One, two three, The dance of the Tao and the ten thousand things….
2 Likes
Just stumbled across my first attempt at this trick.
Circa 2015.
Prv would have made more sense than gauges…
Nowadays we decarb upwards of 20kg at a time…and are looking to scale again at some point
9 Likes
What are your Jackets set too?
It doesn’t appear you use anything to agitate?
Is that 10kg in each of those vessels? how long does that take?
Based on the gauge, I assume you are decarbing under vacuum.
So do you pull full vac when cold/RT, close the valves and seal it off? Then heat it? Makes sense, the vacuum probably offsets a little of the CO2 pressure
1 Like
No, but you would be silly to not start by pulling the oxygen out prior.
Start under vac end under pressure.
6 Likes
In my decarb under pressure setup, I like to N2 pressure test and purge before vacuum out vessel atmosphere. The 60 ish psi nitrogen pressure test and purge prior to vac helps reduce O2 further.
5 Likes
yep this is what I said!
pull vac, backfill with 5psi of N2, then decarb, end under pressure.
2 Likes
Why are so many decarbing under pressure vs under vac? Under vac seems like the real winner in my head, safer as well. You dont have to worry about the system failing and shooting parts across the room
1 Like
Isolate vs BHO/rosin with terps.
One gets vac. One would suffer
I happen to use the same rig for both.
Sometimes over the same night.
It is possible that’s isolate in the reactor above. Or it’s pre heat on BHO.
3 Likes
The simple answer is we like making products our customers love. Most people that decarb under pressure have learned that the typical industry vape cart production method of spin off hte and decarb thca is more labor intensive and does not produce a better product. @Dred_pirate would disagree, lol.
Even the product we spin off, I decarb the thca in a pressure vessel under pressure. I would say that in this industry you need to become proficient at safely using pressure vessels.
2 Likes
Why would one be decarbing anything but isolate? Are we not scared of terpenes isomerization into something bad?
2 Likes
You would get a better producr fully seperating your terps so you dont isomerize them during decarb. I feel as an industry our standards need to be better. Not just half ass when its been proven to be able to be done
I initially learned of this decarb under pressure method (also called terp reflux method) from an actual degreed chemist working in the industry. Also you would be surprised at how many large labs have been doing this for years, although they keep quiet about the tek. We have tested before and after batches of BHO and do not see anything in the testing to indicate even a change in terp profile.
If you have any evidence of terp isomerization via this process please share your results.
4 Likes
Oh Jesus, you’re here to argue with even more people that know what they are doing more than you do. Ha Ha Ha Ha.
Why not vacuum to remove the C02 created. Leaving it in there will cause cavitation when you put it in a filling machine and botch your carts. Like when you open those to pour they react violently, spilling all over the lab. That wouldn’t have happened if you were proficient with a pressure vessel. Or would taper your vapor path to a single ⅜ line and argue that it makes it faster.
And furthermore, if you process your ht properly, you won’t have any side reactions with the residual thca starting to decarb after mixing.
And when you open those pressure vessels. If you smell terps, you’re evaporating terps. I know you’re blasting terps into the room. All of your employees have confirmed this.
Have a good day
1 Like
And you should use argon for this if you want to preserve your terps. Being an engineer, you should know this…
As far as you are aware. What about the terpenes you dont have standards for/ arent testing for. Do you have a standard for every bad thing terps can isomerize too? Jist because something has been done for years doesn’t mean its not being done incorrectly.
Terps should see as little heat as possible always
1 Like
Or helium because who cares that there is a finite amount of it 
also lighter than your volatiles.
@globtek33 Ideally, your volatiles should not undergo any isomerization if ambient air is properly vacuumed out before the closed system decarboxylation occurs. However, like you are suggesting, there could still be unwanted reactions occurring due to the heat that cannot be tested for yet, regardless if O2 or any other oxidizing agents are present. My best guess would be to do a before and after analytics to show an ideal 87.7 percent (THC/THCa) weight retention of the final product, with a comparable gas chromatogram of the VOC’s.
3 Likes
@Dred_pirate I was merely stating a fact, that I decarb thca in a pressure vessel. I know you disagree and that’s fine with me, I disagree with some things you promote. I also value your feedback on some things.
I decarb thca in a pressure vessel because our testing has shown spinning off hte leaves up to a percent or two terps in the thca. One thing I know is that if there is sufficient oxygen exposure during decarb the terps go to absolute shit and the product has to go through spd to recover the cannabinoids. So my options are to decarb under vac in the same pressure vessel pictured. Some terps remain with that method and co2 is removed. Or I can nitrogen purge the vessel then vac it down to 20 torr and decarb with very minimal oxygen. This way more of the remaining terps in the spun off thca are retained.
You are correct the decarb under pressure leaves co2 in the product, but no worries it is easy to deal with. I place it in rotary evaporators and apply low heat and vacuum to degas the material. It makes filling super easy with absolutely no co2 problems whatsoever.
Once again you are correct, there are some terps that can be smelled when venting the head pressure off the vessel. After refining the process the terp smell is less than we get off purging solvent out of the BHO in 85 F vac ovens. But yes there is a faint terp signature while venting. We consistently get 7-10% terps on this process, so on 2kg and 9% that is 180g of terps. How much do you suspect we lost venting the vessel and only having a slight terp smell? 100g, 10g, 1g, 0.1g
@406_Chemabis I did not adopt this process without consideration of potential ramifications. Chemistry is not my area of education, so I consulted with several chemists and a couple other specialists regarding unwanted reactions and the likelihood of creating something dangerous via this process that would not be created during the combustion of flower or concentrate. I also looked at several other companies that have been producing 600,000+ of grams of decarbed BHO per year for vape carts. I hate the fact the experiment was performed but we did not have vape gate 3.0 after several million grams were consumed. I have the ability to perform the testing you suggest. Give me the exact details of the testing you would like to see performed. I could weigh the jacketed vessel before and after decarb, but there would still be dissolved co2 in solution. Once I transfer to rotary evaporators and degas there would be some transfer loss. The before and after terp tests are pretty easy, I will have to ask about getting the chromatograms.
5 Likes