Hi everyone
I was able to achieve what I said in the title in only my 3rd extraction attempt. While my first 2 were also successful, they served me well as practise and as learning experiences. I thought it would be interesting to post this because it goes to show how even beginners like me can get good results.
Firstly, if you are a complete beginner you will need to read up on a couple of things in order for you to make sense of some of what I'm going to describe. Mainly, and most importantly after you've read all the health and safety instructions you will need to research Cyb's hybrid salt tek and become famiiar with it as much as possible. I wont go into too great a detail in this post about technical matters because I am essentially using Cyb's tek to the letter with only a couple of small changes to suit my own personal situation. The changes I made are the whole point of this to be honest, to explain exactly what I did to yield that 2%. For all your extraction info you should refer to Cyb's original tek, I've been using it since day one and let me just say, "I love you Cyb! Thankyou, thankyou thankyou".
So...onto what I did differently.
The main change is that I used shredded mhrb as opposed to powdered. This is entirely down to the lack of things at hand. I do not own a blender, nor a fan, and I do the whole thing without them. I leave my shredded bark to sit in lye for 24 hours so it wil be broken down that way. I add the measured amount and the solution turns black and caustic, then I leave the jar for an hour or 2 to cool down, I don protective gloves and goggles, screw the lid on the jar and shake it for about 2 minutes, the carefully unscrew the lid again and set the jar down. I wipe the lid and then loosely place it back atop the jar. It's at this stage that I leave it untouched for exactly 24 hours. Get some sleep, come back to it the next day.
24hrs later I come back to it. Starting off with a 3 hour heat bath, no stirring or extra mixing just straight in the bath. Heated warm to hot, 45-50c, reheating every 45 minutes as it cooled. Be careful not to overheat, close to boiling is too hot.
Now onto the non-polar solvent stage and the next big difference.
The solvent and pulling methods remain the same, it's just for some reason the process takes me longer to do than others. I'm unsure why this is but it doesn't really matter, it feels natural to me and if I go any faster then it makes me feel like I'm in too much of a rush. IMO, it's good to get the pulling done at your own pace so you feel comfortable. I still do the 4 agitations and let the naphtha seperate 4 times like described in Cyb's tek, it just takes me around 3 hours to do so!
Before I explain exactly how I do the pulls, since we are on the topic of solvent and naphtha, I need to give another shoutout to a fellow Nexian who advised me once as to which to use. Yamma1, if you're listenning buddy, thankyou so much! The solvent he/she recommended to me is a type of panel wipe called Upol System 20 fast panel wipe, available on Ebay. It works a treat and it evaporates cleaner than lighter fluid.
The pulls.
For my 3rd extract I had decided beforehand that I was going to do 8 pulls this time and I'd do them all back to back. I wanted to hit that magical 2% and 8 sounds like a good number, it's the infinity symbol after all, so I went with 8 instead of my normal 6 pulls. Very first bit of solvent added, after that 3 hr heat bath remember?, the mix is still warm so I dont put in back in another bath just yet. Roll the jar around in figure 8 circles and end over end, gently but thoroughly for 8 minutes (theres that number again!) Then set it down for 20 minutes to let it seperate. After 20 minutes repeat the 8 minutes of rolling then put into a heat bath same temperature as before. I leave this for 45 minutes, then roll again for 8, then let sit again for 20. That's 3 agitations so far coming up to the fourth and final one. Roll again for 8 minutes and back into a heat bath for another 45 minutes. Then pipette out into dish, add more naphtha and repeat. That's how I do each pull. It takes 3 hours each pull. Like I said before I did 8 pulls this time, combining all into the same dish. It took me a marathon 24hrs just to do all 8 pulls. I was exhausted by the end of it and I will not be doing it that way again, nor do I recommend it. Next time I will probably split in up into 2 days, 4 pulls one day, 4 the next.
All pulls into one dish. Let evaporate over time down to around 80 to 100ml. Wrapped up thoroughly in cling film then straight into freezer on it's highest setting for 24hrs. After that time I quickly decanted excess nps and placed the dish upside down for 5 minutes in the fridge. After that, moved nearby an open window for 2 hours. Then scraped up with a razor and left on another plate to dry further.
To make a long story short, a single re x later and final yield of 50g mhrb = exactly 1g ie a 2% yield.
So yeah, that's how I did it and how maybe you can too. Good luck to ya.
Once again thanks to Cyb and Yamma1 (and numerous others in chat area!), you guys rule, thankyou so much.
P.s. Sorry I didn't include links, I'm a computer newb and I dont know how!
