Does DMT sometimes look like Ice?

[Ubiquitouso]

Could you tell shards of crystal dmt apart from shards of ice? Does DMT sometimes look like Ice (water ice)? ... Or did I get bunk mhrb? :'(

I just did an extraction, following the most common tek (

). At the end I put my beaker in the freezer for around 15 hours and when I took it out I noticed some cloudy "particles" floating in the naphtha (0.05g at most), and there was a thin sheet of ice on the bottom of the beaker (maybe 0.3g). I assumed this had to be DMT!! So I followed the advice of the guide and scraped it out and let the naphtha + DMT (and the "ice" I scraped off the bottom of the beaker) pass thru a coffee filter. The naphtha + DMT took around 10 mins to fully drip thru the coffee filter but by then I noticed there was nothing left in the coffee filter... I couldn't believe it... Maybe it's possible that the DMT melted back into the Naphtha while it was sitting in the coffee filter? Or maybe the mhrb that I used is garbage and "ice" and floating particles in the naphtha that I thought was DMT was actually just a small amount of frozen water?

Appreciate it if you can give me some advice! Did I make a mistake or does it sound like my bark was bunk?

 

[Hyper Turtle]

Hey Ubiquitouso,

if you had an ice layer under the naphtha, something definitely went wrong with your procedure.

The tek in the video should work. It's basically just STB with no bells and whistles. Did you apply heat during the pull? Did you agitate the soup/naphtha mixture enough? What color did your naphtha have before freezing?

You should always do at least 3 of the naphtha pulls btw, you're never gonna get everything out of the soup by one 50ml pull. That's good news, it means whatever happened, there's still DMT in your lye-bark soup if you still have it.

It is important to make sure there is no water at all before you freeze, and none can get in during the freeze. Ie. let the naphtha sit for some minutes then check the bottom before freezing, and cover it well (eg. with aluminium foil).

During the coffee filtering, the (hopefully present) DMT might have redissolved in the warming naphtha, or it might have been soaked up by the filter paper itself.

If you still have the filter, i'd soak/rinse it with a small amount of acetone (or alcohol) to see if dmt is hiding in the paper - simply evap and see if there's a residue.

How much naphtha did you use, and how much bark? If you used a lot of naphtha, or if you didn't apply any heat, it might not be saturated enough to precipitate anything. You can test this by evaporating part of it and then doing freeze precip again.

Also, what was the specific brand of naphtha you used? They differ in composition, and some may not work for freeze precipitation.

In general, i recommend taking pictures during extractions, so if questions like this arise, you can show us

 

[RowRowRow YourBoat]

All frozen water would be frozen on the bottom, if there was white stuff floating around in the naptha it was almost assuredly DMT. Like Homo mentioned, maybe combining multiple naphtha pulls, letting them evaporate slightly to increase the dmt concentration before freeze precipitation would allow the DMT to form larger crystals and precipitate onto the bottom of the container instead of just being little floaty bits. That combined with the fact that all of your dmt redissolved while you were filtering the naptha makes me think it wasn't concentrated enough for freeze precip to give big enough crystals that they could actually crash to the bottom of your dish.

Also, the coffee filter part, you said it took 10 minutes minutes to drip through, that seems a bit long to me. You want this part to go as quickly as possible because if to much naptha is allowed to warm it will redissolve the dmt. I use whatever the cheapest filters they had at the store were, maybe that makes it go faster, but usually the whole process for me takes less than 2 minutes(and that's dealing with ~100mL of naptha). I pour the naptha in the filter, the majority flows through over several seconds until the filter gets dmt clogging it up and there is less naptha to provide gravitational pressure to push itself through the filter. At that point I grab all the edges of the filter and twist them together so that air gets trapped in the filter along with whatever naptha remains. I then squeeze this filter balloon and my pushing the air through it also forces the rest of the naptha through. Then you have a wet filter with just a little naptha in it. I then take that over to a fan on low and let it blow dry(on the backside of the filter, don't blow your dmt away) for 30-60 seconds until I have a dry filter with only dmt on it.

That said, usually though the floating portion should only be a small portion of the total DMT, usually the vast majority has crashed to the bottom, I think anything over 20% floaters would kind of indicate something isn't right with the freeze precip, it needs to go longer or that the naptha wasn't concentrated enough.

