Inexpensive hydrocarbons - buyers beware

CannaBusiness Vendors
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This thread is being written only to warn members of this e-community. Not trying to pick on any of our competitors and don’t want to start any pissing matches. Truth is that there are very few rules about the hydrocarbons sold into this industry and most extractors don’t know very much about hydrocarbons at all.

The last time I called bullshit on a defective hydrocarbon analysis that was posted on one of these threads, the supplier modified their “analysis” to be more in-line with the nature of high-purity hydrocarbons. I’m not going to post too much information here because I don’t want them to be able to become better at deceiving people.

Our Ohio company has been filling extraction hydrocarbons for the last few years, but I’ve been in the specialty gas and chemical business since the 1990’s. I’ve bought and sold odorless 99.5+% pure hydrocarbons for decades. There is only one ISO approved manufacturer of 99.5+% instrument grade propane, butane and isobutane in the US that sells into the botanical extraction industry - - - Diversified CPC International. Most suppliers to the extraction industry offer Diversified hydrocarbon solvents. These gases they aren’t cheap - but they are consistent & easily meet the advertised specification. I haven’t read the rules and regs of every state, but all that I have read specify that solvents by at least 99% pure. If an extractor is using a blend of, say 70 butane / 30 propane; each component needs to start at the specified minimal purity.

We analyze our bulk loads to make sure the analyses we get from Diversified are accurate and that the gas meets the advertised specification. We got samples from a company offering non-Diversified hydrocarbons. We tested them in house and sent the product to Diversified in Chicago to get a confirming analysis. Diversified’s analytical equipment is superior to ours and that have standards to allow for quantification of impurity levels in the samples. According to Diversified’s analyses (which confirms to our in-house testing), the non-Diversified hydrocarbons analyses resulted in the following gas purities:

Propane: 99.1% pure;
N-butane: 97.96% pure;
Isobutane 92.2% pure. (NINETY TWO !!!)

Most extractors use normal-butane pure or blended with propane. Attached is the analysis for Normal Butane, showing a peak area equating to a purity of 97.96%.

Low purity N-butane report.pdf (848.7 KB)

The awful thing is that even though none of the gases meets the advertised specification of 99.5+% purity, the solvents will still extract oil from plant materials. I suppose it doesn’t really matter if you are not producing for resale, but it sure does if you are - because none of the solvents meets the advertised sales specification. Hell, only one of the three solvents exceeds the likely state mandated minimum 99% purity for solvents. Are state governments actively testing solvents for purity?? No, not that I know if, but if they ever do - this stuff will flat-out fail and your business is vulnerable.

You don’t need to buy from our company, but if you are in a commercial market, you would be well advised to make sure you are getting what your suppliers claim to be selling you.

Rgds,

Jim

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We know people lie about gas quality that’s why we distill the shit out of it no matter where It comes from!

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What’s there to worry about (safety wise) if the only contaminants are lower or higher homologue/branched chain hydrocarbons? I’d personally be more worried about distillation/evaporation residue and its composition, because that can attest as to how the stuff was made and handled.

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Because the other guys have inferior product to his… Duh. The competition cannot compare, the extraction efficiency of their solvent far outpaces the competitors in terms of thermal efficiemcy

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Ae the impurities in the n butane stuff like propane and isobutane or are they something bad? i see the graph but it looks like its only isobutane thats really high? i have no idea the signifigance of the numbers. Can you post the same thing with your gas?

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Probably just different alkanes or maybe an alkene.

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I was probably gonna buy gas from the guy hes talking about off ebay. i dont care if butane has some isobutane. His site has no pricing but im not gonna call and check pricing unless im buying it that day. i get gas in person from bvv. they seem to get it from the gas supply up the street in naperville. I wonder if its the good stuff?

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Joey,

You paint with a very wide brush. Did you actually intend to call me a liar?

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distilling is about the mystery oil unless you are fractional distilling. mysteryoil is just a necessary thing to keep all the carbon tanks from rusting right out.

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If I wanted to call you a liar that’s what I would have done! Don’t get your panties in a bunch it’s just a forum.

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I shared with the group only to warn commercial extractors and others that need to / want to comply with state rules and regulations. Whether the contaminates in off-spec hydrocarbons are harmless alkanes, alkenes or toluene; every hydrocarbon solvent will still pull oil from plant materials.

True that any vendor can create analytical results that show their offerings meet/exceed industry standards for solvent purity. My point is that some in the market actually create analytical reports that are not representative of the products they sell.

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You understand people lie and cheat in every aspect of every kind of business…no one here is even surprised bud it is the way of corporate america

But thanks for the warning about your competitors I guess

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The last time I wrote about the low-purity product on this forum, the company selling it used that information to modify their “analytical report”. I guess I actually helped them manipulate their reports to mimic compliance. I don’t want to make that mistake again.

Email me if you want the information. Jim@qualityextractions.com

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Good to know. Thanks!

Back in the hoary days of yore when we became aware of the wide variation is LPG quality and were seeking commercial sources other than wholesale cases of lighter butane, I sent samples of various LPG offerings to a local lab for analysis. Here is the analysis I received form my first sample of Mystery Oil that I distilled from a case of lighter butane: 8.12 Butane/Propane Mystery oil - GrayWolf's Lair

Subsequent to that initial test, I sent multiple samples from various sources for analysis, and set up at least one supplier of imported refrigeration grade LPG with that lab to act as their receiving inspection resource.

We consider contamination molecules heavier than C-4, and the cleanest LPG that we found with regard to molecules heavier than C-4 was 99.5% and 99.9%, which measured the same and appeared to have come from the same tank, with the added cost of 99.9% for the additional testing.

After becoming aware of Mystery Oil, we made it a practice to without fail pre-distill our LPG. We also conducted distillation plus filtration using VICI Metronics mol sieve columns, with testing before and after.

The 99.5% Praxair that we purchased from Apis Labs actually measured 99.9% before and 99.998% following scrubbing.

The predistillation left a film of heavier hydrocarbons, et al, on the interior surfaces of my collection pot, but no drops or puddles like lighter butane and R-290/600/600A.

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I bet your solvent has stuff that needs to be distilled in a loop, and if you say that’s not the case, I’ll let you buy me a tank!

Never met a solvent supplier that didn’t need to be distilled, and I never willl :slight_smile:

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