Terpenation at Terpene Station

[Permacultuure]

I use tape on all threads other then flare fitting. Tapping the cans through your base and into your tank cleans the butane plenty, just remember to clean your spool. coffee filters should work fine as a substitute. 5 or six filters on each end works great.

 

[Gray Wolf]

I would like to start off saying that I have been drooling over the terps since I discovered them on the internet a little over 2 years ago. Amazing work JD. I have been following along over on SPR ever since. I have only just recently tackled this thread though because I only now have found the money to order all of the MKIIIA parts whoo hoo. I feel very confident that I understand the can tapping and running process but I have a few questions regarding my assembly, and purging.

My system as of now is the original MKIIIA design minus the soup pot, plus a sight glass, the mega flow hose, a 36" x 1 1/2" column, and a 6" x 12" base. No filter driers yet, or modified clear lid for purging.

Unfortunately I ordered before I fully understood all of the required parts. I ordered sight glass gaskets on accident where I needed the ones with the nibs on them. They are Viton and pass the pressure test but they worry me, should I replace them before I run?

Also these same sight glass gaskets don't fit into my sight glass, although it passed the pressure test with the gaskets it came with, was the reasoning behind that change that they couldn't stand up to high pressure?

The reason for the change, is that they came with silicone rubber seals, which don't hold up to butane.

When assembling the MKIIIA it was mentioned very early on by I believe FE to not put tape on the compression fittings, does that mean just on the threads but not up to the compression part or just not use any at all?

Neither the compression or flare fittings use tape and it actually may keep you from adequately tightening them. The flare female on the hose, usually even has gas release slots, so that pressure is released as soon as the nut is backed off the o-ring seal.

The seal on the compression fitting, is at the ferrule, so if it is adequately tightened, there is nothing present at the threads.

When doing the initial can tapping session is it necessary to do any further polishing of the butane to remove the mystery oil or is it all removed by the time it has recovered for the first time into the tank?

If you keep your Terpenator lower tank at about 85F, and stop recovering when you achieve neutral pressure (zero pressure, zero vacuum), you can remove it to parts per billionth/trillionth levels in a single pass.

I have not ordered a filter drier yet. Do you all recommend not running until I can get one?

The one in front of the pump is for its protection. You are gambling without one.

When I am running my first dry run would it be okay if I completely filled my column with coffee filters as I don’t have any post-run material yet?

Yes.

Also I haven't sourced any SS mesh, are most of you still just shoving a couple down at the bottom and top or have you all moved on to something more refined like cutting filter paper or mesh or some combination of things I've not mentioned?

Wadded up coffee filters, held in place by the screen, actually do a pretty good job. If you are winterizing, you are going to filter it again anyway.

I sometimes do a final filter after winterizing to 0.2 microns, using syringe filters, if I want a super clear extract. The ones we did for the High Times article were filtered to 0.2 microns.

Also if I plan to winterize would it still behoove me to use DI during my extraction?

If you are going to winterize anyway, the benefits are sharply reduced. We soak our storage tank in denatured alcohol and dry ice before extracting, to minimize wax pickup in the first place.

My goal is to have nice clear/clean shatter, keeping in mind the fact that I want to winterize and I don't have the clear lid modification or a vacuum oven, what recommendations would you fine gentlemen have for me regarding my purging and finishing?

If you are using a Mk IIIA, and want to dabble in subzero extractions, I first recommend replacing the hoses with stainless over braided PTFE or convoluted stainless.

I also helps to replace the 1/4" vent line with a 3/8" line, because butane flows slower at those temperatures.

Don't put the Terpenator in any water bath. Let it run at ambient temperatures.

Soak your storage tank in denatured alcohol and dry ice until you get it down to at least -50C and run the extraction with butane at that temperature.

The vacuum gauge is practically worthless at that temperature below -10" Hg, so you have to rely on how the ice is forming on the column and tank.

On the last pull, after you've dumped the column and are recovering, you keep track of when you are done, by when there is no longer ice on the column and the ice no longer reforms when you wash it off with luke warm tap water periodically to keep track of where you are.

When the ice no longer reforms, pull it the rest of the way down with the high vacuum pump and let it sit for 20 minutes or so at -29.5" Hg. If you started off with high quality bud, you should end up with a lower tank of blonde cotton candy of shatter consistency.

I'd rather not pour butane but I don't want to scrape either. Also on that note once you have a beautiful pie pan of shatter how do you get it out? Does the warmed up SS pie piece picker upper work well for that? I know it’s not okay to pour butane into a silicone pan but what about ethanol?