I don't think your product is bunk, its just that between the tek and how you performed the steps you didn't set up circumstances to be in your favor to get a great yield. This is the reason everyone suggests only using 50g of bark for a first extraction because it is a learning process and figuring out the actual details of what matters in the steps comes with experience, practice, and research. To me it sounds like you made it through the process correctly, there was just too much inefficiency accumulated through the steps get a yield.

I would recommend looking into a TEK that follows the same process but maybe gives a bit more explanation instead of trying to rush through everything in 4 minutes. THe comments section of the video refer to a ton of changes that could improve efficiency, but better to just go with a well-written and explanatory tek in the first place, imo.

 

[Ubiquitouso]

Thank you for the advice! I decided to put the naphtha that ran thru the filter into a pyrex container and put it back in the fridge and I checked it now (after 17-18 hours) and I can see small white streaks in the Naphtha (a smaller amount than last time). I will include some pics/vids in this post Yesterday before I put the naphtha back in the freezer I noticed a few emulsions in the naphtha (1 large emulsion about the size of a nickel and a few smaller ones), seems like the large emulsion has frozen slightly and appears to have some small crystals inside (you should be able to see in the vid that I link).

Also I will add an image of the coffee filter, it is slightly yellow/brown but there are no crystals or residue that I can scrape off unfortunately. EDIT: Also it's ripped at the bottom of the filter because I thought maybe the dmt crystals got trapped in the filter

You should always do at least 3 of the naphtha pulls btw, you're never gonna get everything out of the soup by one 50ml pull. That's good news, it means whatever happened, there's still DMT in your lye-bark soup if you still have it.

I will definitely be doing more pulls with the lye-bark soup. I have left it sitting in a mason jar for the last 1-2 days and there is a thin layer of naphtha still on top of it. Do I just need to add back more Naphtha and heat under hot water for 2 more hours (shaking for the 1st hour and letting it sit for the 2nd hour to allow the Naphtha to build up on top).

How much naphtha did you use, and how much bark? If you used a lot of naphtha, or if you didn't apply any heat, it might not be saturated enough to precipitate anything. You can test this by evaporating part of it and then doing freeze precip again.

Also, what was the specific brand of naphtha you used? They differ in composition, and some may not work for freeze precipitation.

I used around 60ml of Naphtha and I used 50g of MHRB powder. I live down under so we don't have Naphtha around here. I did some research on the Wiki and it seems Shellite/Fuelite is our equivalent? So I used some Fuelite.

The tek in the video should work. It's basically just STB with no bells and whistles. Did you apply heat during the pull? Did you agitate the soup/naphtha mixture enough? What color did your naphtha have before freezing?

Yeah I filled the sink with hot water then periodically added some boiling water on top of that to increase the temp. I think so, I stirred it to begin with and then changed to shaking/swirling the liquid around for about an hour after I added the naphtha, then I let it sit in the hot water for another hour. The Naphtha was slightly cloudy and bit discolored (yellow-ish).

 

[Ubiquitouso]

And here is the video I took of today after freezing the remaining naphtha for another 17-18 hours.

There is a small amount of white streaky floaters in the Naphtha and it seems like there are crystals in the "emulsion" but it doesn't seem like anything of the DMT is "stable" or hard. I might just leave it in the freezer for a bit longer and hopefully it will solidify more? My freezer isn't that good so maybe it will help.

Does it look like there is DMT in there? If yes, how would you recommend that I extract it? Should I pour out as much of the Naphtha without losing any of the white floaters and then fan dry it?

 

[Ubiquitouso]

It's been 24h so I decided to try extract the DMT.

I put all of the solid crystals/particles in a petri dish and it completely melted at room temperature within a few minutes. I think the crystals/particles floating in the Naphtha must be a small amount of water (maybe from the pipette as there might have been water inside after I cleaned it out). I'll try again tonight, I will aim for 2-3 extractions and then put all of them in a pyrex dish in the freezer for 24h.

Is it possible my "freezer" isn't cold enough? I'm using the freezer compartment of a bar fridge.

