Winterizing BHO with Everclear...

kingsolomon12 · Oct 31, 2014

I finally got my hands on some of the Everclear 190 (thanks to you guys) so though of giving the winterization process a try. I will be working with straight BHO and think I have the procedure almost down but defiantly have a few questions before I begin. I have gone through the tutorial on skunkpharm which has been very helpful but still have a few particular questions.
My basic strategy is to dissolve the bho in the Everclear at a ratio of roughly 1g bho to 30 ml Everclear - Is this a good ratio or should I be using more or less Everclear as I would like to use the least amount of Everclear necessary to reduce the amount of alcohol needing to be evaporated off ?
After the BHO is fully dissolved in the solution I should leave it in the freezer for up to 48 hrs. At this stage my question is, should my mixture be covered in the freezer or left open and is there any risk in doing this in terms of explosions ?
I should then filter the solution and hence remove the waxes that will have separated in the chilled solution.
As far as the final stage & purge goes what is the best method to evaporating off the alcohol and being left with a pristine absolute ? In the case of just evaporating off can this be done as simply as being left in a hot water bath ? As far as vacuuming off the alcohol, must it be partially evaporated off first or can the liquid solution go directly in the vac oven under full vac and at 100-110 F ?
Thank you guys in advance for any info & insight, I just want to make sure I'm giving myself the best shot at being safe and getting this right.

JointOperation · Oct 31, 2014

we do a gram to test how much is in our bho..

1 gram.. in 60-100mls.. freeze 48 hours.. filter. wiegh out remaining extract.. the last run we made 1 gram.. turned into .89 ..

this is how we figure out if its worth winterizing and losing mono and sequisture terps or if theres not alot of crap in it....

basically if theres more then 15% we will use a secondary solvent.. but mainly single solvent dewax and keeping your extraction temps low.. will avoid most of the nasties..

our best run single solvent dewax.. was 3% waxes/lipids/parafins.. and our non dewaxed just frozen .. indoor run hit 4% without any dewaxing..

outdoors has lots more wax then indoors ive found.. so outdoors gets dewaxed 99% of the time.. compared to indoors for me..

Gray Wolf · Oct 31, 2014

I just eyeball the ratio of oil to EtOH at about 10:1 by volume. The mixture should still act like alcohol when sloshed at 0F.

Put a lid on your container anytime you aren't working with it. Alcohol is hygroscopic and will draw moisture from atmospheric humidity.

Not much humidity in a 0F freezer, but there is transferring it, and it is flammable should you spill it and it find a source of ignition.

I wouldn't use a hot water bath with alcohol, because of the hygroscopic issue. Simply setting it aside for natural evaporation is the safest way to get rid of most of the alcohol without decarboxylation.

A seedling mat or fan will speed things up. A fan can also add dust and increases atmospheric moisture pickup.

If you end up with a beige liquid at the end that takes for forever to evaporate, it is most likely water, so I stick the dish in the freezer long enough for the oil to harden some on the bottom of the dish, and then simply pour off the excess water.

You can cold boil away the alcohol using a vacuum pump, but need one rated for chemical duty, or a cold trap before the pump, or change the oil in the pump as the level in the sight glass rises to upper limits. Sometimes several times with one extraction.

For shatter, I like to vacuum at -29.5" Hg and 115F until the solvent bubbles cease.

JColtrane · Oct 31, 2014

Well since we were talking about this yesterday, I'll chime in. The tek that I've developed to make "winterized shatter", I must give credit to RegisPhilburn1. Winterize oil, line dish w/ PTFE (oilslick or other), let evap on seed mat 24-48hrs. Fans are okay, but what I find is this added cooling on the top surface cause's wax problems in the vac stage. I like to let it evap until just a little water is left. Gentlely remove the ptfe and trans into the oven ... let oil get to temp (don't think high temps are bad ... even might be nessesary) and pull a slow vac, I usually pull over an hour (credit to Trimlific for that) and when it reach's 70% full vac, I'll open the vac wide open and let it pull to -29.9ish hg. Violent muffin occurs, and than from there it's impossible for me to explain any more ... gotta use that extracting hat, if you trust it ... it'll be the only one you need :tiphat:

BTW my purge in the vac after the "natural evap process" is anywhere from 1-4hrs w/ different flips and surface tranfers in the oven temps 115-120. We're not purging butane here, we're dealing with H2O mainly ... but watch out, cuz a lot of those mono terps hang out there

HG23 · Oct 31, 2014

If the column and butane are ran at near Cryo temps is it still necessary to winterize? If you're going to winterize can you just eschew DI all together and just use regular ice on the recovery tank?

kingsolomon12 · Oct 31, 2014

Gray Wolf said:
I just eyeball the ratio of oil to EtOH at about 10:1 by volume. The mixture should still act like alcohol when sloshed at 0F.

