if your ethanol was “wet”, then yes, your extraction would not have gone as expected.
Do I think Iso is a better choice? NO! see: Iso vs ethonal
Not unless you simply can’t obtain ethanol in the required proof. 190.
Can you post pictures?
Because you should see “stalks”, they just shouldn’t have anything in the heads.
1gal to 2lb should be plenty.
what size are your “buckets”?
have you read: Bucket Tek (Cold Ethanol Extraction on a Budget)
You’re not going to get it all.** The economics of solvent recovery mean that most folks optimise on a cost basis.
Aiming for 95% isn’t unrealistic, but 90% might be closer to the truth if you’re not agitating. Capna claims 98.5%?
I hear the CO2 guys give up at around 90%.
I certainly aimed at “90% or better” when I had access to a GC.
I didn’t see much difference in extraction efficiency (HUGE difference in the quality of the meds!) when I changed the companies week long room temp ethanol soaks to QWETs targeting 90sec residence time.
Yes, there were yield differences, but who needs 45% CBD that takes a week, when you can get 80% CBD that takes 15min? especially if you’re getting essentially the same kg of CBD??
I didn’t have a fuge at that point, and @Lincoln20XX reckons that should have put me closer to 83% …(same as Capna)
I drip dried the material with no evaporation for 3 days. so I’m sticking with ~90%.
I’ll admit I didn’t test all my input. I did however run the same 3-4 strains, always tested the output, and always did a sanity check on the expected yield.
I’m shopping for a GC right now to develop solid efficiency numbers for the Ace15 & Ace30.
compare @Demontrich’s ethanol extraction to yours.
then go check out @TheLostBiologist’s
** you can get it all…and you can do it with only water as your analytical tool. you just have to do 3 washes, or a whole lot of solvent. You also have to understand what it means to be a loucher 