I bought MHRB from

Spoiler

Aliexpress

so I wouldn't be surprised if it was bunk lol. It does seem to be at this point considering I haven't seen anything that looks like DMT Crystals in the Naphtha (It's hard to see in the video that I posted but all I see in the Naphtha are faint cloudy streaks that seem to immediately dissipate back into the Naphtha when taken out of the Freezer and it seems like there was also emulsions (possibly water?) that froze in the freezer and even when taken out of the Naphtha and left to dry on its own it unfroze at room temp within minutes.

 

[reDeMpTion]

If the solids are "melting" at room temp, you probably have some water in your extract. What did it turn into when it did that?

I have had oils condense into floaty like blobs in the bottom of solvent when it's cold enough, but it doesn't really look like crystals. DMT will crystallize on the glass at room temp if left in solvent long enough.

Have you tried evaporating some of the naphtha and seeing what is left behind? That's what I would do at this point. It's possible you got bunk bark or something else labeled as MH from the source you listed.

 

[RowRowRow YourBoat]

Those ephemeral cloudy wisps you see in the solution should be DMT. That's the kind of thing you want to be seeing at room temperature though, that you are only seeing it after freezing means there isn't high enough concentration of DMT for it to precipitate into crytals you can collect. You need the solvent to be more concentrated. Do your other pulls and combine them all and then start evaporating off some of the solvent to concentrate the DMT. evap the solvent until you start seeing those streaks when you blow on the solvent at room temp, usually letting 40% of the solvent evaporate off is a pretty good start before you have to worry about checking. Keep going till it passes the 'blow test'. Once it does that means you are at the point where the solvent is pretty concentrated and freeze precipitation will be most effective and you will actually be able to get some crystals.

Edit* Oh, and since you are talking about using a mini fridge and I am telling you to evap maybe I should also tell you to read these things first. Some basic extraction safety guidelines

DMT-Nexus Wiki:Health and Safety - DMT-Nexus Wiki

wiki.dmt-nexus.me

and also this blurb from the Law section, in case it applies

When extracting, be careful with nosy neighbours. Evapping petrochemical solvents, for example, will produce a smell that might call attention, so only do it if you dont have neighbours or have a well ventilated area where neighbours wont have access to. Do not extract in dorm rooms, shared houses with people who can't know what is going on. Do not extract in parents house if they are not fully aware and agree with the automatic co-responsibility they will have.

If you end up getting some product out of all this it might be a good idea to read that whole article on health and safety before you blast off. I read it and a lot of other stuff on the wiki here while I was doing my first extraction and by the time I indulged I was very happy I did.

 

[Hyper Turtle]

Hmm, 60ml naphtha with 50g bark sounds reasonable. 1h agitation and 1h settling, all in warm water bath, sounds reasonable. Yellowish naphtha sounds good.

I'm not sure where your problems are coming from. It is possible that your freezer isn't cold enough, afaik you want -15°C or colder.

The stuff in your coffee filter might well be DMT. The filter being wet with naphtha, the crystals might become oily and soak into the cloth/paper. You can get it out of there using acetone or alcohol.

I've heard shellite mentioned for DMT extraction, i have no idea what fuelite is... You don't have a link to a MSDS by any chance?
I live in central Europe and we don't have anything called naphtha either, "Wundbenzin" is something available here that works perfectly.

That you get only floaters might have to do with the size of your pyrex dish in relation to your volume of naphtha. If you think about it, the freebase molecules have to meet other freebase molecules to form crystals. having such a large dish with such a thin layer of naphtha, the distances might simply be too big for larger crystals to form and firmly attach to the glass. Whereas in a thicker layer of (equally saturated) naphtha, the tiny crystals can meet more molecules or other tiny crystals on their way to the bottom. I would try a smaller freeze precip container and/or combine more pulls to get it filled at least 1-2cm.
Plus of course do what RRRYB said, do the blow test and evap part of the naphtha if it doesn't lead to clouding.

When your crystals melted within minutes, were they free of naphtha or still "wet"? If still wet, that is kinda expected. The crystals turn to oil / redissolve, and should harden back into a less beautiful but equally smoalkable chunk once the naphtha evaps fully.

