 95% safer than smoking traditional cigarettes.  This is known and proven.  If you believe from the one line of an article you didn’t read that vaping is worse, I’m sure you believe that chemtrails are real and Obama is a Muslim as well.

What the Harvard article fails to mention is the following.

  1. Most large and small eliquid companies have been aware of the diacetyl levels in their liquids and made changes to their recipes to mostly or fully remove diacetyl and acetoin from their liquids.  This came up over a year ago and there are independent labs testing the liquids to verify this.  There is a ton of information and resources to look all this information up on any liquid that has been on the market for a few months.
  2. Diacetyl and acetoin is also present in traditional cigarettes. 
  3. The levels found in traditional cigarettes are over 750 times that of any eliquid found to actually contain it.
  4. The test used specified that the liquids were heated up in 8 second “puffs” with a 15-30 second rest time.  8 seconds is a long period of time and it has been known from previous testing this is far outside the bounds of normal vaping (3-5 seconds is much more common use).  This can lead to an overheat/dry burn that based on the wicking material used can release different chemicals that would not be present during more standard use.
If smoking isn’t associated with popcorn lung, why would vaping be especially when the levels are that much less comparatively?

3WG Elixirs Review

Another local juice made it’s way on to my desk.  3WG Elixirs, based out of Greenwood Lake, NY.  I like to review anything local as often as possible so I happily bumped these liquids up my queue.

3WG Elixirs currently has 4 different liquids and I will be testing all of them.

  • Outlaw – Banana cream with subtle notes of vanilla custard and creamy chocolate
  • Retaliation – Peanut butter raspberry swirl
  • Renegade – Bavarian cream mixed with sweet cinnamon sugar
  • Conspiracy – New twist on blue raspberry that brings back memories of a red, white, and blue popsicle.
3WG Elixirs - full lineup

3WG Elixirs Full Lineup

As typical, I’ll be using a Snow Wolf 200w mod with my trusty Snubnose RDA.  24 gauge dual coil @ 0.37 ohms running between 45-55 watts.

Outlaw

First off is Outlaw.  I’m very curious about how this one tastes because the description sounds heavenly.  Banana cream, vanilla custard, and chocolate sound like a phenomenal combination of flavors.

When I cracked the bottle open, i wasn’t hit with any overpowering scents.  The cream/custard and chocolate flavors came out over the banana.  The custard smelled full bodied and the chocolate was subtle.

When I got the dripper ready and took my first pull, the banana was quickly overtaken by the cream, custard, and chocolate flavor.  The vanilla custard is tasty and the chocolate is balanced well.  The banana unfortunately is too subtle.  It barely comes out on first inhaling and really doesn’t make its presence known on the exhale.  It’s a pity as I would love to have a bit more banana in this liquid.  As it is, it comes off as a slight tweak to the standard vanilla custard flavors that have flooded the marketplace.  If you like that profile, then you’ll enjoy this one.  But for me, I was really hoping to have something a little different.

Rating: 6.5/10

Retaliation

The description on this one had me curious but very hesitant.  Normally, most peanut butter flavors are extremely artificial tasting.  Basically, I try to avoid anything with peanut butter because it’s almost always awful.  But you can’t write off everything so let’s give this one a go.

Opening the bottle, you’re immediately greeted by a strong peanut butter smell.  I don’t really smell the raspberry off the bat but I’m sure it will be present upon the taste test.

Upon vaping Retaliation, the peanut butter is still the forward flavor.  However, I am happy to say that it is not overpowering and doesn’t taste terribly artificial at all.  The raspberry is present and balances well with the peanut butter.  After a couple of reloads on the dripper, I am wanting for a hint more raspberry.  It is a good flavor overall but personally it needs just a slight tweak to the balance to make it better.

Rating: 7/10

Renegade

Bavarian cream and cinnamon sugar?  Sign me up.  Off the bat, this seems like it will be a good blend based on the flavor profile.  When I open the bottle, the cinnamon sugar comes wafting out of the bottle.  The bavarian cream is a bit more subtle to the sniff test but still present.

The cream is very forward and present upon actually vaping Renegade in a good way.  The sweet cinnamon sugar adds a bit more sweetness to the cream.  The cinnamon itself is well balanced and not overpowering.

This is easily a good all day vape even though I typically prefer not to vape this type of flavor profile all day.

Rating: 8.5/10

Conspiracy

Throwback flavors.  These are some of my favorite and most hated liquids on the market.  If the juice company gets it right, I am extremely happy.  But if it’s a bit off, well…I can’t throw it out fast enough.  On the other hand, I love blue raspberry flavors.  It is one of the few flavors that can be a bit sweet and artificial tasting but still be ok to vape (for me).

Excited to try this flavor (because who doesn’t love Bomb Pops), I load up my dripper with some fresh wick and get the cotton broken in.  I take my first few puffs and I’m not sure what to think.  I taste the blue raspberry, I taste the cherry (or what should be cherry), and the white is…very muted out.  I can’t honestly tell what the last flavor should be in this liquid.

So I keep going.  And going.  And going.  I’m through a couple ml’s at this point because I honestly don’t know how I feel about this liquid.  There’s times I get some really good flavor from it.  Then there’s other times where I’m pushing towards putting the bottle to the side or giving it to a friend.  It’s a very love/hate back and forth.  I even did the testing over a couple day period and still can’t decide whether this is a good, bad, or just an ok flavor.

Rating: Undecided

Final Thoughts

When I first read through all the flavor descriptions, I was thinking I found a great line of flavors that would all be delicious in their own right.  But as I’ve really taken the time to try each every flavor, the only one I can really recommend out of the line is Renegade (bavarian cream/sweet cinnamon sugar).  The rest were varying levels of average and one I can’t even give a rating because I’m so undecided on it.  I tested all 4 flavors in a 3mg nicotine level and found each and every one of them to be consistent and smooth.

Pricing starts at $20 for a 30ml bottle, $35 for a 60ml, and $60 for a 120ml.  The smaller bottles are obviously higher priced per ml and honestly could be a little cheaper per bottle.  I’d peg this at a $15/30ml liquid and structure the larger bottles based on that.

Lastly, 3WG Elixirs makes it very clear on their website that they use an ISO Grade 6 lab for their manufacturing process.  This is a good example of what every eliquid company should be doing in terms of transparency.  So props to them on that point.

3WG Elixirs Website