Byebye, hope this helps someone
xxx
I was able to achieve what I said in the title in only my 3rd extraction attempt. While my first 2 were also successful, they served me well as practise and as learning experiences. I thought it would be interesting to post this because it goes to show how even beginners like me can get good results.
Firstly, if you are a complete beginner you will need to read up on a couple of things in order for you to make sense of some of what I'm going to describe. Mainly, and most importantly after you've read all the health and safety instructions you will need to research Cyb's hybrid salt tek and become famiiar with it as much as possible. I wont go into too great a detail in this post about technical matters because I am essentially using Cyb's tek to the letter with only a couple of small changes to suit my own personal situation. The changes I made are the whole point of this to be honest, to explain exactly what I did to yield that 2%. For all your extraction info you should refer to Cyb's original tek, I've been using it since day one and let me just say, "I love you Cyb! Thankyou, thankyou thankyou".
So...onto what I did differently.
The main change is that I used shredded mhrb as opposed to powdered. This is entirely down to the lack of things at hand. I do not own a blender, nor a fan, and I do the whole thing without them. I leave my shredded bark to sit in lye for 24 hours so it wil be broken down that way. I add the measured amount and the solution turns black and caustic, then I leave the jar for an hour or 2 to cool down, I don protective gloves and goggles, screw the lid on the jar and shake it for about 2 minutes, the carefully unscrew the lid again and set the jar down. I wipe the lid and then loosely place it back atop the jar. It's at this stage that I leave it untouched for exactly 24 hours. Get some sleep, come back to it the next day.
24hrs later I come back to it. Starting off with a 3 hour heat bath, no stirring or extra mixing just straight in the bath. Heated warm to hot, 45-50c, reheating every 45 minutes as it cooled. Be careful not to overheat, close to boiling is too hot.
Now onto the non-polar solvent stage and the next big difference.
The solvent and pulling methods remain the same, it's just for some reason the process takes me longer to do than others. I'm unsure why this is but it doesn't really matter, it feels natural to me and if I go any faster then it makes me feel like I'm in too much of a rush. IMO, it's good to get the pulling done at your own pace so you feel comfortable. I still do the 4 agitations and let the naphtha seperate 4 times like described in Cyb's tek, it just takes me around 3 hours to do so!
Before I explain exactly how I do the pulls, since we are on the topic of solvent and naphtha, I need to give another shoutout to a fellow Nexian who advised me once as to which to use. Yamma1, if you're listenning buddy, thankyou so much! The solvent he/she recommended to me is a type of panel wipe called Upol System 20 fast panel wipe, available on Ebay. It works a treat and it evaporates cleaner than lighter fluid.
The pulls.
For my 3rd extract I had decided beforehand that I was going to do 8 pulls this time and I'd do them all back to back. I wanted to hit that magical 2% and 8 sounds like a good number, it's the infinity symbol after all, so I went with 8 instead of my normal 6 pulls. Very first bit of solvent added, after that 3 hr heat bath remember?, the mix is still warm so I dont put in back in another bath just yet. Roll the jar around in figure 8 circles and end over end, gently but thoroughly for 8 minutes (theres that number again!) Then set it down for 20 minutes to let it seperate. After 20 minutes repeat the 8 minutes of rolling then put into a heat bath same temperature as before. I leave this for 45 minutes, then roll again for 8, then let sit again for 20. That's 3 agitations so far coming up to the fourth and final one. Roll again for 8 minutes and back into a heat bath for another 45 minutes. Then pipette out into dish, add more naphtha and repeat. That's how I do each pull. It takes 3 hours each pull. Like I said before I did 8 pulls this time, combining all into the same dish. It took me a marathon 24hrs just to do all 8 pulls. I was exhausted by the end of it and I will not be doing it that way again, nor do I recommend it. Next time I will probably split in up into 2 days, 4 pulls one day, 4 the next.
All pulls into one dish. Let evaporate over time down to around 80 to 100ml. Wrapped up thoroughly in cling film then straight into freezer on it's highest setting for 24hrs. After that time I quickly decanted excess nps and placed the dish upside down for 5 minutes in the fridge. After that, moved nearby an open window for 2 hours. Then scraped up with a razor and left on another plate to dry further.
To make a long story short, a single re x later and final yield of 50g mhrb = exactly 1g ie a 2% yield.
So yeah, that's how I did it and how maybe you can too. Good luck to ya.
Once again thanks to Cyb and Yamma1 (and numerous others in chat area!), you guys rule, thankyou so much.
P.s. Sorry I didn't include links, I'm a computer newb and I dont know how!
Byebye, hope this helps someone
xxx
