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Alternative UK solvents- what I have found

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fourthripley

Rising Star
MrM asked about this subject so I thought I'd share what my cat has been up to this past month.Its only preliminary and incomplete; he's using Mim sludge that has been pulled 5 times with good results, abandoned at fifth which yielded mimnimal amount. Odourless kerosene aka bbq lighter fluid: cat performed a sixth pull on a portion of the soup, soup and solvent were both heated.On freezing he was suprised to see white material precip out, espesc. as he considered the solution spent.Sadly, despite several cool/freeze cycles, was unable to filter out.Poss a lot to do with the minimal quantity involved, but also he thinks to d with the viscosity of the solvent.That pull is still drying.Although OK drys totally clean, it really takes its time, lie evaporating sand.The evaporaion dishes is starting to form clean crstal though, and the jars used, which were left to dry had minimal spice residues and the naughty but nice aroma :D I'm thinking this stuff could prove useful where a salting out stage s to be used, also- because of the cleanness and lack of colour picked up, might prove useful- using a minimal amount and plenty of patience- as a recrystalisation solvent.Guess the slow evap rate could be a bit of a boon there. White spirit: being a mean old pussy cat, he looked up white spirit.Apparently its a mixture of saturated aliphatic and alicyclic C7-C12 hydrocarbons, with 25% of C7-C12 alkyl aromatic hydro carbons.Pussy tells me he's been interested by reports of 'jungle' spice but, being a cat, doesn't want to shell out on pricey-here- toluene.Being a cat, he dosent know much about chemistry but told me' Its aromatics you need to pull that putative substance, right?'Anyhow, he leisurely doing white spirit pulls on his sludge, and the pull he has evaporated does look like the pictures.He tells me its psycoactivity is unknown, doesnt have enough to work with yet, but he tells me he thinks the solvent is promising.
 
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Very interesting fourthripley, thanks. Few details my friends goldfish would like cleared up before he next goes SWIMing out into international waters; When you say the sludge was pulled 5 times before being abandoned, do you mean 5 successful pulls with bbq lighter fluid, or that only the 6th pull was using BBQ lighter fluid? Presumably if not, the first 5 were with naptha / zipo lighter fuid (and these are the same thing, right?) as opposed to the BBQ stuff. The other question which needs to be answered by someone who understand the chemistry and biology of these things a lot better than i do; what are the hazards with using solvents other than naptha? I believe using the wrong ones can leave carcinogenic residue that may or may not be visible (based on what i have read) which is something i am obviously worried about for whoever would be using the results. Do you know much about this in terms of bbq lighter fluid or white spirits? Finally, a seperate question in terms of your cat's recrystalisation method; Is he using a cooling / freezing cycle to do the final crystalisation, or using a slow room temperature evaporation of the product once the cooling / freezing cycle has purified the smaller crystals? Also; does anyone know what chemical names should be looked for in terms of lab grade solvents for DMT extraction? Preferably something i can find on a Uk website. Cheers for the info.
 
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Yeah the first 5 were pulled with Swan brand lighter fluid, which seems to work great but works out very dear; plus only one shop sells it so I have to buy it slowly and discreetly so the girl in there dosn't think Im some sort of glue sniffing fiend. With the bbq stuff, I tried cool/freeze cycles but the goodies- while popping out while freezing- didn't want to filter out, so its just on top of the cupboard drying out.Nearly there :) looks like about what I'd expect from that pull, but totally clear, not yellowy like I'd expect a straight pulled lighter fuel evap to be, so my cat is thinking the stuff might be useful to recryst some dark orange he got from solvent that had been freeze precipped once, then reduced in volume and fp'd again.Evaps painfully slowly, but that orange is just sat around doing nothing anyway :D Hopes that makes sense.
 
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I've been using Newport lighter fluid. Much cheaper than Zippo and evaporates without any residue. I've also tried White Spirit which is cheap but it evaporates very slowly. But also without any residue.
 
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White spirit always leaves a residue. Maybe you havnt seen it but it is definatley there. It leaves a yellow greasy sticky tarry kind of stuff that dosnt evaporate but eventually hardens over a few years. I know this from many years worth of experiance as an artist using oil paints. I take particular care with my brushes cleaning them fastiduously. I ve noticed the way the residue clings to the bristtles and how fogotten jars of spirits eventually end up. I would never consider using white spirits for extraction purposes. I just cant think of a way of cleaning your spice up once youv'e contaminated it. Thats a real bitch for two reasons firstly, it pulls the spice readily from your base and secondly liters of spirits costs pennies.
 
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great thread folks.ive never had any luck in evaporating any kind of lighter fuel in the uk,every one ive tryed has left a residue= ronsinol,swan,zippo,perma.ill have to see if i can get my hands on that newport lighter fuel.ive got 500 gram of wu zhu yu which is quite cheep so i may do a bit of experamenting with different types of fuels.
 
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Well, the experiment was to see if white spirit(being a partially aromatic solvent) would pull so called 'jungle spice'.That browny/red gunk was yellow crystaly oil before being scraped up; just playing with leftovers before they become drain cleaner :) Torched a dip on a pin, same 'tickle' as regular old spice.May taste, may not; not sure there's enough there to decide anything either way anyway.Solvent was washed thrice, so I doubt there's any base contam there.
 
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it's really hard to find a good solvent in uk but there's hope still zippo brand ligther fuel is so far the best around it has got the biggest amount of naphtha here's the specs: Ingredient: VM & P NAPHTHA; (ALIPHATIC PETROLEUM DISTILLATES); Ingredient: TOLUENE (SARA III) CYCLOHEXANE (SARA III) the next choice is ronsonol but that one only contains Ingredient: LIGHT ALIPHATIC NAPHTHA, VM & P NAPHTHA, LACOLENE *93/4* Ingredient: MEDIUM ALIPHATIC NAPHTHA (AROMATIC 100), PARAFFIN-NAPTHANES Ingredient: BENZENE (HUMAN CARCINOGEN BY ACGIH, IARC, OSHA, NTP) peek your choice and post your results hope it helps on your quest to wisdom 8) :D :D
 
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a uk google search for xylene gives access to a few cheap sources, one of which swim attests left no residue (just dont use a cheap tescos pvc jug or it will dissolve! - other plastics ok). i think i paid £8 for 2.5l or something, inc post. never found any toluene though
 
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hey ethnobotanica where is that shop? swim lives somewhere near north/south/east/west london!!!
can you pm the address for it , would be interested in to find out the trick behind that stove fuel ;)
 
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