which solvent would be better for extraction with fresh frozen material? THC-a crystals being the end goal.
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I’ve had great luck using cryo hexane as the primary extraction solvent and you can crash diamonds out pretty easily once you recover some of it in a roto.
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butane
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i put pentane in my cls and ran it cold and was disappointed in the results. would have been better if i ran it warm but then would have pulled fats etc.
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Definitely needs a much longer soak at those temps when using hexane or pentane. I’ve done 12 hrs overnight in the cryo freezer and it didn’t pull many fats or lipids and the yield was solid.
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Yeah but pentane dissolves thca much better warm then cold So that trade of and time isn’t worth it. Butane is the initial best solvent for thca. just my 2 cents
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I’d almost always go with pentane unless the oil is going to be distilled.
The reason being pentane is a lot easier to remove than hexane and hexane seems to be more damaging to the nervous system.
Another reason to use pentane in this scenario specifically is because it’ll evaporate easier under conditions that won’t decarb your oil (assuming you’re extracting thca)
Edit: butane and propane is a lot easier to achieve thca crystals. The advantage to using pentane or hexane would be using a simple large scale reactor vs a rated closed loop with small material columns
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There should be no worries of hexane damaging your nervous system so long as you are engaging in proper handling and purging.
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Sure, you can remove any solvent, that’s obvious. But pentane would be quicker and wouldn’t require as much heat. For thca, heat can be an issue
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So to extract thc-a butane I know is best but I am unable to use in the lab. I have pentane and hexane on hand. Seems like pentane is better? Still unclear
I personally would go with pentane because the lower boiling point allows you to recover it faster and at lower heats with a rotovap.
Faster means you can get more done but you have to have a badass chiller to get cold enough to recover it, otherwise a lot of vapor will get past your condensing coils. If you don’t have a great chiller, you can put a ss condensing coil in a dry ice bath installed after your roto and before your vacuum pump inline.
You have to keep in mind that high heat and vacuum will decarboxylate your thca into d9 which will not crystalize under normal crystallizing sops.
If you don’t have a good chiller and don’t want to invest in ss condensing coils dry ice etc, you can use hexane but the process will be slow on the recovery side because you need to stay below 35c to avoid decarboxylation.
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With hexane you will have to vacuum purge longer than you would with pentane because you can also decarb in an oven and hexane has about 60f higher boiling point
Thanks man
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Rereading my comment, I realized I explained it wrong .
If you don’t have a good chiller and want to use pentane you need to have your inline setup like this
Roto, condenser, ss coil in bath, cold trap, vacuum pump
The cold trap should have a rather large collection flask to avoid stopping to empty flask as much as possible. Good luck and be very careful. Pentane is very easy to catch fire.
Awesome, thank you. Doing a small batch for R&D lol
Used to run a CLS with a 900# recovery tank man, I know safety
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For sure. I meant it as no offense. I just always urge caution when others are working with pentane, especially if I don’t know their background
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For sure, I do appreciate the safety warning. Currently work with ethanol and hexane occassionally
I changed my mind on this subject after spending time around hempsters who have spent too much time with hexanes.
Shits awful
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