winterizing

[mendo420]

I used 190 ever clear.
48 hours in the deep freezer.
I put to much in my pyrex dishes. It took a week in the food dehydrator for the alcohol to evaporate.
I did not end up with shatter like i expected and I think it needs some more work getting the final alcohol out.
140 water bath is what I'm thinking.
next time smaller batch not 60 grams.

I use BUD extracted with a tamisium. This was Mendo Dream.
The op's deleted my tamisium tread. Aholes!!!!
I would have discussed this in detail there.
So I hope you don't mind if I do here.

I have noticed that the tamisium extracts alot of wax.
I get a lot of 'auto buttering'. A solid resin which is great for handling.

I wanted to make some shatter.
I was excited to winterize for the first time.
I dropped the ball on the post weight sorry everyone.

The oil seems smoother on the skillet and in pens.
I get great reviews.

In the end its a ton of work and no one gives the respect to the makers.
so...........

BIG up to Jump117 and Grey Wolf. And everyone else slaving away, sharing the information.
You are an inspiration.

 

[gunnaknow]

Thankyou for updating us, Mendo. How long did you extract the buds for in the tamisium and how ground up were the buds? There is a fair amount of epicuticular wax in the cutical but usually most of it doesn't get extracted unless the buds are finely ground up and the extraction time is very long. However, the fact that the butane is pressurized within the tamisium could be helping the butane to penetrate the cutical and extract more wax.

 

[jump117]

the fact that the butane is pressurized within the tamisium

Pressure allows butane remain liquid at a warmer temperature, which is supposed to improve the solubility of wax.

 

[gunnaknow]

That's also a good point mate. I'd say that it's a little of both. CO2 also extracts more wax when used at higher pressures.

Mendo, if you weren't already winterizing, I would have recommended that you chilled the tamisium in the freezer before injecting the butane and placing the tamisium back in the freezer for the duration of the extraction. The pressure may still have caused more wax to be extracted than in an open system but the cold temperatures should have limited the amount.

gunna

 

[mendo420]

My thread has be re-instated!!!
Here is how i make it.
https://www.icmag.com/ic/showthread.php?t=231567

 

[mendo420]

I grind the bud by hand with a strainer.
I do not invert the column.
It takes about 5 min to empty the solvent chamber.

I keep temps low. I have been playing with extraction temps.
Extractions are about room temp or lower 70F.
I never exceed 100F during reclaiming.
Reclaiming takes about 1.5 hours give or take.
I do everything in the deep freezer.

NOW that I have some 190 proof I'm going to do a run with a carrier solvent (190 ever clear) and directly winterize the run, then a hot water bath purge.

What would people like to see me try with the tami?

 

[gunnaknow]

Mendo, if you weren't winterizing then I would have recommended things like not grinding the buds, extracting straight from the freezer and reclaiming at the lowest temperature possible. If I had to guess, I'd say that the "auto-buttering" that you mentioned is down to the presence of wax. With that much wax, winterization is really a god send. Thankyou for showing us your pics, they were fascinating!

gunna

 

[prune]

I extract for long periods of time but keep temps around freezing during processing and inert concentrations seem to be well under 10%. I run bud exclusively, but a s&g run of close trim extracted noticeably more waxes, so quality matters.

 

[gunnaknow]

Hey prune, the quality of the bud/trim was one of the first things that came to mind because although the return of oleoresin goes down with lower quality material, the level of wax generally doesn't so much. Although the cuticles of the trichomes contain wax, so do the cuticles of the leaf and bud surfaces. If you used very low quality trim, you could conceivably extract more wax than oleoresin. Although Mendo said that he used prime buds, so the excess wax was most likely to do with extraction/reclaiming temps, grinding and possibly also the high vapor pressure. It doesn't really matter so long as you winterize it but it was very interesting and suprising to see.

 

[BagAppeal]

Great thread, I only have one question.
Where I live, Everclear is illegal, is it possible to use Bio-ethanol.
On the bottle it says it contains:
Ethanol
4-metylpentan -2-on
Butanon
2 -propanol.
Can this be used at all, or are the other ingredients making it not useable.
All the best
BagAppeal

 

[gunnaknow]

Hey BagAppeal, unfortunately bio-ethanol is unusable. The denaturants that are added are difficult to remove. You can buy or make a reflux or fractionating still and purify lower proof grain alcohol. Or you can use ISO instead, although it's not quite as good as using ethanol.

 

[BagAppeal]

Dear gunnaknow
Thank you for the answer.
I will have to look into what I can get a hold of, but it seems like purifying lower proof grain alcohol is my only solution at the moment. I now know where to find answers when I have more questions. Thanks so much for spreading information!
All the best
BagAppeal

 

[gunnaknow]

Anytime BagAppeal. If you can buy 151 proof (75% volume), a single distillation with a simple pot still would take it up to about 86% volume. With the addition of a thumper it would redistill at about 90% volume. That would be enough to redissolve BHO reasonably quickly. If you want to take it up to 95% volume, you can make a good reflux column by packing some 2" wide copper pipe with stainless steel pot scrubbers.

The vessel in the middle is the thumper.

 

[Gray Wolf]

Hee, hee, hee.............. Good impromptu setup!

 

[BagAppeal]

Dear gunnaknow

I belive 60% is the strongest I can get a hold of, higher than that is considered narcotics where I am currently residing.
I never would have imagined that I would be stilling alcohol in my life, but it seems like I have to do it now
I have looked into some different pre made stills,any ideas if the one in the link would do good for the job?
http://www.ebay.com/itm/Moonshine-S...699?pt=LH_DefaultDomain_0&hash=item27d2b1327b
Thanks again for the great information
All the best
BagAppeal

 

[gunnaknow]

That would certainly do the job. It's a reflux still and with correct operation it could produce 95% volume. Distilling moonshine is illegal in most countries. I believe that it's legal to distill alcohol for personal use in Italy but you're in the Vatican, which may have different laws. If in doubt, you can try buying a still from just outside of the Vatican, with cash. Or you can buy a lab glass fractionating column and condensor, which nobody will suspect to be for alcohol distillation.

 

[BagAppeal]

Looks I will be starting a moonshine operation..
Ill give a feedback on how it works out for me when I have it all set up. I'll try my luck with the postal system and order one.
When that's all done I will be ready to start winterizing.hopefully...
Thanks again for the great help!
All the best
BagAppeal

 

[G.O. Joe]

Fractionation is easy for people who know how to use stills they already have, but even then there are alternatives using simple distillation. Dried corn (maize) grit and meal and cobs; cassava - preferably pearled tapioca - is the hot new thing. Activated alumina and zeolites may be other options.

The denatured alcohol can be simple-distilled, after reflux with a little solid NaOH or KOH until no more colored garbage (the condensed ketones) forms. A couple percent IPA shouldn't hurt much.

 

[BagAppeal]

Dear G.O Joe
I am total newb when it comes to stilling, but I will look into what I can source locally, and hopefully organic ingredients. I will be hitting the books once I have my setup installed, and say how it works out.
Thanks for the pointer.
All the best
BagAppeal

 

[Gray Wolf]

A couple of good books on the subject.

The Compleat Distiller, by Nixon & McCaw, Designing & Building Automatic Stills, by Riku,