Alkaloid salts: activated charcoal / paraffin wax defats

[padawan]

I know the usual path is a NP rinse on acidic solutions (which I dislike) but I was wondering about the activated charcoal and paraffin wax methods. I already use activated charcoal to clean used naphtha, and intend to try the paraffin wax to defat both mescaline and DMT A/B extractions in the near future.

Just concerned about either method soaking up alkaloid salts trapped amongst the oils/fats. For the paraffin wax I can imagine how the solidified wax can be easily removed, liquified with heat and diluted into fresh hot distilled water and then re-solified/removed so that the water can be basified etc to test if any alks got trapped in the wax. But with activated charcoal, whatever gets trapped in that stuff ain't coming back out again.

Any thoughts, data or experience on whether alkaloid salts get trapped by running a saturated solution through activated charcoal?

I guess using harmala salts & manske's would be a way to compare alkaloid content before and after running through activated charcoal, but hoping someone's done some testing already!

Safe travels. Peace out.

 

[downwardsfromzero]

Paraffin wax (which, incidentally, is a NP solvent when molten ) has been on my to-try list for quite some time, precisely because it will be easy to remove when solid. There are also various different grades of wax with standardised melting points, which may come in useful. I think it would also be pretty nifty for picking up DMT freebase in an extraction. Recovery of DMT could be expedited by finely grating the wax into sufficiently hot acid.

(Sorry there's nothing for me to add about activated charcoal right now!)

 

[benzyme]

depends on the pH.

paraffins are large aliphatics, which engage exclusively in VDW interactions. alkaloids are easily separated at low pH, hence the acidification step.

I know that's not what you wanted to hear, but that's the chemistry.

the other option is to exploit physical properties...m.p. (refrig/freeze), molecular weight (centrifugation)

 

[padawan]

Thanks guys - that's actually quite useful info. Looks like I'll be doing some simple tests and posting up the results in the near future! Also, I hadn't even considered using paraffin wax for retrieving the freebase alks.