Put a lid on your container anytime you aren't working with it. Alcohol is hygroscopic and will draw moisture from atmospheric humidity.

Not much humidity in a 0F freezer, but there is transferring it, and it is flammable should you spill it and it find a source of ignition.

I wouldn't use a hot water bath with alcohol, because of the hygroscopic issue. Simply setting it aside for natural evaporation is the safest way to get rid of most of the alcohol without decarboxylation.

A seedling mat or fan will speed things up. A fan can also add dust and increases atmospheric moisture pickup.

If you end up with a beige liquid at the end that takes for forever to evaporate, it is most likely water, so I stick the dish in the freezer long enough for the oil to harden some on the bottom of the dish, and then simply pour off the excess water.

You can cold boil away the alcohol using a vacuum pump, but need one rated for chemical duty, or a cold trap before the pump, or change the oil in the pump as the level in the sight glass rises to upper limits. Sometimes several times with one extraction.

For shatter, I like to vacuum at -29.5" Hg and 115F until the solvent bubbles cease.

Thank you guys so much for all the help and info, I think I'm just about ready to give this winterization a go. I do have one more question for you Gray Wolf. When your talking about eyeballing the ratio of oil to EtOH at 10:1 volume that is to say roughly 10ml EtOH per 1g of BHO ? That being said as I have been researching the spread people give is typically between 15-65ml per gram. If I'm understanding correctly your basically saying use as little as possible i.e. 10-15ml per 1g bho and just make sure upon being cold it still has a liquid consistency so as to separate the waxes and leaving as little alcohol as possible still needing to be evaporated off ?

kingsolomon12 · Nov 1, 2014

kingsolomon12 said:
Thank you guys so much for all the help and info, I think I'm just about ready to give this winterization a go. I do have one more question for you Gray Wolf. When your talking about eyeballing the ratio of oil to EtOH at 10:1 volume that is to say roughly 10ml EtOH per 1g of BHO ? That being said as I have been researching the spread people give is typically between 15-65ml per gram. If I'm understanding correctly your basically saying use as little as possible i.e. 10-15ml per 1g bho and just make sure upon being cold it still has a liquid consistency so as to separate the waxes and leaving as little alcohol as possible still needing to be evaporated off ?

Any insight into the above question. I just want to make sure I compleatly understand before proceeding & the only thing I'm not 100% certain of is the EtOH mix with Everclear ratio as there is such a spread people recommend (10-65 ml per 1g BHO). Thanks in advance for any insight into this & sorry to be a pain in the ass guys...

Dab Strudel · Nov 1, 2014

Id say give it a shot. GW is gods word in my BHOusehold. If he says something id give it a go blindly, within reasonable parameters. He said by volume so that would be 10 ml of bho to 100 ml EtOH. Gotta figure out how much it takes to get 10 ml, or whatever measurements you see fit.

kingsolomon12 · Nov 1, 2014

Dab Strudel said:
Id say give it a shot. GW is gods word in my BHOusehold. If he says something id give it a go blindly, within reasonable parameters. He said by volume so that would be 10 ml of bho to 100 ml EtOH. Gotta figure out how much it takes to get 10 ml, or whatever measurements you see fit.

Appreciate the response, I think I'm ready to do my first winterization & can't thank you guys enough for all the help.

Gray Wolf · Nov 1, 2014

kingsolomon12 said:
Thank you guys so much for all the help and info, I think I'm just about ready to give this winterization a go. I do have one more question for you Gray Wolf. When your talking about eyeballing the ratio of oil to EtOH at 10:1 volume that is to say roughly 10ml EtOH per 1g of BHO ? That being said as I have been researching the spread people give is typically between 15-65ml per gram. If I'm understanding correctly your basically saying use as little as possible i.e. 10-15ml per 1g bho and just make sure upon being cold it still has a liquid consistency so as to separate the waxes and leaving as little alcohol as possible still needing to be evaporated off ?

Yup, pretty much that.

kingsolomon12 · Nov 2, 2014

Gray Wolf said:
Yup, pretty much that.

Thank you again and enjoy the rest of the weekend.

SativaBreather · Nov 3, 2014

i just winterized my bho for 1 st time, yet when i took it outta freezer after 48 hours and poured thru filter there was nothing left in the filter, no visible waxes etc like i have seen on skunkpharm - is this normal/abnormal? did i do something wrong?

