Opaline Silica Thread

Pure flo / oil dri does everything on site and is also Kosher and NSF certified.

Geórgia

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That sounds perfect. Might also take less media to get that happy color

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Whoever Tom is, I spoke to him a couple of times today. He’s sending me a couple gallon jugs which what @Photon_noir posted above. I’m ecstatic to try it. It’s coming out of a mine in California. Taft… Maybe? I can’t remember exactly what he said

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Ya the b80 mine is in Georgia.
The opaline is the Taft mine
Im excited to hear this goes!

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maybe you do…

you could always start the rumor that playa dust works for CBD to delta9 :wink:

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:rofl: that’s how

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Playa dust hahahahahahahahaha

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It definitely makes D10

https://foresight.org/Conferences/MNT05/Papers/Gillett1/

Table two, BRP is Black Rock Playa

Pretty fascinating, very in depth analysis of silicates

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Is that the structure of silicates? What’s with the cool shapes?
Edit: cool

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I just did a little more math on this:

25 cubic inches weighs about 190g. That’s actually less than half the amount, by weight, compared to what’s being used with other medias. It comes out to about 8.5% of the biomass weight it looks like.

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Per kilogram of biomass, the amount of opaline silica used is 20"³ for amber resin material and 30"³ for brown resin material. The average is about 25"³ per kilogram biomass. This is not accounting for the actual % resin on the biomass… just the level of color bodies.
I calculated that based on the actual inner diameter of a 6" spool, which is 5.782 inches, or 2.891"r² × π × 23" = 604"³… then divided by 20kg of brown resin biomass (30"³/kg) or 30kg of amber resin biomass (20"³/kg).


… Or it can be divided by the average numbers of kilograms per run, about 8kg, divided by the average number of runs, 2.5 (about 20kg), is about 30"³, or up to about 4 runs (32kg) on good stuff, which is about 19"³ per run.

A 4" spool is 3.834" i.d., or 1.917r² × π = 11.545"² , so you only need 1.733" to 2.6" per kilogram in a 4" spool. But remember, I also recirculated the warm solution on 2nd, 3rd, and 4th runs for more contact time (and temperature). Using a longer tube gives you more contact time than a short, wide tube… so even if you are only doing a 1 kilo run, you would be better off using a 1" × 48" or a 1.5" × 24" spool (leaving some room at the top to tie off and wad up your sock)!

BRP = Black Rock Playa!
BRF = Brown Rice Flour!
BRI = Boy, Rich’s Indignant!
BRB = Be Right Back!
BRA = BRO = “My good man!” (In HettiBoi)
BRN = Bring! Right Now!
BRQ = BBQ (missing a delicious rib)
BRT = Roommate of RNE
BRS = BHO Remediation Silica! or Bleach Ranked Supreme!

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I kinda got there a similar way:

Used the avg of 25cu" (of course that can change anytime)

600cu" * 5 = 1 50* bag or 3000cu"

50*453= 22650

22650/3000= 7.55

Volumes is where I went wrong, I was lazy and didn’t put the correct id of the spool. I just used an even 4. (here’s some notes I keep just to show how lazy I was haha)

I actually found that reference for tubing previously, I use it a bunch!

My numbers were very rough, and considerably off. Thanks for the correction, and by this point I feel like I owe you for the lesson!

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It is biogenic. You can search opaline silica chemical in Google and see what people have found.

Opaline silicas dissolve faster and under the chemicals we use. They are not as stable as amorphous silica. I heard someone already put through nmr and all kinds of unknown spikes came up. I would personally not use anything that has dissolution into a solution. At all.

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There’s been warnings not to use this with ethanol for solubility reasons. Is it soluble in hydrocarbons as well?