If you drop the lower tank in a freezer for about thirty minutes, the cotton candy is easily removed by running a thin blade around the inside of the tank and removing the spool from the bottom. The cotton candy is then easily separated from the lid with a flick of a spatula.

You can also wash it out with warm ethanol, since you are planning to winterize anyway.

I know I've asked so many questions and I have more but I'll stop there. Sorry if I'm all over the place I just finished a power read through of this forum. And my mind is swimming.

Thank you GW for everything you have done, and thank you FE for starting this thread.

Thanks to all in advance for any help I may receive,
YB

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Answers in blue!

 

[PenZenMaster]

Rust on Welds

Rust on Welds

So has anyone discovered any rust on the welds on their MKIII lids?

Is this something I should be worried about and if so what remediation should I take?

 

[Nickypno]

I've been reading this thread since it began, and it's helped answer a lot of questions I had.

I built myself a MkV, but with only one 4" x 24" spool instead of two teed together. It's been working well, but I just ran into an issue and figured this would be the best thread to ask for an answer beside the skunk pharm page which I already posted on.

I must have overflowed my collection tank, because some oil made it's way up to the recovery intake port and clogged the fitting that connects the pressure/vac gauge, vacuum pump valve and recovery hose. A good bit of oil made its way up my mega flow recovery hose as well, but didn't seem to reach the filter drier that meets the hose before the appion.

I only tapped 40 cans of butane into my refrigerant recovery tank, and I thought that was good enough to do runs and not overflow my 12" x 12" collection pot, but I guess I was wrong. I calculated how much butane could sit comfortably in my collection pot and leave 5" of head space, and that was 40 cans. But after this issue occurred the other day, a friend of mine brought up that the volume may differ depending on if the butane is under pressure or vacuum. I don't know how to calculate that though or if that's even the issue.

I also am curious how I should go about cleaning out my recovery hose, because I'm not sure if pouring warm ethanol through it may damage the hose interior.

Apologies for the derailment.

 

[Nickypno]

I forgot to add that I'm also curious if anybody has a solution to heating the 12" x 12" collection pot. There's no soup warmers I can find that it would fit in, nor one that I would think could support the massive weight of the mkV. I found electric wrap around heating blankets for refrigerant recovery tanks that would work, but the lowest temp they are set to is 120F, and I'd prefer to keep my oil in carboxylic acid form.

 

[Kcar]

40 cans will fill a 12x12 approximately 1/2 full.
Did you pull a large vacuum with the appion? Over -20 hg?
That can cause your concentrate to muffin up and some may
go up the intake.

 

[Nickypno]

Yes, I pull a vacuum to -22 with the appion and then pull to -29" Hg with my vac pump. I was under the impression that the butane isnt fully recovered until the appion hits -22.

my recovery hose that connects from the appion to the recovery tank also always has butane left in it that needs to be purged into open air no matter how long i leave the appion running it seems. Is that normal?

 

[Kcar]

It is, but I usually stop and burp the tank around half way through the last
recovery. Get the tank down to 25-40psi(hg?) and you'll lose alot less
at the end. Also takes the propane off the top if your using canned solvent

 

[rb extractors]

So has anyone discovered any rust on the welds on their MKIII lids?

Is this something I should be worried about and if so what remediation should I take?

get it cleaned and electro coated

 

[rb extractors]

I've been reading this thread since it began, and it's helped answer a lot of questions I had.

I built myself a MkV, but with only one 4" x 24" spool instead of two teed together. It's been working well, but I just ran into an issue and figured this would be the best thread to ask for an answer beside the skunk pharm page which I already posted on.

I must have overflowed my collection tank, because some oil made it's way up to the recovery intake port and clogged the fitting that connects the pressure/vac gauge, vacuum pump valve and recovery hose. A good bit of oil made its way up my mega flow recovery hose as well, but didn't seem to reach the filter drier that meets the hose before the appion.

I only tapped 40 cans of butane into my refrigerant recovery tank, and I thought that was good enough to do runs and not overflow my 12" x 12" collection pot, but I guess I was wrong. I calculated how much butane could sit comfortably in my collection pot and leave 5" of head space, and that was 40 cans. But after this issue occurred the other day, a friend of mine brought up that the volume may differ depending on if the butane is under pressure or vacuum. I don't know how to calculate that though or if that's even the issue.

I also am curious how I should go about cleaning out my recovery hose, because I'm not sure if pouring warm ethanol through it may damage the hose interior.

Apologies for the derailment.

LOL... you overflowed your 12x12 spool? I could say a lot of things, but bottom line, you need to have a much better attention to detail.

 

[Gray Wolf]

So has anyone discovered any rust on the welds on their MKIII lids?

Is this something I should be worried about and if so what remediation should I take?

