Difficulty with my carbon scrub

I added ~1:4 of AC:CO2extract in 1:10 raw extract:ethanol solution (fats removed) with 60C applied heat for 2 hours with no apparent improvement in the amber color upon filtering through DE.
I’m using BPC grade powdered AC, could the the issue be the type of AC? Do I just need to apply heat for longer? Any tips are greatly appreciated!

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Also curious what chemical gives the extract its amber color?

I usually get better results with bleaching earth and magnesium silicate.

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This was posted today.

Would you mind linking me the products you use?

You can find everything you need here.

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Wonderful, thank you. Curious to know if you know what chemical gives the extract its amber color?

Debatibly it is the thing that prevents oxidation on thc distillates, when you remove all the colors and highly refine the oil it has a tendency to turn red from oxidation. They are likely carotenoids,tocopherols, polyphenols that are preventing oxidation. Care to chime in @QGA?

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Thanks for the info!
I just had a thought… do you know the particle size of pharmaceutical grade AC? Wondering if it’s too small to be filtered out even by celite, which would explain my lack of success with removing any pigment whatsoever.

if you failed to filter out the carbon, you would be looking at black extract. not amber.

if you purchased from a legitimate chemical supply house, the particle size range is on the bottle, or trivially obtainable from the manufacturer. “pharmaceutical grade” while it sounds legit, could be any old thing. see pharmaceutical grade activated carbon - Google Search for examples.

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Please excuse my newb-ness

Are you guys adding the carbon to the jar of etoh while in freezer pre-filtering thru the buchner, in the buchner? I have the alumn oxide, just haven’t tried it yet. The mag-sil costs a bit more than I want to spend at the moment.

Thanks for the help

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You got Celite 545?

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No
Buchner with medium fritted disc
220g Alumn oxide

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Get the celite, you will want it.

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What’s the pore size on a celite 545 filter cake? I got a different form of DE and its pulling most of the AC, but I’m thinking there’s a small % of the particles that are small enough to still get through

Are you seeing any ac debris in your frits?

Doesn’t look like it. What conditions of time+temp+agitation do I need to get the AC to have an effect? I need to try to make this work before moving on to other methods

I’m also using BPC grade AC as it’s all that is locally available. Could this be an issue? My understanding is pharmaceutical grade is higher quality and has better adsorption properties

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Your ac won’t take much color off, bleaching earth’s have the best effect. The carbon is really better at removal of smell/taste. You will want to heat and agitate your mix for an hour or so. If it’s in etoh or a solvent you are limited by its boiling point, set up for reflux with a condenser so you don’t loose your solvent while scrubbing.

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I have a buddy who has shown me co2 oil hes made look like distillate with food grade AC scrubbing and a .45 micron filter. Is it the .45um filter that’s doing the magic then?

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