Does anyone have experience with both of these types of evaporators for cbd oil distillation? (Solvent removal and purification)
Opinions online vary significantly and would like to get the opinion of someone that has tried both systems.
Thanks
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thin film for solvent removal. wiped film for actual distillation of cannabinoids.
calling solvent removal “distillation” is not incorrect, but using “distillation” for two separate processes (both required to reach your goal) muddies the water enough that it is not the norm.
look at it this way; when “distilling” your primary target is that which evaporated and condenses. when you’re removing solvent, you certainly want as much of it back as possible, but your real goal is the sticky stuff left behind in flask A. when distilling cannabinoids, your target moves from flask A to flask B
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Ah, thanks for the info.
When I read about wiped film they claim that you do 1 pass to remove solvents then another pass to distill like a short path distillation unit. Which doesn’t make much sense to me.
you can absolutely run a WFE that way. most don’t. because a thin film (rotovap) with the same throughput is cheaper.
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I’ve been using only rotovaps so far but I don’t think they can remove solvents as fast and as efficiently as a wiped film evaporator.
I said cheaper…
WFE is certainly more efficient. also more complicated, and therefor more expensive.
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Yeah but you do get what you pay for in this instance. The two are not even comparable in performance and quality of product.
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I’ll just shake my money tree and replace my rotovap with wipers then. Thanks for the info!
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if you’re sold your sold…
quality of product?
as in “better” crude after solvent removal? I’m dubious.
have to admit I’ve never bothered wasting my WFE’s time stripping solvent. don’t use it for stripping terpenes either. both those can be done more cheaply using other methods/equipment. saving the WFE for distillation of cannabinoids increases throughput for less $$ than buying another. A WFE absolutely produces great distillate…and it’s usually the bottle neck because they cost an arm and a leg, and folks “make do” with something smaller than they need. why give it more tasks to perform if it can’t keep up?
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Actually you can get them pretty cheaply from china now.
I used to use buchi rotovaps and now I use Chinese ones, they get the job done just as well for a fraction of the cost.
So I assume the wiped film evaporator from china would be quite adequate.
Cool, now go shake the “contribute something useful to the conversation” tree and then maybe we’ll get somewhere. 
he did. he’s looked at the economics of this long and hard. and shared most of his insights, many in the form of spread sheets.
you’ve asked a reasonable question. you also seem to have decided on the answer.
you can absolutely buy WFE units that WON’T distill cannabinoids. they’re cheaper than the ones that will.
Well they are to be used only for solvent removal not cannabinoids.
And you did answer my question about the 2 actually.
consider membranes for solvent removal.
phase change is expensive…
note the lack of wipers in this thread:
Yeah I noticed a huge price difference between a thin film evaporator and a wiped film one.
Ive used a two staged rolled film to wiped film kd unit and a two stage wiped film. I preferred the 2x wiped film because the wiper is the limiting factor in distillation. Even though the roller rips through feedstock, I end up having to divert the flow into stock pots rather into the second stage hopper which just creates more work and mess. Big right arm vs small left arm situation. So unless you have the beefy-est of wipers, a roller probably won’t do you much better than a dedicated stripping reactor and a wfe.
Can’t really see it but pictured is the chemtech rft6/kdt6 two stage with some distillate.
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Thank you, appreciate the feedback.