Seperating THC from our CBD distillate

in the past we have made all of our own products so we could dilute THC down below .3% on our own based on what product is being made. With bulk CBD distillate production and distribution means we want the highest possible CBD with >.3% THC. what are my options? is it essentially only column chromatography? Is there a roof on the THC content in the hemp biomass we are getting to prevent high THC? Just using common sense, with high to mid 90% distillate is going to bring with it concentrated THC. Just wondering what our options are since we cant dilute it out.

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Maybe start here? CBD Isolation

Then check out some of these Search results for '' - Future4200

One of the things I don’t see mentioned as pro for Wiped Film vs Short Path - #3 by Phytoalchemy is that you can fractionate to a much greater extent with an SPD because you have more plates.

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have you seen the hybrid popes? best of both worlds, it has a fractionating column and the wiped section behaves as a reboiler. How’s that for adding theoretical plates! images

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Wow so that pope can column chromotagraph the material in line?

Neither of the those posts touch on actually removing the THC compound from Hemp derived distillate :confused:

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Your options are:

  1. crystallization
  2. fractional distillation
  3. chromatography.

I agree that those threads do not explicitly state that a couple of rounds of crystallization should reduce the thc content drastically…but it is implied by the term “isolation”.

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no, but its a little more exact than the standard wfe i see out there.

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no its short path and wiped film in one.

Honestly, I think you need to get a better understanding of the various cannabinoids and how the behave as well as all the equipment and its purpose in order to separate them. THCa and THC (your subject vs what you are actually talking about) have different properties and crystallization characteristics.

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If you decarb the entire mess the cbd will be the only thing that wants to crystalize. decarbed d9 thc will not form crystals. So like @cyclopath said, recrystalation would probably be a primary route.

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That’s incredibly helpful. Thank you

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If your only concerned with high cbd% and just need trace levels of other cannabinoids. Dilute with whatever oil to get the thc % below 0.3% and then add cbd isolate to get your cbd numbers up

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How would you remove the THC through Fractional distillation? I have done 3 passes & THC is still just over 4%?

How do you crystalize the THCa without crystalizing the CBD as well simultaneously??

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You crystallize the cbd, not the thc. Thca will crystallize as will cbd. Thc will not. I’m not clear on cbda. I believe it will crystalize, but have not seen it first hand

After three passes through your spd there should be no thca. Only thc and cbd. Only one of those will crystallize.

more theoretical plates (packing) might help…

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Ok, is there a way to remove the from my Distillate without Crystalizing???

Chromatography?

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Are you familiar with this method? Or can you point me in the right direction??

I appreciate any help & advice!

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I’ve done a fair amount of chromatography, none with the cannabinoids yet.

why are you against crystallizing? it is the simplest solution.

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You can invest $100k into a BRintruments spinning band system and retrofit it with a difussion pump. I believe the high separation ability coupled with ultra-deep vac will allow you to separate the two, however it won’t be a perfect separation and you will need to start with highly purified material as Cannabinoids tend to pull each other up with azetropic bonds and some contamination is inevitable.

And for everyone who is about to say it’s not possible, consider the fact that CBD will not distill and carry over into the condenser if the head (vapor temp) is too cold - IE 155-157°C (which is the boiling point of THC). Combine that with the amount of theoretical plates the BR offers and you may just get the result you want provided your able to acheive some deep-ass vac IE with a difussion-pump :sunglasses:

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This is also not scalable and people work to seperate thc from cbd to sell it. Spinning bands can only get you so much material

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Everything is scalable - I think your argument is that there is limited standard equipment with commercial availability for our industry which is true… But consider that even CTS KD30’s , 75’s, and 300’s didn’t exist until a need for them arose. You can get a BRintruments with a 22L Boiling flask - and here’s a pic of a medium level scaled-up version of what I’m talking about with the BR as well.
distillation-machine-500x500
And if we are talking about massive scalability for separating compounds precisely by boiling point, the ultimate solution is a fractionation tower, not a wiped film:
300px-Colonne_distillazione

Better yet - the ultimate Refinery goal would be to utilize multiple distillation methods in a tightly controlled closed-loop setting.

-cheers

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