Kash's A/B - What if I used too much HCl?

[cascadia_voyager]

Greetings Nexians. I'm working on pulls from my first attempt at Kash's A/B extraction of Trichocereus Sp. I have experience with MHRB extractions but this is my first attempt with cactus (and back salting).

I have successfully evaporated my first pull and things are going smoothly, but I fear that I may have used way to much HCl during my first and second pulls. For my first pull I mixed 100 ml of H20 and approx. 0.5 ml of 31% Muriatic Acid. After mixing the solvent and acid water solution on the stir plate for about 15 minutes, I checked the pH of the water and it was way down at 1.6 pH. The water was left to evaporate overnight with the help of a fan. White and tan colored crystals were formed in the dish.

What happens if I used too much HCl? Are the crystals potentially contaminated and unsafe to consume? Can the crystals from these pulls be salvaged? Is there a way to figure out how much HCl I need to use? I have read so much conflicting information and I just want to be sure that I'm not wasting all this time or worse- hurting myself when it comes time to bioassay the product of my efforts. Thanks for any help you can provide.

 

[_Trip_]

From my understanding (and im happy tp be corrected) assuming your hcl is pure and it's mixed with distilled water (to give you the 31%) and you used distilled water to pull, then at room temp it would all eventually evaporate and leave nothing behind. Hcl has a boiling point of -85c and therefore without water (which it is soluble in) it turns to a gas and evaporates clean.

So you will just be left with your mescaline hcl maybe some water impurities if tap water was used or the hcl and water mix is not with distilled water.

 

[drpotato]

in practice, HCl does not leave a system readily, but essentially yeah.
hot air may be required to drive it off as HCl does not tend to evaporate away from porous substances cleanly.

Also hardware store HCl usually contains iron and/or titanium salts as stabilizers, although they are easily filtered away if baked to dryness, plus they also arent toxic.


Im pretty sure HCl salts despite being HCl not just chloride, bound to a freebase, can be cleaned using bicarbonate, not carbonate, just bicarbonate. but then you have chloride and bicarbonate contamination.
In the first place its not a huge issue if there is a lot of HCl present, but it will probably cause the salt to have trouble drying properly unless heat is employed. This is all generalized advice i dont know how mescaline chemistry works.

 

[doubledog]

Is there a way to figure out how much HCl I need to use?

Easiest way is to slowly and carefully add drops of diluted acid (I would use 10% concentration) and check pH after each addition. Liquid pH indicator is very useful here.

 

[drpotato]

i would say the easiest way is to split your liquid up into several volumes, or just take a few test-tube samples (weigh them dont use volume), and neutralize each one with acid, recording how much it took, or how much you were able to add before a pH change was observed. you could also try a very precise but small fraction, acidified with a heavily diluted acid by a known amount, diluted to make it easier to apply precisely, to make addition easier. doing this will allow you to determine exactly how much acid is needed to reach a specific precise point, its what i did the first time i tried to gently basify a 3L maidenii soup where if i overshot, id get a horrendous unfilterable gel or something.

If you overshoot one and undershoot another, try adding the former to the latter and see how much of the former it takes to completely neutralize the latter, which in turn also gives you an even more refined value.


If you can accurately land within 96-98% of the target acidification, then the remaining 2-4% can be added with 10x diluted acid, very slowly, very easily, without also adding a huge excess of water just for the sake of a slow addition. you can slow it down right where the ramping occurs.
Lastly, just as a backup, maybe take 5% of your liquid out, to add back to the acidified solution in case you do overshoot, will give you a second chance

 

[pete666]

Check this thread where back-salting/titration is explained. See attached calculator as well.

HCl is convenient because the excessive acid in the water solution evaporates when heated, along with the water. Mescaline HCl is very stable, and heating it while evaporating doesn't cause any loss.

The only issue is the acid that gets trapped in the molecular matrix during evaporation, but the volume is typically not high. If necessary, dry mescaline can be dissolved again in water, and the water can be evaporated to release the HCl, resulting in a cleaner product.

Small amounts of HCl are not problematic for oral route, as the acid is already present in your stomach. However, for other methods of administration (such as rectal), it is not acceptable, and the final product needs to be clean.

Be aware that evaporating large amounts of HCl can damage your oven, and the vapors are toxic when inhaled, so you should exercise caution when evaporating.

 

[cascadia_voyager]

Thank you everyone for the helpful replies. I'll take what I have learned here and finish my extraction, and post again with detailed final results of my process.

 

[JackAllMasterNone]

Would too much HCI prevent crystallization? In my 1st attempt my pH was < 3 and last stage evap. left nothing. 2nd attempt and it looked like it was going the same way so I added a tiny bit of Sodium bicarbonate to get to ~5 pH and it started crystalizing.

 

[pete666]

Would too much HCI prevent crystallization? In my 1st attempt my pH was < 3 and last stage evap. left nothing. 2nd attempt and it looked like it was going the same way so I added a tiny bit of Sodium bicarbonate to get to ~5 pH and it started crystalizing.

Excessive HCl is evaporated when the extract is heated to about 80°C in the oven for some time. This should not affect the crystallization if processed correctly.

HCl reacts with sodium bicarbonate, resulting in NaCl. Therefore, your result is probably the salt. Taste it, and if it's salty, you know what you have. If it's bitter, there might be some alkaloids mixed with the salt.

Do not add any base to the extract if you used HCl for salting. Simply evaporate it in the oven, and you will have a much cleaner product.