I’ll get that recorded today. It was on the to-do list as well seeing if pH strips will be affected by the solvent.
I will also water wash the butane and take pH of the water before and after the LLE.
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Correct, nothing changed on our end
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Except the tank of gas…
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Be sure to note the ambient temperature
Trying to water wash solvent does not sound worth it though!
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There seem to be some problematic aspects of analysis of
low MW alkanes …https://theanalyticalscientist.com/techniques-tools/its-all-about-the-residue
In addition to propylene and neo- pentane, there is a whole world of low level diamandoid contamination…(mystery oils) of LPG, butane etc… that no one talks about.
Moreover, I think you may need a special quadrupole scan selection SIM focused on low molecular weight.
Not every lab or any lab is going to do this for you.
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I feel like we are beating around the solvent issue bush right now, because certain labs will get shut down once they realize this is a solvent issue. It is a more prevalent issue then is being lead on. I feel like They are well aware of the issue and don’t want any blow back. So in my mind try and point out anything it could be besides the solvent. That’s how I feel at this point. Beyond frustrated, we’ve known it was the solvent since the first weekend it started happening. I don’t know what exactly, although I can say the amount of odor and mystery oil from distill runs is 100x worse then I ever remember it. Smells like hydraulic fluid. 
13x and cleaning after every distill run seems to really help alleviate the problem. Not 100% fix but alleviate. Thank you Dred for the original recommendation.
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Reading some literature on adsorption of 13x sieves, and had no idea they would hold alkanes… wow.
Will have to do some more reading
This bolsters the case that whatever it is sequestering should be able to be detected via analysis of the seives.
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apparently 13x is the preferred media for separating isobutene…
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Ours didn’t retain any butane, propane, or heptane (which would have come from the denatured ethanol).
Isopropyl alcohol and acetone never show up in our butane/propane extracted live resin (nor did they show up in the unpurged extract). Typical denature ethanol cross-contamination in our butane/propane extracts would only show ethanol and heptane in amounts that make sense based on the source solvent.
We have had chalky THCa crystals test at 99.7-99.8% THCa and show over 1000 ppm butane (rather than the typical non-detection). I’ve seen residual solvent and HTE seep out of solid THCa crystals after sitting on the shelf for a week, post-purge.
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just because it didn’t get all of the EtOH out doesn’t mean it didn’t adsorb some…
That is not what I said. This specific molecular sieve was already contaminated with denatured ethanol before being used on butane/propane.
And is why the mods should be pulling all irrelevant threads to the ec
First Jar from Distilled Solvent Tank after running Material. -15C contaminated.
Second Jar direct From Cannagas 12C.
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@Dred_pirate is there an amount of gas you can run over the 13x sieves at which point they will poison, in other words the extract will start to Medusa?
If so, at this point you would have the maximum amount of whatever they are adsorbing. If you’re going to test some sieves, make sure you load them up like that to give the best chance of detection.
Just my 2 cents.
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Do you mean straight out of the container, or material that was left exposed to the lab air conditions.
I do not understand the COA…what does it represent?
How was it contaminated with denatured ethanol?
I am not sure whether the molecular structure of the x13 will stand up to this…but a couple hour’s run in a self cleaning oven at 750 F or so…should desorb and pyrolyze all organics.
Unless you are using expensive Sigma x13…lesser grades may have an enormous number of chemicals adorbed to the surface…you have SOP cleaning step before use? Then re-bake or something? At least for the attempt to ID mystery adsorbent…a standard and suitable control is necessary. This does not mean you have to use any such procedure in Production…just for this experiment.??? if you just pour some fresh out of jar x13
into a colum…and sort of follow this procedure : /doi.org/10.1016/0016-2361(92)90190-Y
should give a decent unused control.
I’ve brought this same thing up to a friend a few months ago. Has nobody tried tapping cans as a type of control yet? Seems like a great way to narrow the issue down to solvent.
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I took samples from the stock tanks as part of my method. Always stable.
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