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I mean if you research before using and have proper protocols in place as well solid sop’s the fine’s shouldn’t be a issue. since starting to use crc ive been very anal about this in the work place. we bought extra respirators(full face) for pre handling. Pre wash everything and use redundancy filters. ive had this concern from the get but it can be completely avoided with PPE,SOP’s, and QC

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I have definitely considered this possibility (with every medium I ever tested), and I can say with 99+% certainty that this material is NOT observably soluble in butane, or probably any alkanes, at all. The 23" level in the sock never dropped (which kinda surprised me, since I figured it would at least settle tighter), and on the initial tests, I was pushing up to 6 runs through the same charge of media. That’s at least 600 lbs of cool solvent from extraction (probably around 450 fresh lbs, total) and well over 2400 lbs of submerged rinsing over at least 12-18 total hours of heated, high flow rate recirculation of 90 to 110°F butane at 50-60 psi! Oh, and this was done at least twice, because the first set needed fresh mol-sieve… so the solvent was about as waterlogged as could be, and neither dry nor wet butane showed any signs of dissolving the silica. All the sharp angles of the granules were still sharp, and field microscopic examination showed no pore size growth, poc-marks, nor any other signs of liquid erosion. There was also no sign of particulate matter or nucleation in any of the resin slabs (except a set about a month later when we got some new guys who were not trained on how to properly pack the cotton ball filter).

I suspect the same can be said for ethanol, even the 190 proof, wet and non-denatured potable stuff!

You may be asking why I did not use mass. Well, I have no idea how much mass of color bodies, pigments, phosphatides, lipids, wax or even desireable parts of the resin like bioflavonoids, water from the extraction, or even leftover butane, might have remained adsorbed to or absorbed within the “clay” after extraction, and even if I rinsed it with acetone, air-dried and cool vacuumed the solvent(s) out for safety, then vacuum baked for the same time and temperature as I did prior to using it, there would still be no definite elimination of any of those variables… not to mention weight loss in dust into the filters and all the container transfers!

Regrettably, it’s just not a very precise science when one is working with room-temperature-gaseous solvents, sticky plant matter and dirt, but I do try my best within (even slightly un-)reasonable doubt, especially where the safety of others is concerned!

Fortunately, that is a much easier and safer test to perform on ethanol… ah, damnit! I lent out my little vacuum oven! Grr!
Well, anyone can do the ethanol/silica solubility test with vacuum oven-dried silica and pure 190 proof potable ethanol, especially now that solubility in cannabis resin and alkanes has been ruled out! You can even microwave it a bit to heat it in the ethanol (only 10 seconds at a time!), reheat, cover and soak for days in excess volume, pre-weigh the vessel and a dry coffee filter and/or cotton ball for use in a funnel to catch the dust mass, etc!
And best yet, you can do a mirror test on the filtered ethanol, to determine if ANY solid residue is left behind! Just filter well and let it settle for an hour or so before sampling with a dropper from the top of the liquid!!

Hey, do y’all remember these?

Those are some test runs in reverse order;
#1 is bottom right run
#2 is bottom middle
#3 is bottom left
#4 top right
#5 top mid
#6 top left

And I knew it was done after run #6, because the starting color from this batch of old trim was not much darker than that, and we had recirculated solution #6 for at least 3 hours! We stopped recovery when the liquid level was about half where it started, so we could continue recirculation another couple hours.

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Thank you for your Christmas gifts, Photon. Now I have a little more idea why you weren’t more forthcoming about those modified EX40 photos I inquired about a few years ago. We were still a few years out from needing to learn about what (some) of those modifications were for.

Thank you for sharing the secrets at last.

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@SamuraiSam

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That’s an interesting improvisation, @Hansel! However, sand is crystalline silica, so it works as a filter aid, but not a decolorant. Also, it should be washed with water, first, to remove any dirt or polar compounds, and probably baked before or afterward above 220°F to kill any microbes and spores! Then it can be flushed with acetone to help clean out any less polar compounds and also to remove the water… but definitely do NOT bake it with acetone in it!

Interestingly, Celite is a brand name of diatomaceous earth (DE), most often calcined specifically for filtration. So although DE is composed of molecularly amorphous (but microscopically structured) hydrated silica, its dehydrated (calcined) form is best for filtration. However, when the raw hydrated DE (sold for killing insects in human grain stores, and as a directly ingestible supplement-like material) is used as a stationary phase in a sort of column filtration of non-polar resin solution, it will chromatographically separate the colors!

Here is a photo of a T-shirt I wear with diatom skeletons on it, to show some of their microstructures:

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@Photon_noir, I personally haven’t done this! @SamuraiSam was asking in another thread about using sand (or something along those lines). I remembered seeing this and figured I would share with him!

Thank you for all the info!

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