304SS is "stainless" by virtue of its chromium content. When you weld on it, some of the chromium combines with the carbon in the alloy, to form chromium carbides.

That takes the chromium out of solution, so that the alloy becomes less corrosion resistant.

To fix that, you solution anneal it by taking the 300 series austenetic above about 1040F and holding it at that temperature for one hour of cross sectional density, before rapidly quenching it in water.

The rapid quench drives it through the temperature range where chromium carbides are found so fast, that the chromium stays in solution and protects the alloy.

You can also use a low carbon grade like 304L, or a higher chromium content alloy like 316, 321, or 347 SS.

PS: Don't try that with a final machined part, because it will also stress relieve by warping. Final machining after heat treat and straightening as required.

 

[Gray Wolf]

I've been reading this thread since it began, and it's helped answer a lot of questions I had.

I built myself a MkV, but with only one 4" x 24" spool instead of two teed together. It's been working well, but I just ran into an issue and figured this would be the best thread to ask for an answer beside the skunk pharm page which I already posted on.

I must have overflowed my collection tank, because some oil made it's way up to the recovery intake port and clogged the fitting that connects the pressure/vac gauge, vacuum pump valve and recovery hose. A good bit of oil made its way up my mega flow recovery hose as well, but didn't seem to reach the filter drier that meets the hose before the appion.

I only tapped 40 cans of butane into my refrigerant recovery tank, and I thought that was good enough to do runs and not overflow my 12" x 12" collection pot, but I guess I was wrong. I calculated how much butane could sit comfortably in my collection pot and leave 5" of head space, and that was 40 cans. But after this issue occurred the other day, a friend of mine brought up that the volume may differ depending on if the butane is under pressure or vacuum. I don't know how to calculate that though or if that's even the issue.

I also am curious how I should go about cleaning out my recovery hose, because I'm not sure if pouring warm ethanol through it may damage the hose interior.

Apologies for the derailment.

One way oil can get into the intake port, is splash in when you flood or dump the columns too fast.

40 300 ml cans would be 12000 ml, or about 732 cubic inches.

Water weighs .0361lbs/cubic inch and butane has a specific gravity of .601, so you had about 15.9 pounds of butane in your system.

Your 12" OD system has about 1301 cubic inches internal capacity, holding about 108.4 cubic inches per foot, so 732 cubic inches of butane would occupy about 6.7" of space.

That agrees with your accessment about 5" of head space, but let me paint you another scenario.

Not sure how you were running it, but as a 24" column would only dump about 265 cubic inches of butane in the lower tank, I infer that you were not doing a flood and soak, with recovery to -10" in between.

Sooooooo, consider what happens when the lower tank has anywhere close to half its volume full, and you open the dump valve, which dumps through a tube to the bottom of the tank.

If the column is at higher pressure than the tank, you will get a sudden large uplifting of the pool inside the tank, maybe slamming it against the underside of the lid where the pump intake port resides.

 

[Gray Wolf]

I forgot to add that I'm also curious if anybody has a solution to heating the 12" x 12" collection pot. There's no soup warmers I can find that it would fit in, nor one that I would think could support the massive weight of the mkV. I found electric wrap around heating blankets for refrigerant recovery tanks that would work, but the lowest temp they are set to is 120F, and I'd prefer to keep my oil in carboxylic acid form.

For starters, the Mk V pot is heavy enough just by itself, that we've mounted all of our Mk V's on carts, so that all you have to lift is the pot.

We have three solution. The first is that you don't need much heat unless you are pushing for maximum oil production for orals.

You just need to periodically remove the ice to keep track of where you are at, when extracting carboxylic acid.

1.0 Go to a restaurant supply and get a big enough pot to set it in and just pour tap water in it, or use a submersible heater in it, or pump tempered water in and out of it.

2.0 Omega and Brisk heat both make silicone rubber heating mats that will go over 400F, and that is what we use on columns and as one of the options on our tank. They have individual thermocouples and PID controllers.

3.0 Weld on a liquid heating jacket and use a process controller.

 

[Gray Wolf]

get it cleaned and electro coated

A light electropolish will also remove the ferrous oxide, and make it more corrosion resistant, but be careful on the machined gasket surfaces.

Best to mask them if electropolishing after the machining operation.

 

[Young Bull]

Hi Guys thanks for the input. So once I've got my frozen cotton candy out of the bottom of the terp I can dissolve it in ethanol and if I evaped out of something like the evap chamber on SPR would I be left with a pretty clean fully purged end product?

 

[Young Bull]

Hi Guys thanks for the input. So once I've got my frozen cotton candy out of the bottom of the terp I can dissolve it in ethanol and if I evaped out of something like the evap chamber on SPR would I be left with a pretty clean fully purged end product?

