Soaking in the summer sun is great for you or me. In moderation you can absorb the sun’s rays and it helps to raise your vitamin D levels, lets you work on your summer tan, (but don’t forget the sunscreen) and generally puts you in a good mood. However, that bright sun and heat can just as easily put you in a bad mood, if you aren’t careful to keep your ecig, batteries, tanks, and ejuice out of the elements.
Let’s start with your batteries. Just like any other electronics that say not to expose to high temperatures, the same is true of your ecig and its batteries. As Vapor Digest notes, most batteries should not be kept in temperatures higher than 86 degrees F. At this temperature, the battery begins to sustain damage. This can cause something as simple as a noticeable decline in charge capacity and retention ability, or something as extreme as melting, bulging or causing sparking from your batteries.
Don’t forget, just because it’s less than 86 degrees outside, doesn’t mean it’s the same inside your car. Your car can act as an oven, quickly raising temperatures inside to levels much warmer than the outside air. You should always take your batteries with you instead of leaving them in your vehicle during the day.
Now let’s move on to the devastating effect heat and direct sunlight can have on your delicious e-liquids. In a matter of minutes these conditions can turn your once tasty ejuice into a gross, burnt-tasting mess. Your favorite juices are precisely blended with a balance of PG, VG and nicotine to provide a great and lasting flavor, but sunlight can spoil that in no time. As the fluids are exposed to the sun and heat, the ingredients can begin to separate and degrade, accelerating the natural breaking down of ingredients that usually doesn’t start to happen for a year or more when properly stored. This can lead to a flavor that tastes funny, tainted, or even wholly unpalatable.
While heat is an obvious part of the vaping process, it’s meant to be done to e-liquid inside your vaporizer – not to fluid in the bottle. You may also see your fluid become darker. Now many times this can be caused by your nicotine darkening due to its photosensitivity. It may also be a result of exposure to sunlight or heat. This is partly due to oxidization, says Spin Fuel. This is also why you’ll often notice fluid in your clearomizer darkening as it becomes more oxidized during the heat exposure from vaping. In both cases, the color change is harmless, but heat exposure can lead to a distortion in the taste of your vapor. Of course, other issues can also lead to taste changes, as we previously discussed, but leaving your fluids out in the sun and heat definitely won’t help your flavors last.
The taste of your next puff isn’t the only thing you need to worry about when you expose your device and ejuice to the heat and sunlight of summer. Heat especially can have a devastating effect on your vaping experience. Heat can change how well your seals and O-rings keep your ejuice inside your tank. Heat can also cause your ejuice to expand slightly, changing the pressure inside your tank and forcing ejuice through your airflow holes or right out your drip tip. This problem is made even worse by the fact that vegetable glycerin (aka the thick part of your juice) is thinned when exposed to heat, and once it has thinned out, nothing will thicken it again. So if you would rather vape your ejuice, than clean it out of your cup holder this summer; keep that ejuice cool.
So what are you to do to prevent these problems? First off, keep your equipment and your e-liquids in a cool and shaded place whenever possible. This could be a drawer in your home or a shelf in your closet or pantry. Next, be aware of the conditions you’re in whenever you’re on the go. If you plan on having a day out, consider taking a smaller amount of your e-liquid or leaving one of your extra batteries at home so that it’s not exposed to the heat and sun of the day. Lastly, though it may be tempting, don’t refrigerate your e-liquids, place them, or your batteries in the cooler. Some fluids can lose their taste in cool temperatures just the same as they can from too much heat, meaning that chilling them can have the same effect for your flavors as leaving them out and exposed. As for batteries, keeping them in the fridge in extremely hot weather can be an acceptable option, but it’s important to keep them from getting wet. This can happen easily in a portable cooler, and even in a household refrigerator from accidental spills or drips. Also, you should be mindful that taking a cool battery directly into warm weather can cause condensation to occur, which could also spell doom for your battery.
Just like making sure to apply your sunscreen, keeping the sun and heat in mind for your ecigarette and e-liquids this summer will prevent you from getting burned. Don’t forget our great selection of cool summertime flavor recommendations to help you stay refreshed all summer. Have tips of your own for summertime vaping? Let us know in the comments below!
