Do you have direct recommendations on using the surfactant for ingestibles? I think if you continue to use topical-focused surfactants you might continue running into (nearly) unavoidable flavoring issues.
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I did the same thing lol. Started making my own cereal bars with cannabutter, making cannabutter I googled and added some things to make it better/easier yk adding your own thing to it over time. Your own method. Then started dabbling with distillate and making distillate cereal bars then gummies and cereal bars and then specifically gummies. Do everything on my own w it that way. I just need to keep notes more but have my recipes and techniques memorized and imo have found the golden way for me to make quality for gummies.
Also failed chemistry and literally all of my classes and started to learn on my own from real knowledgeable people and applied any more knowledge I learn to it. Just need to get better at taking notes for everything in general
Yeah. The company i bought it from gave me their ingestible formula (basically just weight of the ps80 and nothing else)
I’m an absolute goofball. The paper says 0.1%, I’ve been using 1% lol!. I’m not sure how dangerous that is. But I am going to remake the lemon syrup with the correct amount of PS80 and it will more than likely make a HUGE difference
. There’s 1% in the THC syrup. but I am diluting 7ml of it in 12 oz. So basically .7g of PS80 to 360g of water
EDIT: I looked at the math. and I’m at 0.2% PS80 per 12 oz. Sooo looks like I wasted 10g of distillate, nice.
Another EDIT: I think I ingested around 10ml of PS80 testing flavors today and around 20ml of SuspendRx(using it for the BitterBloc). Rip my colon man . It was nice sharing my thoughts with you all. It was a good ride lmao.
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On a good note, the last batch of edibles I made had pretty consistent effects all throughout so there’s at least a W somewhere in there.
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Lots of development in the edibles amidst a hectic personal life.
First, I figured out how to make drinks. While still being “safe”/“legal” with the FDA. And that is… grain alcohol 
. We all know ethanol dissolved distillate like no other. When combined with a homogenizer, there’s not many better options for complete homogeny.
So why then does no one recommend it when making edibles?? If you’re cooking the edible the miniscule amount will burn off leaving just the thc (at least, that’s how the chemical reaction SHOUD work). Not too sure. But I am making drinks, which isn’t like pouring wine on steak. I have to worry about laws regarding alcohol content in beverages. But if Kombucha has alcohol, why can’t my drink?
Kombucha usually has around 0.3-05% alcohol. That last number is important. It is the line between non-alcoholic and alcoholic beverages. It is the determining factor between under 21 or needing a plethora of licensing to not only manufacture but sell such a drink. I think people are afraid of this. How can you possibly have such precision to not have even .1% over the legal limit allowed, is probably a question you are asking. I asked the same thing. The truth is, I have no clue. Kombucha is still allowed and I don’t believe for a second that these people are perfectly fermenting these drinks to be at or below .5% EVERY time.
So, I know the limit allowed. I know that it is being tested and probably broken all the time. So how do I take 151 proof ethanol, and put it in a 12 oz beverage without breaking that law. it’s tough
My first dilemma was volume of the mixture/emulsification in the first place.1:1 is pretty tough with the emulsifiers I had to use (no need for Tween because alcohol is a preservative in itself. But I did use xanthan gum to help mix things better and partially prevent separation once it touches cold water. Along with some other things). And then there’s the volume itself, the actual amount of liquid being used. I’ll use easy easy numbers to help.
10g of disty to 15ml EtOH (151 EC). With about 10ml of emulsion material.
This means we have 75.5% of alcohol in about 35ml.
And for average sake, 9,500mg of thc. So 9,500mg/35ml = 271.42mg/ml simplified to 272 (I don’t like to round down. Rather round up to be safer than sorry.)
If we want each drink to be 100mg thc that means we a need 0.367ml drop per 12oz bottle.
At 75.5% ABV in 0.367ml gives us an alcohol content of 0.277ml.
0.277ml of alcohol into 12oz of liquid gives us a total of .078% ABV/12oz
100mg THC and 0.08% ABV per bottle… WOW
I mean, can it be beaten? Sure. But if you’re looking to sell your product and don’t care if your customers need to shake your bottle (because I promise you they do not care they need to shake a bottle if it tastes good) then I don’t really see a more efficient way.
Now if you want to be on the “bleeding edge of cannabis” and go nano, then it’s gonna be a challenge. And you’re gonna have a metric ton of nasty surfactants that probably will be found to poison people and cause cancer or something in 15 years. For me, I couldn’t afford the R&D or the time so I went this route till I can.
And before you say “NO ALCOHOLIC BEVERAGES AND THC”. I’m no lawyer but I’m pretty sure this is like saying drinking kombucha and driving is illegal because it is alcohol in it.
EDIT: I didn’t search the forum because I’m not asking a question but it seems like people have done this? Technically? Not specifically in a drink it seems and people hate explaining math in depth on here so hopefully this will help someone in the future haha.
