Hard distillate vs soft distillate

Help Support and Requests
1

I’ve been trying to understand distillate a little better so I can be an educated buyer. I run a small vape company where My goal is to have the highest thc tips vs the competition

Buying on the black market can be difficult but I’ve learned to steer away from weird smells(egg,motor oil), red coloring/streaking or swirling. But recently the supplier I have has been giving me soft distillate instead of the usual hard snappy stuff. This is soft but not sticky. No smell and relatively nice color for d9 and the price.

I’m going to get it all tested and see how it compares but I was just wondering if anyone had any experience or input/tips to avoid scams while the results are being tested.

6 Likes
2

I’ve always found higher purity distillate to be more stable. Would be real easy to cut some distillate with MCT to increase the weight without adding any smell or flavor.

11 Likes
3

I doubt that someone is intentionally adding cuts to increase weight, although I’m sure it’s happened.

More often than not, it is the result of inadequate removal of solvents, typically terpenes.

Abnormally high CBD content can do this too.

7 Likes
4

Speaking of CBD, I’ve had a bunch of CBD distillate contaminated with hemp seed oil, it’s a runny mess

9 Likes
5

Interesting, they don’t separate out easily via traditional distillation?

1 Like
6

thanks for the input future and ghettoyellow :+1:

1 Like
7

I bought some hemp seed oil to see if I can pull a nice clear fraction out of it. We have a client that is looking for some kind of cut for their vapes (not advocating this). But we pondered that if it could be at least hemp derived, that the carts can be sold as 100% hemp.

2 Likes
8

While I agree about the stability at high purity, I will say that two distillates could have very similar cannabinoid content and have totally different consistencies. I’ve seen this specifically in the case of ethanol extracts that were not winterized. During distillation, the pressure is very jumpy, and it seems as if something is breaking down throughout the run and creating these spikes. I think it be them fatty acids breaking down into much shorter chain hydrocarbons or something like that. The final consistency is always much more jelly-like, even when testing at 80-85% (second pass, sometimes third if really nasty). Winterized distillate in the same 80-85% range is stable enough to get your tool stuck in. It’s something in the impurities (it also needs to be dabbed a little warmer and isn’t smooth at all).

Seems pretty easy to clean up with a nonpolar solvent, no?

3 Likes
9

Seems to me a nonpolar solvent would be just as hungry for canabinoids as the hemp oil.

3 Likes
10

will winterizing work?

11

I had similar thoughts. It may work to remove the bulk of the compunds.

12

I guess there is a whole range of polarities involved in contents of hemp seed oil. I overlooked it. Linoleic acid seems more polar than cannabinoids. Maybe a series of liquid-liquid separations will work, with a gradual change in polarity of either solvent system?

2 Likes
13

No. But they will separate with liquid partioning. Damn Canadians grinding all the seedy tricrop

3 Likes
14

That’s it, a gradient basically. Our conclusion was to label it as Cannabinoid rich hemp oil

3 Likes
15

That’s a hell of a product, honestly…

1 Like
16

so the key to making distillate for vape carts that don’t require added ingredients is to chuck pollen? Good to know…

I’m guessing the extraction solvent chosen also impacts oil pickup from the seeds. Do you know what was used in your case?

Isn’t this going to be an on going issue?
provisioning acres upon acres of clones is expensive.
Or are folks selling feminized hemp seed?

17

You know what would be interesting to try if you’re doing 2x distillation on runny stuff, is including a winterization step in between the two distillation rounds…

I collected some distillate jar scrapings via ethanol washes and threw it in the freezer to see what happened. Some stuff definitely settled out, and I thought I was doing winterization properly with 2 cycles of freezing/filtration!

2 Likes
18

How do you filter out hemp seed oil?

19

so the tests came back and the cannabinoid content was normal. THC over 85% and misc CBN CBD totalling 90-93%

I do not notice a difference in potency, hard vs soft based on this info

2 Likes
20

Dont know if its been suggested but my guess would be a small .5-3% phytol contamination. Its a mostly odorless terpene that sometimes slipps in during a rushed distilation. Small amounts change the viscocity but little else.

5 Likes