T-5 does appear to be pulling out some browns, and I theorize oranges since I’m not seeing those after the use of carbon, but t-5 alone does not remediate greens at all, carbon removes all of that.
This is my t-5 layer. I separate my media layers with 25u filter paper to disturb the beds less so this had been topped with a paper and a thin layer of carbon, hence the carbon around the edges.
I did try just running over t-5 alone again and it appeared to do very little to nothing to color, but increased clarity immensely. Next time I’ll run a bit over carbon and celite alone to verify it comes out orange, then some over t-5 alone to show it still has that bright green color, and finally a combo to show that yellow seems to require a combination of both.
I have tried at both -18°C and room temperature and neither method seemed to affect the performance of the medias. I am curious what would happen if we ran it through at -40 - -70°C, but I don’t know if my ceramic and glass buchner setup could withstand those temperatures.
I also don’t know I like the low ph of T-41 so I’ve been using a neutral carbon paired with my neutral t-5 hoping to protect my cannabinoids that way. shrug
At the bottom t-5 alone at room temp, at the top t-5 and carbon. I did not weigh either media this time. I used a 1/8-1/4" thick layer of t-5 and a very thin layer of carbon, maybe .5g-1g. I feel the results are identical to that of the extended cold agitation method, so agitation and exposure time does not appear to improve results.
Have you thought of getting a water aspirator? Worked great for me before I bought my welch. Cheaper than that device you posted as well. Including the pump.
Also, you likely started cold boiling the ethanol already in the flask. Or the pressure differential with ambient humidity. Kind of like how a plastic water bottle suddenly clouds when you twist it to build pressure and suddenly release pressure.
That makes sense to me. I think i did note some boiling, but it all happened so fast and i cut it immediately i couldn’t be sure lol.
I happen to have a garden hose fitted water aspirator designed for aquarium cleaning. I could attach it to a hose, or faucet(I have an adapter), and get a pvc reducer to connect my 1/4" hosing to the other garden hose sized fitting. Think that would suffice? Still add a pressure gauge inline?
I think that would work? Pretty sure the vacuum would depend mostly on the flow rate. Which a garden hose would be great for. If it doesn’t, this is the one I ordered from Amazon. I also got a steel one, but never ended up using it because I got the Welch by the time it finally came in from China and got through customs.
Now, that I like. I like the part about not wasting water, I know it might sound silly, but fresh water is a precious resource; One I’ve been raised my whole life to use sparingly and recycle whenever possible.
To get this stuff done I’m gonna hit it 1 time with the garden hose one and an attachment from Lowe’s or whatever, but I think I’m gonna have to order that aspirator.
So you’ve got a ton of experience recovering ethanol… You think the countertop distiller is adequate to evap and decarb simultaneously? Decarb is kinda my goal after all. Or should I be trying to use my vacuum chamber and a cold trap, then decarb later? Rotovaps are way beyond my price range.
I was born and raised in the desert, so I definitely hear you on water conservation. There are diaphragm water pumps that are relatively inexpensive as well to use in conjunction with the aspirator. I believe 7 gallons per minute is what most say is “minimum”. I got away with 5 gpm for $14, but it wasn’t ideal.
As far as decarbing, you’re going to want to do that in a separate step after recovery so that you can make sure to get the temp to 140c and have very precise control of temp and ability to monitor it. A rotovap with an oil bath meets all those needs, but a countertop distiller is either not going to get it hot enough, or more likely, burn your extract. You’re going to get some decarboxilation during recovery, but nowhere near a full decarb. For that, a hot stir plate and beaker would suffice. With a thermometer in the material of course.
That’s great from a warm wash. Any pics of it dried down? In my experience the honey color is a few grades lower than the baby yellow but it’s hard to tell for me when it’s dilute because some batches darken considerably during solvent recovery.
for reference here are two pictures of the same material. the first one with the light color is a cryo-ethanol wash filter through T5 only. The other is the same material after I added a couple more leaders of solvent and spun down again with no T5 but with carbon filter through a one micron glass filter. I feel like when dried down there’s going to be about three grades of color difference between these two I wish I could consistently get the baby yellow but it’s hard to keep The solvent that cold during filtration because it is so slow at that temperature
Dwell times will kill your extract quality. It doesn’t take long as temp rises to start to see the negative impacts. I’ve found that any increase in temps while plant matter is in contact with my tincture results in less favorable color. I go inline filtration through 25um then over a bed of celite on an 2.5um filter all right away in rapid succession. I have found that filtering the particulate out quickly makes a huge difference. I then have more time and ability to play with higher temps when I do my color reduction filtration.
They work fine in dry ice. The surface area isn’t great so cooling vapors is a little limited but I’ve used them a lot as a final vapor catch just prior to my vacuum.
I’ve run -70 through T-41 and T-5 and the T-41 seemed to not do much at all. The T-5 was super slow so slow. At the same temp carbon over celite was better and faster then both T-41 and T-5.
My poor phrasing, sorry. I meant only that the final color is not as light as some other runs and , largely due to my own poor used alcohol remediation methods, color has been a big problem for me. Your color is incredible for those quantities at room temp! It’s 190 proof you use? Anyway I’m not sure t5 does anything, this is the same material, left is through t5 right is through a 1.2 micron glass fiber filter, no carbon nada