Obviously filtering out the wax before evap

 

[Nickypno]

One way oil can get into the intake port, is splash in when you flood or dump the columns too fast.

40 300 ml cans would be 12000 ml, or about 732 cubic inches.

Water weighs .0361lbs/cubic inch and butane has a specific gravity of .601, so you had about 15.9 pounds of butane in your system.

Your 12" OD system has about 1301 cubic inches internal capacity, holding about 108.4 cubic inches per foot, so 732 cubic inches of butane would occupy about 6.7" of space.

That agrees with your accessment about 5" of head space, but let me paint you another scenario.

Not sure how you were running it, but as a 24" column would only dump about 265 cubic inches of butane in the lower tank, I infer that you were not doing a flood and soak, with recovery to -10" in between.

Sooooooo, consider what happens when the lower tank has anywhere close to half its volume full, and you open the dump valve, which dumps through a tube to the bottom of the tank.

If the column is at higher pressure than the tank, you will get a sudden large uplifting of the pool inside the tank, maybe slamming it against the underside of the lid where the pump intake port resides.

Thanks so much G.

I've been running it as a flood and soak, but I was allowing a bit more butane than what was necessary for a soak to shower through the material before closing the valves for a soak, and then recover to -10" Hg before repeating. The last run I did where the intake inlet became clogged, I allowed more of a shower than I did on previous runs. The collection tank saw 45psi at the height of the shower before closing the valves to soak.

I'm also curious where the butane level is at once the appion pulls the vacuum back to -10" Hg. Is it mostly empty again?

When doing a soak, I noticed that the butane level drops very slowly in my sight glass. I assume I have the same problem you mentioned before in your mkIII terpenator build page, a leaky lower dump valve. I have the adjustable and rebuildable ball valve you recommended, but I'm not sure how to adjust it to remedy the leak into the collection pot.

Thanks again Gray, your advice is appreciated.

 

[Nickypno]

For starters, the Mk V pot is heavy enough just by itself, that we've mounted all of our Mk V's on carts, so that all you have to lift is the pot.

We have three solution. The first is that you don't need much heat unless you are pushing for maximum oil production for orals.

You just need to periodically remove the ice to keep track of where you are at, when extracting carboxylic acid.

1.0 Go to a restaurant supply and get a big enough pot to set it in and just pour tap water in it, or use a submersible heater in it, or pump tempered water in and out of it.

2.0 Omega and Brisk heat both make silicone rubber heating mats that will go over 400F, and that is what we use on columns and as one of the options on our tank. They have individual thermocouples and PID controllers.

3.0 Weld on a liquid heating jacket and use a process controller.

Exactly what I needed.

I've been using a 55 gallon plastic trash can cut in half to be able to submerse the pot in water and still be able to operate the valves. The water just gets so cold that I figured it would speed up the process by an hour or so and not alter the product by heating it to 85 or 90F.

Now that you recommended the sumbersible water heater, I can't believe that didn't come to my mind earlier. I actually already have one sitting here that I used to use for other purposes.

Thank you

 

[Gray Wolf]

Hi Guys thanks for the input. So once I've got my frozen cotton candy out of the bottom of the terp I can dissolve it in ethanol and if I evaped out of something like the evap chamber on SPR would I be left with a pretty clean fully purged end product?

The evaporation chamber doesn't do a final purge. The puddle surface has to be liquid for that to occur readily, so some heat is required.

 

[Gray Wolf]

Thanks so much G.

I've been running it as a flood and soak, but I was allowing a bit more butane than what was necessary for a soak to shower through the material before closing the valves for a soak, and then recover to -10" Hg before repeating. The last run I did where the intake inlet became clogged, I allowed more of a shower than I did on previous runs. The collection tank saw 45psi at the height of the shower before closing the valves to soak.

I'm also curious where the butane level is at once the appion pulls the vacuum back to -10" Hg. Is it mostly empty again?

When doing a soak, I noticed that the butane level drops very slowly in my sight glass. I assume I have the same problem you mentioned before in your mkIII terpenator build page, a leaky lower dump valve. I have the adjustable and rebuildable ball valve you recommended, but I'm not sure how to adjust it to remedy the leak into the collection pot.

Thanks again Gray, your advice is appreciated.

A leak anywhere in the column system would lower the butane level. I would pressurize it with air and set it in a barrel of water to see if there are any bubbles, before rebuilding the lower valve.

The only adjustment is to make sure the four bolts holding the valve together are tight, and that the packing gland under the handle is tight. The packing gland is the most common source of leaks. Just tighten it down until it is firmly tight. If the valve still leaks, you need a rebuild kit.