Entry-level CO2 Extraction

[Thomas@LRL]

Are people making shatter from CO2 just using a vacuum oven.... Its still a complete mystery to me.

I don't know anyone turning Co2 into shatter at all, the amount of hate we get for using Co2 as a solvent has been seriously disappointing :-/ not from consumeres, just other people in the industry or in the community who might one day "be" customers.

 

[thegreenman91]

I work on a waters machine, we have done winterizations, purged in a vac oven, winterizations purged in a rotovap, unwinterized decarbed oil, and fully distilled co2 oil. So far we have not gotten stable shatter with our co2 machine. We typically run our machine with lower quality material for our infused products. Higher quality material goes to hydrocarbon extraction. Our raw extract typically ends up 50 percent decarbed coming out of our machine and is also usually loaded with water making shatter very difficult.

 

[thegreenman91]

Unfortunately I am having residual ethanol issues coming up even from a raw extract straight out of the machine. Our state limits are 276 ppm of Ethanol. This isn't even winterized oil. If it's sticking around after cleaning the machine, I am in trouble. You guys have any suggestions? Gray Wolf?

We have visible ethanol come through on the first two runs after our cleaning runs. We don't test all of our raw extract for residuals so there is no telling how much longer we have residual ethanol in the system but it definately sticks around.

 

[Roji]

I don't know anyone turning Co2 into shatter at all, the amount of hate we get for using Co2 as a solvent has been seriously disappointing :-/ not from consumeres, just other people in the industry or in the community who might one day "be" customers.

We make CO2 shatter in an Eden.

 

[Thomas@LRL]

We make CO2 shatter in an Eden.

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So it IS possible! That's good to know. We're working the kinks out of our purging process, working with hundreds of grams at a time is not easy. I'm hoping to reduce the size of our batches significantly to reduce unnecessary heat/light exposure. I'm just a lowly lab tech still on probation though, we'll see how things go

 

[Thomas@LRL]

We make CO2 shatter in an Eden.

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Do you guys run subcritical or supercritical? So far we only run supercritical and haven't tried fractioning yet. A lot of things change every day though so we could start something new Monday. (Along with the N2 that's coming, which is also new)

 

[Roji]

Do you guys run subcritical or supercritical? So far we only run supercritical and haven't tried fractioning yet. A lot of things change every day though so we could start something new Monday. (Along with the N2 that's coming, which is also new)

Both.

 

[oneshot]

I work on a waters machine, we have done winterizations, purged in a vac oven, winterizations purged in a rotovap, unwinterized decarbed oil, and fully distilled co2 oil. So far we have not gotten stable shatter with our co2 machine. We typically run our machine with lower quality material for our infused products. Higher quality material goes to hydrocarbon extraction. Our raw extract typically ends up 50 percent decarbed coming out of our machine and is also usually loaded with water making shatter very difficult.

Do you use the recycler or the baskets?

 

[thegreenman91]

Do you use the recycler or the baskets?

I work mostly in post-processing so I am not the perfect person for information on this. We use a recycler however I am unfamiliar with what baskets you are referring to.

 

[A6 Grower]

Oh man if we could start a discussion on Co2 operating parameters and compare peoples experiences thatd be so amazing. Thanks so much guys for even saying what little has already been said. Trying to expand my extraction knowledge to more then just hydrocarbons and alcohol.

 

[Thomas@LRL]

This is some pretty nice SFV OG we've been working on.

We've been working on our processes so far to improve it every step of the way but it's been a nightmare due to so few people in the industry willing/able to talk about it (NDA's ugh).

 

[Symbiotic AD]

We make CO2 shatter in an Eden.

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This looks really nice. We've seen one other company, out of Colorado, that is making CO2 shatter. They didn't have a consistent methodology and were using a modified Apex. They basically explained it like this.

When you pull the oil out of the system you watch the froth/bubbles at the top of the ingot. If it has a specific look (didn't explain it detail) you can remove the froth from the ingot and spread it across parchment/bakers tray. Then they didn't explain anything after that, and it magically becomes shatter. They said they do it successfully but inconsistently, they worst by product of failure is typical CO2 oil.