Here's how i do the freeze precip to avoid this sort of thing:
- decant, pipette, somehow transfer the naphtha from the soup into a glass vessel (jar in my case)
- let it sit for 15+ minutes so soup droplets sink to the bottom
- pour the naphtha into the clean dry glass precipitation dish. Droplets stick to the first vessel. Zero water/soup is allowed to be in this dish.
- cover/halfwrap the dish with aluminium foil and place it in the freezer for 18h+
- set up a coffee filter on a naphtha collection glass vessel (same jar in my case)
- take the dish out the freezer, lift the aluminium foil on one corner, carefully but quickly pour the naphtha through the coffee filter. I try to keep floaters in the dish, but all the naphtha has to go, and the filter is for catching the ones i couldn't hold in.
- place the dish back in the freezer, upside down so any residual naphtha can flow away from the crystals onto the aluminium foil. I leave it for 1h+.
- take it out, put it somewhere to warm to room temperature - still upside down on the aluminium foil
- When at room temp, remove the aluminium foil and place the dish sideways to air out for a few hours without dust getting in, until there is no discernible naphtha smell anymore.
- Scrape scrape scrape

 

[Tripp Moore]

You might want to give this east tek a try The Super Simple DMT Extraction Guide. There’s no video, but it’s sufficiently verbose and it has nice cartoon style drawings for each step. It’s a STB method for beginners and I used it the first time out and it worked like gang busters. Just be sure to read it though once (maybe twice) beforehand so you are familiar with the steps. It also helps to gather all the equipment and have it laid out by which step it’s used in. The french call this Mise en place, a term used in cooking meaning every thing in it’s place. Then follow each step and read it through once before beginning to make sure you didn’t forget any equipment. I also did the optional recrystallization step at the end and I felt it really did a lot to up the purity.

 

[Jugginlow]

Since this discussion was about ice I feel it may be appropriate to ask some questions here about freeze precipitation.
I was every excited to see crystals this morning after checking my freezer, the naphtha is still very cloudy is this a sign to continue precipitation?

 

[Hyper Turtle]

Since this discussion was about ice I feel it may be appropriate to ask some questions here about freeze precipitation.
I was every excited to see crystals this morning after checking my freezer, the naphtha is still very cloudy is this a sign to continue precipitation?

I think something went wrong with your upload, i don't see an image. Maybe you didn't click "upload" after selecting the file, or maybe you used a file type that is blocked for some reason, such as webp.

My recommendation from what you said is to leave it in 6-12h more, and see if there's more crystals and less cloudyness. If yes, leave it in for another 6-12h. If no, take it out.

 

[Ubiquitouso]

Thank you everyone for your advice! I will try again sometime in the future and will use all the advice you have given me. I think the main problem must be my freezer isn't cold enough, it's probably only -5°C to 5°C (20°F to 40°F). And another problem might be that there is a low concentration of DMT in the powder I bought... Once I have a proper freezer I will be able to figure it out

I have had oils condense into floaty like blobs in the bottom of solvent when it's cold enough, but it doesn't really look like crystals. DMT will crystallize on the glass at room temp if left in solvent long enough.

Really? I thought it had to be frozen for the DMT to crystallize?

I'm not sure where your problems are coming from. It is possible that your freezer isn't cold enough, afaik you want -15°C or colder.

Oh okay it's definitely not that low, maybe as low as -5°C but probably closer to 0°C. Are there any articles on this site going over the optimal temperature to use for freezing DMT out of the Naphtha? I've heard people say -20°C and others like reDeMpTion say it can precipitate at room temperature if you wait long enough? Is this true?

And also are there any articles for what the optimal temperature is when heating the Naphtha + Bark + Lye solution? Is 40°C to 50°C degrees enough or should it be higher?

 

[reDeMpTion]

I should have checked out your video. I responded in a hurry at a time when I probably should have been asleep. It sounds like the cloudiness is probably what you are looking for. Your solvent may not be saturated enough for crystals to be forming well as someone else said, evaporating some solvent out would help the freeze precipitation happen faster and more efficiently. If you left it in the freezer for a couple/few days you would probably see crystals forming.

I do have crystals show up at room temp in the solvent pretty much every time I do DMT extractions. It doesn't have to be really saturated to do that (it helps), but over time it will happen. It's not as fast or as complete as freezing, but I've gotten some nice big crystals like that.

I like to do the mini a/b for cleanup and use as little solvent as possible and evaporate it, so I'm not the most experienced with freeze precipitation tbh.