Confusa Extraction

[DoingKermit]

Hello fellow space cadets! I was lucky to have received a gift from a fellow Nexian who sent me some Acacia Confusa stem bark from the far east. Last night i decided to experiment on about 50g of the bark to see if anything could be extracted. I made a solution with 300ml of water and 80ml of acetic acid (vinegar) to boil the bark in, which i didn't want to powder due to the noise of the blender. I just cut it up in pieces with scissors (as you can see in the first picture).

I boiled the chips for about 2 hours in total, topping the pot up with more boiling water every now and then. I did not actually add any more acid, as i thought the initial amount would have been sufficient. I poured the liquid into a small jar through a sieve to catch the bark pieces and then placed it in my cupboard to cool and settle over night. I woke up to find such a tiny amount of sediment collected on the bottom and i decided to leave it as it was without decanting.

I then made a basic solution using 150ml of water and 30g of lye. I let this cool down slightly and added it to my jar containing the bark soup. It was just enough to leave space for my NP solvent (Ronsonol naphtha). See Pic...

I proceeded to do the DMT shuffle and did 3 pulls in total. The pic is of 2 pulls combined in a bowl. As you can see the solvent looks very milky Hopefully fully saturated with the goods.

I put the bowl with lid on it into the freezer for ten minutes and then checked to see if any oils had crashed out first. A small amount did in fact crash out, so i decanted the naphtha into another identical bowl, which i then placed back into the freezer. This is where i am now. Hopefully i will get some crystals forming by tonight and i will update this thread with the results.

Thanks for reading!

 

[Orion]

Nice work, do keep us posted.

 

[actualfactual]

Can't wait to see what comes out of the freezer! I got some confusa lying around I need to do something with.

 

[DoingKermit]

Well crystals are definitely forming! i don't want to jump the gun here, as i know how things can turn out. You have great results until you start scraping... and suddenly you realise it's goo. Anyways, i am trying to stay optimistic... here is the bowl after about 1 + 1/2 hrs in freezer.

Edit: sorry for bad quality pic. Hopefully you get an idea of what's goin' on.

 

[vibrancy3]

looking forward to seeing your update....

I have been using acacia, but never get a decent yeild :/ what i do get thruogh is quite powerful compared to mimosa....

Good luck Kermit

 

[DoingKermit]

Well the bowl that had the oils in it, which crashed out after being in the freezer for ten minutes, smells like our beloved molecule. I am going to let the other bowl sit undisturbed in the freezer for another 10 hours or so. I'll post an update as soon as it's done.

 

[DoingKermit]

Here is what i had in the bowl this morning. This was more of an experiment to see if crystals would form and they have. I have a big bag of bark and a bag of phyllodes too, so more will be done with this plant. At least i got some crystals and they didn't melt like a lot of others suggested. Next time i may do a solvent defat before basing, as the crystals seem to be stuck to a sticky under-layer. Smells like spice and after i get a bigger extraction done, i'll bioassay the heck out of it

 

[DoingKermit]

Collected crystals. Looks like about 25mg which isn't much, but as i said before this wasn't a huge extraction that i expected much out of. It was merely done to find out if actives could be pulled and it was indeed a success. Larger scale extraction soon come

 

[nen888]

..good to see some UK acacia action..

..my only suggestion..some ethanol or methanol (even just vodka) usually improves extraction quantities with acacias..
happy cooking...

 

[nen888]

..hey DoingKermit, i hope you haven't been assulted by gangs of angry youths, & that all is well in your extraction land (& in the UK for that matter)...

 

[FlyingFaders]

Very interesting. Keep us posted.

 

[Xt]

Good work. Did you see how i pulled a bunch of fumarate's using FASW/LIMO only to yield a tiny fraction of clear tryptamine stanky (official descriptive term) oil

 

[DoingKermit]

Yeah, many angry youth's in London. Silly rabbits. Anyhooters, i need to get a few more materials together before doing a bigger extraction and haven't had the time recently to try that acacia spice in the pic. As soon as i finish my dissertation in the beginning of September, i shall be back on the acacia extraction front

XT, I remember that extraction you did. It all looked good in the beginning and then ended up being a bit of a fail. I was surprised to say the least that i got crystals that actually didn't melt at room temp (loads of people had problems with that). All that's left to do is see if the results are active and from the smell i can say i am quite hopeful. Did you try any of that oil?

nen888, when would you add the alcohol and in what way does it improve the extraction? Thanks in advance!

 

[nen888]

..DoingKermit, i would soak the material in ethanol or vodka plus acetic acid/water overnight, and then boil 3x..(this can boost extraction quantities by more than a third than just water/acid), best of luck...

 

[DoingKermit]

I definitely want to try the ethanol/acetic acid soak... great idea, man. Do you think isopropyl alcohol would work in place of the ethanol?

 

[Trickster]

I definitely want to try the ethanol/acetic acid soak... great idea, man. Do you think isopropyl alcohol would work in place of the ethanol?

The project is so interesting that I would suggest to do a small-scale but very thorough extraction trying to get out all the goodies. Otherwise we would not know how much spice is in there.

I did a lot alcohol extractions. Methanol seems to be the best. It is also dirt-cheap. But maybe methanol is not good for simple boiling extractions because it is poisonous. I use a lab extractor with reflux condenser so very little methanol escapes into the environment. My ideal mixture is Methanol/Water 70/30 and a dash of vinegar.

IME couple of freeze-thaw cycles before cookings also boost yields. Freeze-thaw cycles should be done with water only. Alcohol/water mixture may not freeze. You may add alcohol later during soaking and boilings.

I've noticed a slight increase of yields if I defreeze the soaked frozen bark in a microwave oven at full power. Saves time as well.

I would definitely powder the bark. I would also think about doing a defat once. Also IME, 3 pulls are not enough. Usually I do at least 5 pulls.

Hope it helps.

 

[nen888]

..great advice Trickster

DoingKermit, i'm not sure about isopropyl alcohol, and it's a bit toxic too..

i thought i'd link a couple of past confusa reports from the nexus..
Acacia confusa, some notes and thoughts
Acacia confusa problems

 

[DoingKermit]

Awesome stuff Trickster!

I wish i had some of the gear you get to play with, but sadly i have to stick with what i have. The freeze/thaw cycles sound promising and i will definitely give it a shot. Now that my thesis has been handed in i am going to get back onto this project and experiment a little

Thanks for the links nen888.