 

[Thomas@LRL]

This looks really nice. We've seen one other company, out of Colorado, that is making CO2 shatter. They didn't have a consistent methodology and were using a modified Apex. They basically explained it like this.

When you pull the oil out of the system you watch the froth/bubbles at the top of the ingot. If it has a specific look (didn't explain it detail) you can remove the froth from the ingot and spread it across parchment/bakers tray. Then they didn't explain anything after that, and it magically becomes shatter. They said they do it successfully but inconsistently, they worst by product of failure is typical CO2 oil.

There is a consistent method, we pieced it together by researching other industries that process plant oils/fats and how they remove water and separate the various components without damaging volatile terpenes. Gray Wolf has posted most of the info himself as well. The industry should be able to get behind a standard pretty quickly to be honest.

 

[Thomas@LRL]

https://www.facebook.com/chriskellydabs/videos/10207771131385246/?pnref=story

 

[Thomas@LRL]

Argh, not being able to edit my posts is frustrating. Here's a few more images from that batch along with the others I posted.
http://imgur.com/a/ibD5J

 

[CoCoSativas]

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Just picked up an 8oz. open CO2 extraction machine (up to 4000psi) to play around with ! There seems to be little information available regarding CO2 extraction on here so I'd like to dedicate this thread to document and discuss the processes to achieve various forms of extract.

My goal with this unit is mainly to create a runny terpene rich oil that will work well in e-pens with little to no dilution, but will also experiment with shatter and wax.

At room temperature, when filled, the psi reads ~1200psi. The suggested psi to start with from the instructions that came with the machine is 1800psi. I've read that good terpene retention can be had at ~850psi. I plan to initially test the unit with runs from 850-1800psi to see how effective the yields will be before adventuring up to ~3800psi.

I'm not sure exactly how much CO2 will be required, but will document how many pounds were used for each extraction and at what psi.

Per instructions, the CO2 tank can be heated up to 120F in a water bath to obtain 1800psi, then heat is added to the extraction chamber if a higher psi is required.

As expected, the machine will only be ran in a well ventilated/open environment.

Wow co2 must be so much safer than butane...

Cool shit I'll have to scope this out.

 

[Symbiotic AD]

There is a consistent method, we pieced it together by researching other industries that process plant oils/fats and how they remove water and separate the various components without damaging volatile terpenes. Gray Wolf has posted most of the info himself as well. The industry should be able to get behind a standard pretty quickly to be honest.

Thank you for the post! I'm sure as people make their money on it that will become more open to sharing methodology. I know it exists because I've seen lots of people posting pics of CO2 shatter, but as I've said I've yet to do it myself.

 

[Thomas@LRL]

Thank you for the post! I'm sure as people make their money on it that will become more open to sharing methodology. I know it exists because I've seen lots of people posting pics of CO2 shatter, but as I've said I've yet to do it myself.

Most of us are bound by NDA/Non Compete, which is very frustrating. I can tell you though that everything you need to know is in this forum, on Skunkpharms and Tokecity at the very least, if not contained in organic chemistry texts. It's not as hard as people are making it out to be. The methods have existed for decades in the perfumery and essential oils industries, some even for hundreds of years. There are safe and reliable methods to separate or remove components. People kept telling us "you can't do that, you can't do that" but we kept reading, spent a lot of money on R&D and took examples from people like Roji and Gray Wolf, created hypotheses and worked it out to the end.

The boiling points are common, the temperatures are common, the processes themselves are common, they just need to be adhered to. Don't let your temperature run away from you. Know what your boiling points are under pressure. Know what heat (or cold) kills what component of your concerete/absolute.

 

[oneshot]

Wish I had the material to experiment with

 

[Thomas@LRL]

Wish I had the material to experiment with

We are hiring. [email protected] send a resume and cover letter if you're interested in relocating to Rochester, WA. Cost of living is stupid low.