I am going to hopefully be starting up my own CBD isolate production lab. I have a couple questions regarding my process and expenses. I have little money and want to get up and running for as cheap as possible.
Can I get away with this process of purification? I’m trying to avoid distillation and am not sure if this will get me to the purity required for crystallization.
Right now my only expenses would be buying the crude, isopropyl alcohol, and pentane because I already have a significant amount of glassware. Also I am in PA and we don’t need a permit/license to process hemp currently. What other expenses should I expect/keep in mind?
Finally, do you guys think I should just start with biomass instead of crude? The main reasons I didn’t want to was because of the hassle and smell of decarboxylation, however it might be more economical to just start with biomass.
Won t work
Please please take time to read read and read some more
From the tech above it shows that you lack a lot of knowlidge
Isolate to be. Sellable needs to have a 98% purity at least that is the very least
We are here willing to help but you need to learn the basis yourself
Buying this info is also an option
Be wellđź‘Š
From what I’ve read, CBD can crystallize around 60%. Just because the solution is impure, doesn’t make the crystals impure. Washing the crystals with cold pentane should in theory remove any other impurities which happened to precipitate during the cooling of the pentane. Also, I mentioned chromatography to further purify the extract, which could easily get it high enough to crystallize, I just don’t know right now what would be the best mobile phase/stationary phase/if I should use an isocratic column, etc. I mainly just want to avoid having to distill the CBD.
This is a example of cristalization at low saturation numbers the first amount comes fairly clean but as soon as gunk starts concentrating there is no way to keep it out of the crystal lattice
That isn’t true. The more impurity in your solution can lead to entrapment of impurities in your crystal structure. The higher purity is also needed to not lock up your chromatography column or destroy your resin with terpenes and crude pigment each run, not just induce crystals. If you do a cold pentane wash you are slaying your yield and continuing down a road that isn’t profitable unless you purchase a chromatography system to run your liquor, which should run you just about the same as a glass short path all the way up to a large steel wiped film depending on scale and quality. No amount of reading can replace experience. It’s not smart to cut corners. If you’d like, hit up some separation labs that charge tolling for chomatography of crude - I don’t think you’ll get the best feedback.
It is possible, however, I’m sure the cost of chromatography media would very shortly outweigh the cost of distillation equipment. Silica 60 isn’t exactly cheap.
So experiment away and show us your results. 100g at a time is a great R&D size- I suggest utilizing a DCVC chromatography column packed with activated alumina, it’s a cheap packing material and does good work on removing pigments
You might also be interested in trying some LLE purification- working between methanol and alkane with a higher BP than pentane (heptane being the star choice for me due to its lower toxicity than hexane and it’s easier to work with when it’s not rapidly evaporating into atmosphere like pentane does)
Adsorbants will be your friend here - a pull past a CRC stack would be something to look at
This post is a world salad I’ll edit it in the morning so it’s coherent. Happy full moon
