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Noreason's extractions

midwestHIGHS

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Rulatone-
The azeotrope of 95% ethanol and 5% water evaporate as one. And to remove the last 5% of water drying agents like benzene are used and will leave trace amounts of the drying agent. 190 proof ethanol is the best for winterizing and making absolutes IMO and IME, I would not use anything else. The milky white solution on top your ethanol bho solution after it was filtered of waxes, lipids and fats is from additional moisture. This happens usually when you spill a little water in your oil tray during the hot water purge, blow on it with your breath or purge on a very humid rainy day.
 

RulaTone

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Rulatone-
The azeotrope of 95% ethanol and 5% water evaporate as one. And to remove the last 5% of water drying agents like benzene are used and will leave trace amounts of the drying agent. 190 proof ethanol is the best for winterizing and making absolutes IMO and IME, I would not use anything else. The milky white solution on top your ethanol bho solution after it was filtered of waxes, lipids and fats is from additional moisture. This happens usually when you spill a little water in your oil tray during the hot water purge, blow on it with your breath or purge on a very humid rainy day.

Maybe additional moisture but when i have used 99% solvents i didnt get that.
I have tried 190 proof eth, pure acetone, and 99% isopropilic for winterize, differences were minimal, acetone was suggested here not long ago. it is a bit more aromatic but evaporates at lower temps. and is good in leaving the lipids away, plus it costs far less than 190 proof wich is taxed where we are.
 

noreason

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You can hold on to alot of flavor in absolute with a few tricks, for one you don't need to fully purge the intitial butane extraction and all boiling points are lowered under vacuum, alcohols boiling point is lowered to about room temp under -29.9hg so there is no need to get your temps up to alcohols boiling point of 173F. Allowing you to purge at the same temp you would your bho.

I did not purge well initial butane extraction obviously, to avoid applying heat, but let me post a question:

you're saying that with vacuum less heat is required. Right.
But if all boiling points are reduced, this mean also the terpenes and other substances boiling points are reduced too.
So if this make sense, what's the utility to use vacuum instead of heat? Doesn't the result will be the same?

I can just use logic and my senses to know what's better, but I'm still uneducated, so maybe these are question you guys already ask for yourself, and I'm glad to know your point of view.

May I also ask the way you dry your fullmelt? I've been following mattrizes and selecta nikka t's technique for minute, they suggest once your puck has dried for about 24 hours and your able to pick it up and it's not sopping wet, he then uses a microplane to break it up into a fine almost indivdual resin head form, then lay it in a very thin spread out layer on parchment and allow it to dry in cool dry room with low humidity to avoid melting of the resin heads while trying to remove moisture. I don't know if he freezes it, but matt said he even gets his hands cold to help from the fullmelt from turning into sticky mess when trying to microplane it. Drying like this allows the resins to stay in there natural color alot longer and doesn't cause it to darken quickly because of access moisture degrading them drying in large pieces. Just a few tips I learned from following rizes technique mostly and thought I'd pass it on.
Check out there youtube channels, matts got some crazy melt shots these days, selecta does to, he recently posted a video of dabbing rosin!

Never heard about it. Will check it ;)

About the drying....If you don't press the resin, it will dry with no problem. The hashish structure is composed by glands and impurity and it's porous. It does not seems, but it is. Being porous, air can flow inside and dry everything.
With a just extracted hashish, still full of water, you can put it on a towel and see in 2 seconds how much water it loses. It becomes dry and it can be observed from the top, just because of its porous structure, so water can flow to the paper.

About the darkening of resin....it happens only outside. When I break a pice of hashish it is still blonde inside, even after months. Oxydation can't perform in the inside.

Haven't made rosin my self in about two years, man that guy who first introduced that around here had some insane melt pictures. I might have to make some soon, have you ever tried making some with your hash Noreason?

Rosin remember me something...but I have to check it out ;)

:wave:
 

noreason

Natural born Grower
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I think waxex are smoother due to the limited volatile loss result of whipping and heating.
Is a bit weaker in that scratched-throat feeling meaning its more pleasent and for some folks this means "better".
In my experience waxes are never as good as the oil they were derived from.

