We distill either passively or with a refrigerant recovery pump, not a vacuum pump.
http://skunkpharmresearch.com/vacuum-distilling-butane/
I read that link when I was first purchasing my vac chamber setup. It seemed like there was no inexpensive way for your average joe to do this though.
I want a better extraction setup then just the glass tube, butane can, and coffee filters; however I am not prepared to drop thousands on all that equipment. I am having difficulty finding good info on how to use these tools as well.
I made my first batch of shatter! it came out well but I could not get all the bubbles to pop (at 105 for 24 hours -29.5hg) So i turned the heat up to like 120 and they all popped, however the consistency is somewhat waxier and less clear than before the additional heat.
Before the heat it was clear as glass (with some amber hue).
How do you get all those bubbles out at low temps for really good shatter.
My vac is a 5cfm dual stage and can pull -29.9, I have a digital heating pad from best value vacs for the heat source.
Thanks again!
thanks for the quick responses guys! I can probably drop around 300 or so for an extraction setup (I already have a decent vac pump if those are required). Think that would get me the passive lil terp? or something like it
Even at full vac my bubbles weren't popping more than a few at a time until I turned the digital heat pad up to 132 f or so.
The important temperature is the oil, not the heat pad. There is about 8F difference on our heat pad heated vacuum chamber.
We check with an infrared thermometer.
I have taken chemistry 1 and 2 so I sort of get basic chemistry. What I don't understand, is if distilling the butane is an important step to making good shatter, why don't these companies (like puretane) sell it pre-distilled? I mean they are clearly targeting the BHO market.
Return On Investment is what usually drives new product offerings, requiring capital investments.
On imported lighter butane, the refining would have to happen before canning, so ostensibly in China or Korea. The predicted increase in volume must either not appear attractive from a return on investment/assets standpoint, or they don't have the money to invest.
New capital investments in the size ranges needed to perform the fractional distillation in the volume currently sold, would be huge, so they might be more inclined to spend the money to retain their market share, than to increase it.
If it is high purity you seek, as opposed to availability and lowest price, consider using domestic Instrument Grade or better.
Some smaller companies like Apis Labs are developing those capabilities on a smaller scale, but they are starting with domestic Praxair 99.5%, which is noticeably cleaner than most lighter butane out of the container, and then further refining it to purer than 99.995% C-4 and below, by both distillation and filtration.
Thanks again!
lol.. animal lovers get an extra surprise in the mix lol..
Gw- what's the longest you have had to purge to obtain shatter? How many times on average do you flip?
Yes thin slabs seem the way to go at least for ease of purging. Is that the color you usually end up with? I'm sure that does vary as well depending on strain/quality/ etc... Is your shatter usually end up dark amber or have you been able to get yellow shatter? You seem pretty set at the 115 for shatter but going to a lower degree which some people are doing I'm assuming is to possibly to obtain lighter colors. By going less in temperature let's say at 90-95 will everything still be purged (of course with longer purge times)? Will the shatter still release everything at lower temps or is there a certain temps that need to be obtained for the tane to be released completely? Or does it get trapped for any reason? Otherwise with enough purging and flipping at lower temps the same result should be able to be obtained? Sorry hope I'm clear typing on the fly here.
Holy cow gw that looks so stable it appears to be crystalline? !?
The color depends mostly on material and especially age of material. Then the temp of the solvent can make a different, you don't want to use warm solvent. Quicker initial washes will have better color but be less productive. A second wash or longer washes will produce more and be more terpy however darker in color and more waxes will be extracted.
People keep saying you need to do at least 109F to get out the heavier contaminant solvents like pentane and hexane. I have no idea though and I'd like to argue if your solvent is properly distilled, all those heavier solvents should only be in your first run.
90F will work but can take up to a week or so as the solvent bubbles will be less apt to pop. I've seen muffins last for an entire day or more at that temp. I think the analytical consensus is that harder and faster preserves more terps, but I personally have no evidence to support that idea.
I've had yellow shatter, and wax. You'll start to get an idea of how the product color will be as soon as you open the collection pot and look inside. Those pics gw posted say propane one them. Propane or a propane blend will yield better colors at he sacrafice of production. However bevause it's boiling point is so much lower and it's a much colder solvent, perhaps that loss of yield is only to having less waxes being extracted. Once again, just theory.
Does back filling the oven nitrogen to control the vacuum level speed up purging time?