Hello Everyone, my name is Jack, I graduated from the University of North Carolina with Bachelors of Science degree studying computer science with a minor in biology. I have started my own CBD lab in Charlotte, NC called Cannavessel Labs. The idea to get into the hemp industry all stems from my invention/idea of creating “The Cannavessel” (hence the name of the company). I will go into more detail about this project later on. The company started off with a couple of friends from college and it’s slowly turning into something much more.
I’m starting a series or blog called, “The Unforeseen Challenges of the Hemp Extraction Industry”, on challenges Cannavessel labs has gone through and how we overcame the setback’s and issues. Future4200 has had a serious impact on our company’s survival in the hemp extraction business, without the information from Future4200, Cannavessel Labs wouldn’t exist. @future has had a huge positive impact on the industry (continues to do so) and is helping thousands of people like myself stay in business. To show my appreciation I want to share my experiences in order to help others avoid making the same mistakes. A lot of the experiences shared will save you a lot of time and money, or they be things you already know and are trivial (I hope not). But nonetheless, I will be posting a new experience once a week. Feel free to post something you may want some more information about, or questions you may have about the industry. There will be people reading this that may find the information to be useful, so if you don’t please keep your negative feedback to yourself. I’m not a professional writer, or do not claim to be an expert in the cannabis industry, but one thing I do have is EXPERIENCE extracting and business experience behind extracting. I know everyone’s tolerance to reading a full blown article is relatively low, so for the time being I’m going to posting short experiences, with the lessons I gained to help you better prepare yourself for the some of the challenges you will be facing in the extraction business. But enough with the formalities here is the snippet of the series.
The Unforeseen Challenges of the Hemp Extraction Industry: Chinese parts and Equipment
China is one of the world’s largest manufactures, they have earned this title by having a cheap labor force and access to raw materials. This is great for the hemp industry, it means we can get cheap stainless steel parts and other lab equipment well… cheap. There are many different United States lab companies selling Chinese equipment at a premium and slapping their logo on them. I’m not going to name any of the companies, but it’s not difficult to figure out who is doing this. I’m not sharing this information to get everyone upset with the companies that do this, there are many benefits to using USA companies reselling Chinese parts. For one, the companies buying large supplies of parts and equipment can afford to send you a whole new piece of equipment when (not if) the Chinese part or equipment breaks. There are many more benefits, but I want to talk about the actual process of buying equipment from China. Most of the working conditions in China (due to the low wage labor force) is extremely poor. This leads to lax manufacturing practices, thus leading to dirty equipment. Now, I know what you’re thinking, just clean the equipment that’s easy. This is where the real world set’s in and you’ll have some issues. There are many different directions I can go with this, but to keep this a quick read I’m going to go into a more specific scenario. If you decide to buy a jacketed vessel (tanks, centrifuge… etc) CLEAN OUT your jackets really well! If you do not do this let me explain to you what can happen to your chiller. Small steel particles that wasn’t properly cleaned out by the Chinese company welders will be left in the jacket and will damage your very expensive chiller. Ultimately, leaving you unable to run for an extended period of time. These small particles can also accumulate in your heat exchanger and can cause deeper problems, such as a refrigerant leak.
Lesson:
Prevent the problem in the first place, add an inline filter to your precious silicone fluid, and while you are at it add another filter to collect ice that may build up over time. It’s also a good idea to have a filter inline as a precautionary measure incase other particulates (that may not have been anticipated) do not build up and add pressure to your jacketed vessels. If you want more details dm me and I will be glad to share the types of filters you can add to prevent this problem.
If you enjoyed this quick lesson please leave feedback, if you have more insight on this topic please feel free to add, or enlighten me with information on this topic I may have missed. Thank you and I hope to continue to keep sharing our experiences!