Gray Wolf · Nov 4, 2014

SativaBreather said:
i just winterized my bho for 1 st time, yet when i took it outta freezer after 48 hours and poured thru filter there was nothing left in the filter, no visible waxes etc like i have seen on skunkpharm - is this normal/abnormal? did i do something wrong?

Unusual for no waxes! Could you see precipitated waxes hanging in solution before filtering?

SativaBreather · Nov 4, 2014

not really mate, a little cloudy sediment on the bottom of the jar prior to filtering but nothing visible on the filter when the whole solution had been poured through it.
I have put it back in the freezer for another 48 hours to see if this will have some effect

JointOperation · Nov 4, 2014

what temps did u get it to ? and when u made the bho.. did u freeze and keep temps super low during extraction?

this is the reason i dont winterize my indoor runs.. we check a gram to see if its worth it or not.. sometimes an 8th depending size of the run..

but all outdoors is either single solvent dewaxed.. or winterized with ethanol..

the only thing i do not like about winterizing.. is the taste that ethanol seems to add to it.. a lil sweetener of sorts.. probably from sugars in alcohol.

patience is key.. if your trying to make something vapeable in a few hours.. you will be very disapointed..

low and slow.. brings that tasty shit..

Gray Wolf · Nov 4, 2014

SativaBreather said:
not really mate, a little cloudy sediment on the bottom of the jar prior to filtering but nothing visible on the filter when the whole solution had been poured through it.
I have put it back in the freezer for another 48 hours to see if this will have some effect

The cloudy sediment was the waxes and if they didn't end up on the filter, we need to address that.

How cold was the filter and the funnel you used and what kind of filter?

Some grows have less plant wax than others and super cold extractions reduce the amount picked up and requiring subsequent removal.

SativaBreather · Nov 4, 2014

Gray Wolf said:
The cloudy sediment was the waxes and if they didn't end up on the filter, we need to address that.

How cold was the filter and the funnel you used and what kind of filter?

Some grows have less plant wax than others and super cold extractions reduce the amount picked up and requiring subsequent removal.

ok buddy, appreciate ya input but I'll preface this by saying im not working with any great equipment such as you manufacture so Im making my bho in a caffetiere and filtering thru a coffee filter.
I added the bho to iso and dissolved fully before putting in the freezer. I cannot tell you what the temps in the freezer are - bloody cold is the most accurate i can be lol sorry

so i took the jar from the freezer, removed lid and poured thru the coffee filter. There was no visible sediment etc except for a little cloudiness right at the bottom and none of this seemed apparent in the filter.

I have put the filtered solution back in the jar and the freezer for another 48 bours to see what happens then - is it possible the initial 48 hours was not enough?

thanks for your help

Gray Wolf · Nov 4, 2014

SativaBreather said:
ok buddy, appreciate ya input but I'll preface this by saying im not working with any great equipment such as you manufacture so Im making my bho in a caffetiere and filtering thru a coffee filter.
I added the bho to iso and dissolved fully before putting in the freezer. I cannot tell you what the temps in the freezer are - bloody cold is the most accurate i can be lol sorry

so i took the jar from the freezer, removed lid and poured thru the coffee filter. There was no visible sediment etc except for a little cloudiness right at the bottom and none of this seemed apparent in the filter.

I have put the filtered solution back in the jar and the freezer for another 48 bours to see what happens then - is it possible the initial 48 hours was not enough?

thanks for your help

I suspect that more likely you don't have a great deal of wax to start with and that you are winterizing with ISO instead of Ethanol.

The waxes are mostly non polar and Iso is less polar than either Ethanol or Methanol, so will hold on to more.

The waxes are fragile while hanging as a fluffy floc, so are easily warmed by warm filters.

A coffee filter can do an adequate job of filtering out the waxes, and a cheap funnel will work, so nothing needs to be fancy, but it does need to stay cold to effectively remove the waxes by winterization.

SativaBreather · Nov 4, 2014

ok thanks
so should i even put the coffee filter in the freezer?
if i'd known ethanol was better I'd have asked a buddy who has some, i'm sure I'd seen people winterizing with iso so i thought it was ok.

kingsolomon12 · Dec 1, 2014

I have another question for u guys. After my solution has been freezing all the waxes, lipids ect are clearly settling on the bottom of the container. Should I mix this up before filtering or do I want to pour & retain as much of the waxes etc in the container. Further more I am using a Buchner with Vac assist with medium filter papers (125mm). If I'm filtering roughly 250 ml at a time through the filter paper is this fine or should I be changing out the paper vs pouring all 250 ml through one ? Thank you guys in advance for any further input & I hope everyone had a great thanksgiving...

Winterizing BHO with Everclear...

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