Newbie question here. I am getting really bad odors from my vacuum pump. It was purchased as used equipment. I thought the exhaust filter was contaminated with mercaptoethanol but a friend said it was the Terpenes. I thought Terpenes were sweet smelling similar to pine essence or citrus like. I am more inclined to believe the smell is mercaptoethanol that has been carried over from its former use. The system is a 2" pope w.f.d. unit. Any thoughts?
If it was used for distillation before it is likely to have a stinky, schwitzy smell. Embrace this aroma
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If you clean/overhaul/rebuild it properly you get it to stop smelling that way. If you have it hooked up to a Pope and you don’t push off a vast majority of the terpenes from your oil before you run it, it’s just gonna end up smelling like that again.
Do yourself a favor, get a mist filter and an exhaust fan to run the funk outside. Otherwise, you’ll go home smelling like that every day. I’d imagine it’s probably not great to be breathing that funk everyday anyhow.
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There’s a few different types of terpenes, and the good smelling ones are not all of them. The smell of raw cannabis contains multiple layers of terps that make up that smell The good smelling ones are monoterpnes. Things like limonene, pinene, and myrcene are part of the highly volatile monoterpene group. The bad smelling ones are sesquiterpenes or triterpenes. They often smell like burnt rubber and rotting fish.
Monoterpnes are the lightest of the bunch, and they evaporate/get released first. Your decarb/devol stage likely removes a majority, if not all of these prior to distillation. This means that the only smells left going into distillation tend to be the bad ones. If your vacuum wasn’t protected with a cold trap, it is likely that the oil (and machine itself to some extent) has picked up some of those terps, and that is what you’re smelling.
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Your best bet is to clean the pump like @ExTek90 said, install a mist eliminator and some good ventilation.Better cold trappin’ like @Akoyeh mentioned is the last piece in this puzzle.
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Like what my leybold currently smells like after running a clients garbage trim run. Smells like burnt ammonia!
welcome to distillation. embrace the odors
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Sure, like when I spilled my terp fraction bf on my hand when I went to dispose of it. Washing with 99%iso, 190 etoh, acetone, etc, nothing removed the stank for weeks. It was rank!
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Dont forget to change your vac oil after every run!
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“embrace this aroma” 
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i like to decarb in a hot plate to atmosphere. only drawback is when you descend from the hills and go into the city smelling louder than wiz khalifa. Everyone always says I “smell good” though haha
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I do the same. But in my spd boiling flask and mantle
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It has a cold trap, dry ice/ iso as well as a mist eliminator on the vacuum exhaust. The vacuum exhaust then runs through activated charcoal scrubber.
Is that how it was run prior to your purchasing it?
Not sure what it was used for before other than it was bought as a used equipment item.
Dove bar soap seems to work the best of anything I’ve tried honestly.
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How do you use it in the setup?
Why is this what everyone in America says haha. Its always interesting how many different tones it can be said in.
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WTf r u talking about?
Responding to two separate other commenters. Both regarding the fish fart terps that comes with distillation and follow us everywhere
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