Causes of subpar or unsuccessful extractions

[CokFLHX]

Hello. I know a guy who has performed lots of extractions and even his first one turned out well. He started by following the hybrid salt tek and the max ion tek and now can do it without referencing any write ups.

Extractions always produce acceptable yields of clean, white crystals.

He has friends and aquaintances who have tried multiple times, but can’t seem to achieve the same results.

When extracting, friend always uses water from a reverse osmosis water purifier, and HCI to lower pH. Morton’s non-iodized table salt, and pure lye as used as emulsification prevention and to raise pH. NPS used is always Heptane.

This has consistently produced desirable results of clean, white crystals.

My question is, in the opinions of folks smarter than me and better versed in chemistry:

Is the use of pure water, and HCI, rather than say deionized water and white vinegar, along with Heptane rather than naphtha play a part in the outcome of extractions?

Are there any benefits from using HCI instead of vinegar?

Thanks

 

[Transform]

Some people are just more attuned to the art of extracting; while it may be more desirable to use reagents and solvents of the highest purity, there comes a point when they're more talismanic than anything else, at least in terms of 'going the extra mile'.

For example, my first ever extraction went just swimmingly with ordinary (soft, good quality) tap water, hardware store lye (Wilco caustic soda, actually ) and - don't hate me! - BBQ lighting fluid, which was just medium naphtha.


What I was thinking, on seeing the title of this thread, was that it would be good to have a troubleshooting list or flowchart of extraction problems, along with their solutions, all nicely packed out with links to the relevant threads. Something like that could go into the resources section, maybe as a DMT Handbook 2.0…

 

[Ernestine]

My advice is to just keep pulling. Many times my first pull has been a bit underwhelming but after five pulls the overall yield is normal. Seems to happen less often now but I don't know why.

I also don't think purity of ingredients is a major factor. Bark quality may be more likely.

 

[fractals4life]

Most common low yield problem seen with the people I've interacted with on here seems to be fear of emulsions causing lack of adequate mixing of the NPS layer at first. That and not having a proper amount of water in there.

Perhaps a video of what good mixing is ( I'm still not entirely sure what the commonly repeated instruction "move it in a figure of eight motion" actually means! ) and how to spot an emulsion forming, so you know when to back off a bit with the vigour, would be a good resource.

 

[Ernestine]

I feel fortunate that i haven't had much issue with emulsion. I invert and roll my flask vigorously.

 

[CokFLHX]

I’ve found that if you add enough non iodized salt you can pretty much shake as hard as you want

 

[Hailstorm]

A strong 365 nm UV lamp can help troubleshoot low yields without waiting for freeze precipitation. I could easily eyeball DMT (technically, indole) density in each pull by how intensely the non-polar phase was glowing under the UV light.

 

[Icon]

A strong 365 nm UV lamp can help troubleshoot low yields without waiting for freeze precipitation. I could easily eyeball DMT (technically, indole) density in each pull by how intensely the non-polar phase was glowing under the UV light.

Is 365nm a risk to the molecule? People say to protect it from light, is that about preventing UV from creating oxygen radicals?

 

[Hailstorm]

The exposure is brief and surface-level, the amount of dissolved oxygen is low. Thus, no perceptible reduction in yield.