I also read about people not liking the scalability of certain methods so here’s how it scales. It uses a line. Very similar to the way coke makes their products. Each bottle is filled with a certain amount of syrup (the thc/EtOH) then carbonated water (to make this easier just premix and pasteurize) and then capped. This is super easy to automate. Counterpressure filler for sterilization and boom, auto drinks.
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Long time, turned my idea into a business. Things are difficult and crazy but well worth it.
Finding insurance is a bitch and don’t let anyone tell you starting a hemp/canna company is easy.
Anyways, for anyone that comes up on this thread, this version of putting distillate into water is hard. I tried to recreate it. It didn’t work.
TEMPERATURE IS EVERYTHING. What i realized is that I was actually evaporating most of my ETOH off during the disty-alc-xg cooking so keep that in mind. Edit: i want people to understand, when they are no and learning. So here’s WHY this is bad
: The only other additive in that mixture is the xanthan gum. The XG and the distillate hate eachother. Think of the ETOH as the binder. When that’s gone, the XG and disty will get hard, fast. Put it into a bottle it will float, get stuck on the sides and that will harden too.
Do lots and lots of smaller test if you decide to repeat my steps. I’m falling asleep. Will update letter
I’ve now moved into nano emulsions. The SOP in the forums is basically unusable in my opinion. For most people’s applications it taste horrible, which is par for the course when it comes to drinks and THC.
But that’s not something we can stand by so I paid for a better sop, and had a chemist help me out.
I also came across a friend selling D9 THC drinks. They somehow mixed cannaoil with sugar and the drinks didn’t seperate. Obviously the method of buying flower is not cost effective, and selling D9 isn’t legal in most places. But maybe this knowledge can help you.
That’s all for now, happy holidays to everyone.
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Is this the SOP that you’re talking about?
I’m a personal user who made edibles for a long time but now want to try to go nano for a potentially more potent and consistent dose.
That’s SOP seemed affordable enough for just me and my at home use, but if it isn’t worth doing please steer me in a better direction.
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https://doi.org/10.1111/1541-4337.12189
This article will give you all the informations you need to produce a nanoemulsion via low energy spontaneous emulsification.
It is an alternative, which does not need expensive ultrasonic homogenizers. But you may need to work on the taste, since you use a lot more surfactant and it will get a really unpleasant bitter taste
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Thank you! Taste is something I can deal with as long as it works. None of my blood pressure medicines ever tasted good before but that didn’t stop me from taking them.
Can’t wait to read this over and see what’s possible.
to run a system like this one in my sop it will cost you about 15K for everything you would need
the ultrasonic being the most expensive piece coming in around 11-12K depending on the model you want.
But the ultra sonic is the key to getting it down to the nano meter. It produces sound waves that vibrate at such high frequency that it literally rips the molecules apart which allows the lipids in the surfactant to encapsulate the THC molecules that were shredded by the frequency coming off the probe. This keep them in nano form and creates a stable emulsion
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As others have said. Nano emulsion is not cheap. If you want the benefits of nano (faster onset, better absorption) and you are doing it for personal uses, skip all the surfactant and highly temperamental emulsion science and buy nano water soluble product.
But if you’re just Makin sweets (even gummies) a homogenizer and stick blender is all you really need.
Another alternative if you bought a shit ton of disty like me is sending it to get processed into nano powder…
In my honest In opinion though, nano is not worth the trouble unless you 1. Have a company, 2. Really really need the small benefits or 3. Already have a lab and the knowledge to do it without ripping your hair out or selling a kidney.
If i could go back and do it again, I wouldn’t lol. I’m not a chemist, food scientist, etc.
, and trying to figure out how to essentially change the chemical structure of an oil is hard work even with all the resources out there.
IMPORTANT EDIT : The taste of surfactant is not good. Like at all. It will linger on your buds for a while and nothing seems to help. You NEED to remove the taste(which i kind of outline but not in depth) otherwise every bite will be miserable.
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have you tried sucrose esters/SAIB? I’ve only tried the former with good results, it make some strange bubbles though
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Looks like AMP (Adenosine 5’ monophosphate), sodium gluconate and sodium acetate do a good job at masking bitter taste. And they are cheap. May be worth a try with nano emulsions
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Your response and another person’s reply has me rethinking this now.
I’m not wealthy by any means, but I love making all my own meds start to finish. And seeing as I plan to continue using cannabis as medicine for hopefully a long time to come, I don’t see 15k as ridiculous for personal use.
That said, I feel like the benefits are going to be real small for me in the end because ultimately a tolerance will build up to nano emulsions just like my normal distillate infused edibles of choice.
What I’m thinking of trying instead now is adding different cannabinoid isolates like CBD or maybe cbg to see how things feel. Made 200mg/75mg THC distillate/CBD isolate cough drops today that were good, but I’m not sure there CBD actually added anything noticable to the experience.
Best way to start 
Add acidic cannabinoids…
I feel dumb, but are there markedly different effects using the acidic versions of different cannabinoids in edibles?
I’m real interested in mixing other cannabinoids with THC in edibles so getting little bits of info on what is good to mix in my recipe is pretty exciting.