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harvest right freeze drier

thatguyinarcata

New member
So, I'm wondering about peoples experience with freeze driers? I've heard good things from people who press their bubble into rosin, and I've heard mixed things from people who are just making some melt. I've seen really nice colors on the few samples I've seen but it seems sort of dry. Nothing nearly as oily as a regular dry on the bubble. Of course that could just be because I've only seen a few samples. Is anyone using one regularly? Lemme know
 

PDX Dopesmoker

Active member
The cool kids in cali have been using freeze dryers to make what they call "frosin" which is rosin pressed from water separated hash thats then freeze dried instead of air dried. the freeze drying stops the hash from turning dark as it dries so you get a paler rosin to press out of it, but i'm not sure there there is an actual significant quality bonus.
 

Mikell

Dipshit Know-Nothing
ICMag Donor
Veteran
I've heard a loss of flavour as well, but nothing solid re: quantified results. Not a lot of information on load weights or dry time. I gather it's partly by feel once you get mudded.
 

thatguyinarcata

New member
So I've run a couple little batches in this thing. I don't really see a loss of flavor or smell. But one batch came out a lot drier and less melty than the same trim run the same way and dried regular
 

Lazyman

Overkill is under-rated.
Veteran
Just bought a small Harvest Right (sorry gravedigging) and stuffed a pound of untrimmed fresh/live GG#4 in it. I lowered the shelf temp from 125*F to 90*F, trying 9 hr freeze and 7 hr vacuum cycle. Will post results in a couple days
 

bloyd

Well-known member
Veteran
I've tried various temps and times and haven't found any that produce an end result I desire. To me it pulls way too many terps and leaves a dry bland kief that is hard to control. If anyone wants a deal on one barely used, pm me.
 

Lazyman

Overkill is under-rated.
Veteran
Well that was fun. 457 grams of wet weed came out at 81 grams and stupidly dry. Rolled gently in my palms to trim it. Smelled like nothing. Smoked like fresh microwaved wet weed. Sprayed a little water on a nug and it smelled like wet weed again.

I then threw it all in a jar with an Integra humidity pack (67gr 62%) and waited a few days. Took 3 packs to get the RH up to 62 in the jar. Still smells like hay and fresh weed. Beautiful color though. After a long cure it might smell better, but it still has the wet-trimmed hay smell I hate. Oh well, it was interesting to do.
 

WaterFarmFan

Active member
Veteran
Hey Bloyd & Lazyman. What part of the freeze drier process is causing the over-drying? Too deep vacuum or too many refreeze cycles? Does the vacuum level go up and down based on re-freeze cycle, or just stay static all the way?
 

ChaosCatalunya

5.2 club is now 8.1 club...
Veteran
Hey Bloyd & Lazyman. What part of the freeze drier process is causing the over-drying? Too deep vacuum or too many refreeze cycles? Does the vacuum level go up and down based on re-freeze cycle, or just stay static all the way?


The people who know are not telling the world how to do it... But.. I heard that the secret is a cycling pattern, go quite strong for an hour or two, the back it off. Presumably the hash homogenises RH throughout like that and you do not overdo it. I heard of different cultivars having slightly different cycles when optimised, the fanciest HR machines have digital controls and if I remember right, you can have a number of different saved programs
 

Mikell

Dipshit Know-Nothing
ICMag Donor
Veteran
Seems like a lot of people buy the home use model that lacks control.
 

WaterFarmFan

Active member
Veteran
The people who know are not telling the world how to do it... But.. I heard that the secret is a cycling pattern, go quite strong for an hour or two, the back it off. Presumably the hash homogenises RH throughout like that and you do not overdo it. I heard of different cultivars having slightly different cycles when optimised, the fanciest HR machines have digital controls and if I remember right, you can have a number of different saved programs

Thanks for the info. When you say "go quite strong", are you referring to a deep vacuum level? I am curious about vacuum level from my own vacuum oven terpene extraction experiments. Under deep vacuum, there is very little convection heating happening, because there are no gas molecules to bounce around and heat material. Thus, under vacuum there is only radiation and some conduction.

So, I wonder if they are doing deep vacuum during freeze process, which induces sublimation, and then a minimal vacuum level during heating process to encourage convection, which encourages evaporation? Is what I described the default state of the basic harvestright, or would it require programming?
 

WaterFarmFan

Active member
Veteran
Ya all get creative with processed ganja. That is a side effect of legalization, marketing, and boredom.

Hehe. A bit of truth in this...

Anyone recall what processed food is like?

While this can be true if using really shitty starting material (ie, beaks and feet in chicken nuggets or god knows what in hot dogs), the process in this thread is about using premium fresh frozen flowers. Do you consider a steak to be processed if it is dry aged, marinated and grilled? Does cooking = processed food???
 
And i agree there must be a technique for a proper dry using this thing. I have seen some melts that were top shelf made using one.
 

WaterFarmFan

Active member
Veteran
Could you hook up a cold trap to the vac pump to reclaim any evaporated terps?

I might be mistaken, but isn't the vacuum pump built internally with these units? What is the micron rating? It might be difficult to do this because the terpenes will condense on the cooling unit of the freeze drier. Terpenes LOVE to stick to anything, and must be rinsed well with distilled h20 to extract all. One reason that I like a vacuum oven for this process, is that I can raise oven temps and volatilize any terps remaining in oven for collection in condensing cold traps. Downside of my process, is that I have to use ln2 and dry ice to replicate the sublimation of the freeze drier.
 

WaterFarmFan

Active member
Veteran
Could you hook up a cold trap to the vac pump to reclaim any evaporated terps?

Another problem with this approach is how to deal with the water in the material that is also being turned into vapor. Fresh material is around 80% water with usually less than 0.5% terpenes (using wet weight). My solution is to have multiple stages with the first using ~2C water in condensers that drain to collection flasks and then multiple traps using -75C dry ice and ethanol to collect the extreme volatiles.
 

Easy7

Active member
Veteran
I looked into a freeze dryer for mushrooms. The vaccum may take out some volatiles for cannabis.

I think I wouldn't get too comfy with my involvment. There's gonna be a witch hunt.
 

WaterFarmFan

Active member
Veteran
Well that was fun. 457 grams of wet weed came out at 81 grams and stupidly dry. Rolled gently in my palms to trim it. Smelled like nothing. Smoked like fresh microwaved wet weed. Sprayed a little water on a nug and it smelled like wet weed again.

I am really trying to deduce what is going on here. What you described seems to indicate some kind of steaming is taking place during a heating cycle. Perhaps after a bulk of the water is removed, there is very high humidity during the heating? How is the water stored and removed in the unit?

Edit - As a side thought, do you people that are getting good results are periodically removing the water from the machine during a single process?
 
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