It could be. Working it to make it like wax I also noticed a lot of flavors come my way. If I can smell flavors this mean something is evaporating...

Gotta spend some time face to face soon bro ;)
 

midwestHIGHS

Member
Veteran
Yes your right, all boiling points are lowered under vacuum and that should include terpenes as well. For some reason though it seems you loose more terpenes just trying to use heat to fully purge raw bho rather than using deep vacuum and constant heat. Because of cannabis oil's surface tension purging at temps around 110-130F makes it hard to remove the residual solvent, to keep the oil constantly releasing solvent without the aid of a vacuum temps need to be highered usually, where as under vacuum/heat as long as resins viscousty is lowered it will release solvent and break the surface tension much easier with the aid of negative pressure. Once you start using deep vacuum and constant heat to purge your oils you will never go back, the rapid release of solvent you get is night and day compared to heat purging.
 

midwestHIGHS

Member
Veteran
Yes rosin, the general idea of using heat and pressure to rupture trichome heads to release there oils on to surface while keeping trichome shells and contaminate as a whole. I would just take quality bubble and smear it on hot pyrex don't remeber the temps and It would leave an oily film with the remaining contaminate stuck to what ever I was using to smear the hash. Then scrape up the oily film and enjoy, yield is low usually, but the finished product can be dabbed with a melt comparable to solvent extracts.
 

noreason

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Yesterday I had the last Colibrì 250ml can, so I cut some exodus cheese flowers (at late flowering) and did an extraction with the thermos. Flowers were not so many because of the few butane remained...however after the butane evaporation, I add 25ml of etOH to dissolve everything, 12 hours freezing and then filtering on a 31µ inox screen.

The final result is a solid amber, that shatters if pressed with the dabber. I did a couple hits and wow, that's the smoother smoke ever, while the high is still cosmic! Just the overall flavors can't beat at now the raw bho, that is harder in the throat and the first part of lungs and make me cough sometimes.

I used the same exodus cheese clones to make different kind of oil, and everyone has the same, very nice sweet lemony aroma, but with slight difference. At now, the best for aroma is raw bho but it makes to cough.
The best for being so smooth is the amber obtained from fresh flowers and winterized for 12 hours.

This make me think that during the purging of etOH, a part of terpenes and/or other molecules evaporates. This part is enough to feel the difference between them.
Considering ex.cheese extract has a lemony aroma, I would assume there could be a good amount (still very small) of d-limonene in the resin. This molecule has a boiling point of 177°C/350°F but it would evaporate very easily even at very low temp, with an high ΔT value from the evaporating start and boiling point.

So next step is probably winterizing with a lower boiling point solvent like acetone as suggested me. Gotta find some!


Doh, I was forgetting to post pictures...

Here what I filtered out with winterization

 

noreason

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.....and this is what I finally get



After an hot bath it melts into this (damn hair!)

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This one is going to be my desktop image for a while

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midwestHIGHS

Member
Veteran
Yes you do loose some terpenes with the additional processing, rendering it not as flavorful as the orginal raw bho, but removing the waxes, lipids and fats are whats important for making a solvent extract that's suitable for everyday consumption. Acetone is not a polar solvent I would recommend, I like ethanol and ethanol only for this purpose. Acetone is also less polar than ethanol so it won't winterize as well as ethanol.

You can hold onto more flavor purging under vacuum like I mentioned before, because you don't even need heat untill your down to the residual ethanol, the majority of ethanol can be removed without heat. Once the liquid ethanol has purged under vacuum and your left with mostly resin and residual ethanol, now you can use heat of around 110-130F lower the resins visosity and deep vacuum to get that last bit of residual ethanol out. Also I don't know if you do this or not, but don't warm the ethanol to speed up dissolving of the raw bho, this seems to release more terpenes then room temp dissolving.

The second pic is my favorite, very nice! Dr john hammond would be proud! :)
 

noreason

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Yes you do loose some terpenes with the additional processing, rendering it not as flavorful as the orginal raw bho, but removing the waxes, lipids and fats are whats important for making a solvent extract that's suitable for everyday consumption.

Is there any specific reason for a purified extract, to be more suitable than a raw one?

Acetone is not a polar solvent I would recommend, I like ethanol and ethanol only for this purpose. Acetone is also less polar than ethanol so it won't winterize as well as ethanol.

