Hangsen Grape
ConcreteRiver
Setup: Recoil w/ flavor barrel, Dual 15 wrap 26g 3mm Nifethal 70 coils @.17 ohms. 60w power, 450F temp limit. Full Cotton Wicks.
Testing: HS Grape @ 2%, 60/40 VG/PG, Steeped 6 days.
Flavor Description: A front-loaded grape candy bordering on dimetapp or grape chewable aspirin. Dense up front, light in the back with a chalky mouth-feel. Like a reverse mullet, with a chalky mouth feel.
Inhale is syrupy-sweet, dense artificial grape. Mouthfeel borders on sticky. Exhale is a candy grape base note, with some bitter medicinal top notes. Mouthfeel is less dense than you'd expect from the inhale, and overall gets a bit chalky toward the end. Relatively clean finish for something that starts this syrupy. Flavor here is totally front-loaded, which is a bit weird. Exhale is nowhere near as sweet as the inhale. Grape flavor also feels fairly desaturated in the exhale.
Off-flavors: Chewable grape aspirin. Little chalky, and definitely medicinal.
Throat Hit: Light. Little harsh around the edges, but nothing major.
Uses & Pairings: Definitely a candy flavor. Sweet and a bit chalky. The one thing that excites me about mixing with this is the actual structure of the flavor. The front-loaded nature of the concentrate is going to let you start the inhale mega-sweet and keep it going through the exhale with other candy fruit concentrates. Pairing TFA Raspberry Sweet or INW Strawberry Shisha with this is going to be super sweet, but structured really well to hold a fairly consistent sweetness through the entire vape.
The chalky thing would be great for anything trying to emulate that kind of mouthfeel. So like, sweet-tarts or something like that.
I'd avoid this for your grape-drank flavor, just because that medicinal notes are going to be a bummer... unless you want to go full sizzurp. I'd pair with a handful of vicodin for authenticity.
Notes: S&V concentration tasting, this seems pretty linear. Flavor is just way less saturated at .5%. Starts to get a bit medicinal at 1.5%, although it still seems a bit thin. 2% is a solid percentage for a single flavor. At 3%, the grape actually seems to take a back seat to that medicinal flavor and it almost starts to take on a koolada type chill. I'd mix this between 1.5% for a less descript candy grape mixer, and 2.5% for that sweeter, sticky grape candy flavor.
So personally, I'm not seeing a lot of need for this flavor. SC Grape is already an awesome grape candy flavor and FLV Grape has the grape kool-aid market cornered. Maybe if you're after that powdery thing or the weird structure give it a shot, but it's pretty hard to recommend in general.
Second Opinions:
Again, not a lot of documentation on most of the the hangsen flavors.
/u/contactclosure/ did leave a comment in a post on grape standalones here: "Hangsen Grape is the best I've tried. INW Grapes helps round it out. Try 3% HS and 1% INW for starters. Lots of things mix well with that pair. Strawberry, apple, lime etc." Actually, /u/contactclosure/ is the only person I've found talking about this concentrate on the sub. Found about 3 references, so it's save to say that at least someone is more positive on this than I am.
Quick mention in the comments for this post on ECF. user michaelsil1 calls it okay, nothing special.
Lots of weird hangsen e-liquid reviews from british people on youtube. Don't watch this because it's damn near useless, but WiltshireVape says it tastes like grape fanta. It's the finished liquid and not the concentrate, but I can't imagine it being more complex than like 15% HS Grape.