First Alkaloids Extraction

[smokerx]

I have followed gibran2 tek to extract alkaloids from my 100ml Yellow Caapi brew but the whole thing did not go down well.

I extracted 270mg of light brown looking alkaloids (hope they are alkaloids). I should have extracted much more than that but I had problems with extraction right from the beginning. I am not going to talk about it but at the and this is what I ended up with.

Can you please look at the pictures and tell me if the brown colour is normal? The ph was 7 after I was finished so there should be not lye left in it. I guess or hope that the brown colour is just some impurities from brew.

Is it safe to use it ?

 

[prottel]

Yes it is safe to use. It is normal to get brownish colour. You need to do repeat the procedure more times to get a purer product. However, that is not necessarily.

At pH 7.7 about half the harmine should be dissolved. Since you ended up with a pH of 7 maybe some of the actives are still in the liquid.

If you use a good coffee filter, filtering the harmalas is easy. Then there is no problem in ending up with a pH of 9-10. The amount of lye will be negligible.

After the water has drained from the filter, there is a trick you can use to get as much water out of the harmalas as possible. Get some paper and put it on a bench, then just put the filter paper with the harmalas in it on top of the paper. The paper will quickly absorb the water. When it is soaked, move the filter to a dry piece of paper. After you have done this a few times and the filter paper is decently dry, put some paper over and some under it. Then put it on the floor with a book over it. Then stand on top of it. Should squeeze out even more water.

 

[Eden]

It's not contamination, just possibly non-harmalas that precipitated as well. Pure harmalas will be a lighter color.
Preforming a manske and basifying again as detailed for rue extractions in the wiki will eliminate your unwanteds.

Not sure how the pH is 7....the solution should be basic in order for the alkaloids to precipitate. How much vine does 100ml represent?

 

[smokerx]

It's not contamination, just possibly non-harmalas that precipitated as well. Pure harmalas will be a lighter color.
Preforming a manske and basifying again as detailed for rue extractions in the wiki will eliminate your unwanteds.

Not sure how the pH is 7....the solution should be basic in order for the alkaloids to precipitate. How much vine does 100ml represent?

the ph was between 7 and 8 but I don't have proper tool to measure the exact ph. I only have basic ph paper indicators.

100ml represents 100g of vine .

 

[smokerx]

After the water has drained from the filter, there is a trick you can use to get as much water out of the harmalas as possible. Get some paper and put it on a bench, then just put the filter paper with the harmalas in it on top of the paper. The paper will quickly absorb the water. When it is soaked, move the filter to a dry piece of paper. After you have done this a few times and the filter paper is decently dry, put some paper over and some under it. Then put it on the floor with a book over it. Then stand on top of it. Should squeeze out even more water.

nice trick thank you for that. Next I am going to try black caapi extract then I can test your tip.

 

[gibran2]

...At pH 7.7 about half the harmine should be dissolved. Since you ended up with a pH of 7 maybe some of the actives are still in the liquid.

Where did you get this information? From what I’ve read, (see attached) and from my own extraction experiences, harmine is insoluble in pH=7 water.

(And if it was soluble, we would describe its solubility in terms of mass per unit volume – mg/ml – and not say “50% dissolves at pH 7.7”)

 

[gibran2]

I have followed gibran2 tek to extract alkaloids from my 100ml Yellow Caapi brew but the whole thing did not go down well.

I extracted 270mg of light brown looking alkaloids (hope they are alkaloids). I should have extracted much more than that but I had problems with extraction right from the beginning. I am not going to talk about it but at the and this is what I ended up with.

Can you please look at the pictures and tell me if the brown colour is normal? The ph was 7 after I was finished so there should be not lye left in it. I guess or hope that the brown colour is just some impurities from brew.

Is it safe to use it ?

The color is normal – maybe a bit darker than usual, but within a “normal” range. As I said in my last post, harmine is insoluble in pH neutral water, so don’t be concerned about having lost some due to the pH being 7.

Your yield is obviously low (I assume you used 100g caapi to start?) – 0.27% is low, but not below the levels one might expect in very weak caapi. The alkaloid content of caapi varies considerably (much more than it does with MHRB, for example). I’ve had a batch of yellow caapi that yielded < 1%, and a batch of black that yielded about 3%.

It’s also possible that you did something wrong in the early stages of the extraction (did you shred the bark very finely? did you boil long enough? did you add acid? etc.).

Anyhow, what you have looks good. Give it a try and let us know how it works!

 

[smokerx]

Anyhow, what you have looks good. Give it a try and let us know how it works!

good thank you for that I thought I did something wrong and the final product was not good to be used.

as I have mentioned in my other thread, I had quite a bad experience from using 50ml of the same brew I used for extraction. How much of alkaloids should I start with ? Plus how much of dmt ?

I believe that alkaloids don't give you so much nausea or not at all and that was the reason I wanted to try this as well.

This time I want to try to use dmt fumarate instead of freebase as its easier on stomach (that's what I red on the forum somewhere)

 

[prottel]

...At pH 7.7 about half the harmine should be dissolved. Since you ended up with a pH of 7 maybe some of the actives are still in the liquid.

Where did you get this information? From what I’ve read, (see attached) and from my own extraction experiences, harmine is insoluble in pH=7 water.

(And if it was soluble, we would describe its solubility in terms of mass per unit volume – mg/ml – and not say “50% dissolves at pH 7.7”)

That is what I have read on this forum, of course, I may be wrong. I know from experience that when basifying harmine, taking it up to ph 7 will not freebase all of it. Not even half. Maybe when you take the pH from 10-11, down to 7 it may be a different story.

That he has such a low amount of harmalas as 270mg in 100ml of water could mean that some of the harmalas went back into solution.

 

[gibran2]

That is what I have read on this forum, of course, I may be wrong. I know from experience that when basifying harmine, taking it up to ph 7 will not freebase all of it. Not even half. Maybe when you take the pH from 10-11, down to 7 it may be a different story.

That he has such a low amount of harmalas as 270mg in 100ml of water could mean that some of the harmalas went back into solution.

Ahh… I see what you’re saying. If he used the extraction technique I provided, then he freebased it to pH=12 or higher, then naturally lowered the pH during rinses with pH neutral water. So the final pH of 7 is the result of lowering pH after freebasing in order to remove excess unreacted NaOH.

Once harmalas are in their freebase form, they are very insoluble in water – they will not go back into solution at all, unless the pH is lowered.

 

[smokerx]

anyone who could help me with these questions ?

as I have mentioned in my other thread, I had quite a bad experience from using 50ml of the same brew I used for extraction. How much of alkaloids should I start with ? Plus how much of dmt - fumarate ?

 

[Bert]

After the water has drained from the filter, there is a trick you can use to get as much water out of the harmalas as possible. Get some paper and put it on a bench, then just put the filter paper with the harmalas in it on top of the paper. The paper will quickly absorb the water. When it is soaked, move the filter to a dry piece of paper. After you have done this a few times and the filter paper is decently dry, put some paper over and some under it. Then put it on the floor with a book over it. Then stand on top of it. Should squeeze out even more water.

nice trick thank you for that. Next I am going to try black caapi extract then I can test your tip.

If you have access to an oven, it's much easier to put the filters on a tray for an hour (350 is fine, anything from 200-420 should work) or less. Dries them right up and the harmalas will easily flake off.