If after winterizing and filtering out the fats, acetone is added to etOH, is there any possibility to have an hybrid from both solvents with maybe lower boiling point or this can't happen?

You can hold onto more flavor purging under vacuum like I mentioned before, because you don't even need heat untill your down to the residual ethanol, the majority of ethanol can be removed without heat. Once the liquid ethanol has purged under vacuum and your left with mostly resin and residual ethanol, now you can use heat of around 110-130F lower the resins visosity and deep vacuum to get that last bit of residual ethanol out.

I'll investigate further into the vacuum purging soon bro. I got the point that using vac you end with a more flavor extract ;)


Also I don't know if you do this or not, but don't warm the ethanol to speed up dissolving of the raw bho, this seems to release more terpenes then room temp dissolving.

I do not. Maybe it takes longer, but no trouble to dissolve little piece of bho. If there was 100gr it would be different :D
 

midwestHIGHS

Member
Veteran
The waxes, lipids and fats are contaminate that are irratating are lungs and vary possibly being deposited in the lungs, because they are not absorbed by our lungs and they are hard to expectorate out. Because of this, an absolute is much easier on the lungs and IMO/IME a healthier choice for daily consumption rather than it's original raw bho form.

I personally feel short of breath after dabbing raw bho and the feeling lasts a while and I do not like this feeling at all, it feels like my lungs are coated, sticky and do not want to open all the way.

I do not get this shortness of breath, coated sticky feeling in my lungs from vaporzing fullmelt or flowers and they contain these contaminates but in their natural state and I believe the lungs handle these differently than whats been dissolved by solvent and purged of that solvent. Now absolutes cleaned of these are very smooth and easy on my lungs with nice expectorant qualities, that allows me to actually breathe well when I excercise and not leaving me feeling short of breath. It's why I'm such a strong advocate of absolutes, from what my lungs tell me they appreaciate it, big time.

I used to dab around .5 to 1g of raw bho everyday and my lung function seemed to decrease greatly after sessions, giving me feeling like my lungs are coated and sticky. This caused me to become short of breath very quickly with simple tasks threw out the day, like going up and down the stairs, or even a quick sprint. I have since gave up dabbing raw bho frequently and my lung fuction is much better, I only dab absolutes and every now then will have dab or two some raw bho, but I much prefer high quality fullmelt if flavor is what I'm after.
 

midwestHIGHS

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Veteran
I'm not sure if 95%ethanol 5% water and acetone would form an azeotrope, anyone else know that one?. I do know that an azeotrope mixture can have a lower or higher boiling point than the two compounds seperatly as stated by Olifant.

The reason the boiling point of ethanol is reduced by the water azeotrope is because the vapor pressure is higher than can be accounted for by the molar ratio of the two compounds (raoult's law) which is because of the intramolecular forces between the two compounds. It works the other way as well, some azeotropes have boiling points higher than the compounds which compose them..
 

noreason

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Thanks for the explanation mH on the fats and lungs, it makes sense.
Could coughing be a result of our lungs to expel those fats?

Have you any documentation or link or explanation about lungs and their incapacity to let the fats pass into the vascular system?
I'm curios about this kind of stuff, but having not enough time to investigate on everything, it would be great if someone would share his knowledge on the topic ;)

I definitely feel a smoother vapor with amber, but at now, I also feel less heady effect. Concentrates world is complicated and every detail could be really important for the understanding of how a substance can interacts with every of us. Thanks to many of you guys, my knowledge on it has increased and it continues day after day, so I would say one more time, thanks to all those folks who share their result with others. This makes a difference, a big difference in the people's life. Don't forget about it! THANKS!:thank you:
 

Gray Wolf

A Posse ad Esse. From Possibility to realization.
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Coating our lungs with plant wax, does induce coughing to rid ourselves of it. On the other hand, cannabis and some of its terpenes like pinene, are listed as expectorants, which make you cough anyway.

What I notice, is that cough from wax is a dry cough and the expectorant action produces a wetter cough that seems to get under the congestion and lift it out.

As far as passing the blood brain barrier, if for no other reason, like paraffin, it probably is too long and heavy a molecule to be liquid at body temperature, so that it is transportable.

