Black residue on e-mesh?

[awalmartbag]

Hey everyone

Just had my first DMT experience. Spice left this black residue on the mesh... what is this stuff? Is my spice impure?

I was coughing a bit exhaling too.. but maybe that's just cause when my lungs started to tingle, I (foolishly) thought I'd somehow fucked up the extraction and was going to suffocate.

I'm using an Aegis Solo with Vandy Vape SS316L 150 mesh in TC mode at 205C.

 

[Tomtegubbe]

I believe the residue is some sort of grease. If you keep your temperature moderate you should get smooth vapes even if the spice is not 100 % pure. Just change the mesh after getting too much residue.

Travel safe!

 

[Th3_tRuTh]

I make sure to switch to wattage mode and fire it red a couple of times after every trip. This burns off any residue left behind and helps prolong the life of the mesh build. I have some slight discoloration on mine but no residue build-up at all. Doing this every time seems to keep it pretty clean.

 

[awalmartbag]

Thanks guys. I did what you suggested and burned the residue off. The discoloration left was pretty severe, so I decided to swap the mesh in the end.

Tried a second, lower dose at 180C. Less residue this time but still a bit harsh to smoke. On the forums and in the e-mesh tutorial video, people claim their spice is so smooth you don't feel it and get no residue at all. That does make me question the quality of my DMT...

 

[Mirus]

It might be a function of the TC of your mod. Some are better than others.

If you can spare the material, put a milligram or two on the mesh and fire the mod with the top off. That way you can see what's happening. Repeat this with lower and lower temp settings until you find a temp where the sample just melts, but doesn't vaporize. Crank up your indicated temp maybe 8 - 10 degrees above this melting point. This should eliminate burning and the resulting harshness. You then have a temp setting that works for you, with your mesh type, RDA and mod.

I routinely see recommended temps here for over 200C, but in my setup that burns it a bit and I usually run about 180...for MY setup.

 

[Th3_tRuTh]

It might be a function of the TC of your mod. Some are better than others.

If you can spare the material, put a milligram or two on the mesh and fire the mod with the top off. That way you can see what's happening. Repeat this with lower and lower temp settings until you find a temp where the sample just melts, but doesn't vaporize. Crank up your indicated temp maybe 8 - 10 degrees above this melting point. This should eliminate burning and the resulting harshness. You then have a temp setting that works for you, with your mesh type, RDA and mod.

I routinely see recommended temps here for over 200C, but in my setup that burns it a bit and I usually run about 180...for MY setup.

Solid points, and absolutely my experience. All mods are different and no one has gotten the TC perfect, but Evolv has my vote for most reliable and consistent TC. That being said, every device will require a bit of tinkering until find the sweet spot. The day I finally got mine set perfectly, I vaped a 20mg dose to test, didn't feel or taste anything and even the crystalized layer inside my glass drip tip didn't melt (it always melted with previous trips). I thought for sure it was a fail... until it hit me a couple seconds later. I've been maintaining and periodically testing resistance to be sure, but my rig is now working flawlessly. It took quite a bit of fiddling to figure it out though. E mesh is definitely a method that takes tinkering, persistence, and patience. But once you dial it in, it is a beautiful thing.

 

[downwardsfromzero]

Thanks guys. I did what you suggested and burned the residue off. The discoloration left was pretty severe, so I decided to swap the mesh in the end.

Tried a second, lower dose at 180C. Less residue this time but still a bit harsh to smoke. On the forums and in the e-mesh tutorial video, people claim their spice is so smooth you don't feel it and get no residue at all. That does make me question the quality of my DMT...

Check out this post - even in the absence of oxygen, pure DMT can leave a small residue from thermal decomposition products upon vaporization.

 

[awalmartbag]

I took the top off and did some testing. For my mod, ~180C seems to be the lower threshold for evaporating a sample on a reasonable timescale. I get vapors even at 120C, but not nearly enough.
One thing I've noticed: even if I crank it up to >300C, there are usually a handful of very small white 'kernels' left over. I have to use wattage mode to vaporize them. Maybe that's just cause the mesh doesn't heat evenly though?

downwardsfromzero, would any oligomers be removed by re-x? I initially made the mistake of heating wet crystals to ~100C to evaporate the heptane. I figured it would just melt the DMT... clearly hadn't done enough research.
I did do another re-x cycle after that, and evaporated at 45C instead. But if enough oligomers were formed, they'd just crystallize out too...

Lowering the temp seems to have solved my residue problem, but not the harshness.
I'll play around with settings some more and try a new batch using hexane.