Thanks for the explanation mH on the fats and lungs, it makes sense.
Could coughing be a result of our lungs to expel those fats?

Have you any documentation or link or explanation about lungs and their incapacity to let the fats pass into the vascular system?
I'm curios about this kind of stuff, but having not enough time to investigate on everything, it would be great if someone would share his knowledge on the topic ;)

I definitely feel a smoother vapor with amber, but at now, I also feel less heady effect. Concentrates world is complicated and every detail could be really important for the understanding of how a substance can interacts with every of us. Thanks to many of you guys, my knowledge on it has increased and it continues day after day, so I would say one more time, thanks to all those folks who share their result with others. This makes a difference, a big difference in the people's life. Don't forget about it! THANKS!:thank you:
 

Olifant

Member
I seem to recall something about the afghans using resin as an expectorant consuming crazy amounts 7 grams or something per person per session. Terpenoids are not all easily detected by odor nor are they all volatile. Sesquiterpenoids because of their generally higher molecular weight are less volatile and as such they are less noticeable through olfaction. THC a terpenoid for example has no detectable odor is high boiling and not removed in appreciable quantities by 190 proof or extremely high vacuum levels (not to brag but I just picked up a welch duoseal 1405b for $130 that produces a .1 micron vacuum). sesquiterpenoids generally are more pharmacologically significant imo as well. Although hard to make generalizations I've found less polar solvents produce more aromatic extracts than more polar solvents.

I don't see much evidence of lipids being removed by winterizing, although certainly there's some aliphatic acids in the epicuticular waxes. If I were to guess stearic acid would be the primary component but I'd guess it to be quite soluble in ethanol. I'd guess the other epicuticular waxes, particular those found surrounding the gland heads would be the primary precipitate in winterizing higher quality nonpolar extracts, terpenoid, flavonoid, aliphatic hydrocarbons mostly with the fatty acids and aliphatic alcohols found in the waxes remaining for the most part, but I'm just stating my best guess I don't have the analytical data on what exactly precipitates and since it is a complex mixture would be hard for me to say with certainty.
 

noreason

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I was forgetting to post the QWET extraction I did some time ago.

The procedure is the following:

I took 13 gr. of frosty dried flowers and put in a pyrex bowl in the oven at 50/75°C (120-170°F) till the flowers were crunchy enough.
This step should help losing chlorophyll without damaging the resin.

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After the oven I put everything in the freezer for 12 hours. Alcol too. Being sure to seal the weed into the bowl with some cellophane avoid possible condensation in the next step.

Once 12 are passed, I added the alcol (etOH 95% and water 5%) in the bowl, doing it quickly to avoid hotter air touches the cold flowers.

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5 minutes gently shaking the bowl and a following filtration using a 31µm inox screen to keep out fats from the solution.( I noticed a lot of fats on the screen).

After put the solution to evaporate and having some booze for the vapors, it's the collecting time.
This time I used a ceramic white plate instead of glass and it was way easier to collect the resin as the incremented contrast of the white was very helpful.

However scratching the oil was an hard work and I need to keep the plate warm to make it easier. It was like 30 minutes or more to collect everything.

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And this is the final hard vitreous extract

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noreason

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In the attempt to melt the extract all in one piece I used hot water to warm it, but even after a long bath time, the extract still don't want to melt. I do not have the possibility to use an oil bath to increase temperature, so I decided to let it this way, and the final result is some sort of budder. It seems hard, but is breaks into powder once touched with the dabber.
I can say the hot bath changed its texture, without impacts on the aroma or not noticeably.

Starting hot bath

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Partial melting

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Notice the bubbles formed. I think they was residual trapped etOH as bubbling them I clearly smell the vapors.

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When still hot, smelling it I can't recognize any flavors so I guess this temperature is not enough to volatilize molecules, am I right?

Finally, once cool down, that's how it looks

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Even this time the extract ''budderized'' with the hot bath. I think there is something involved linked to liquid/gaseous state of something that change the extract texture. Any of you have more informations about this event?
I would try to redissolve the extract and collect it again to try and see what happen. Any thought?

Stay high and keep it concentrated :wave:
 

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