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Mescaline from San Pedro, stuck with transparent solvent

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pedrin

Rising Star
Hello everyone!

This thread is on the extraction of mescaline from San Pedro powder with A/B extraction.

Many TEKs that can be easily found online, go like this:

(1) Boil San Pedro powder in vinegar (acidic solution) in a steel pot.
(2) Move the acidic water containing the mescaline into another pot, to reduce its volume by boiling it for several hours.
(3) Pour lye into the solution in order to basify it.
(4) Pour a solvent, mix it, and then wait until the layers separate.
(5) Extract the solvent on the top layer and move it to a new jar.

However, at this point, two problems arise:

#1 TRANSPARENT SOLVENT:
The solvent should be yellow, but in the attached photo it can be seen that the solvent (benzine) is just transparent. It means it hasn't caught anything inside I guess. What could have gone wrong provided the steps above were followed?

#2 HCL vs. FREEZING:
Then, some TEKs say one should put HCL into it, but wouldn't freezing the solvent and letting the crystals form (just like DMT) work as well?

Any insights will be welcome.
 

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#1 nothing wrong here

#2 freezing doesn't work in this case. Solubility of mescaline doesn't vary with temperature in Toluene/xylene

Edit : didn't see you're not using toluene or xylene. I don't know what is benzine.
 
doubledog said:
As far as I know, mescaline is not soluble in benzine.
You should use toluene instead.
Click to expand...
My thoughts mirror this. Xylene or limonene would also work. Other terpene hydrocarbons may also work but the data does not exist and there are better times to start experimenting.


pedrin, looks like you should have better read the bit in each of those 'teks' where it says which particular solvent should be used. This activity presents a number of hazards - you must read the instructions diligently.
 
Mescaline may be slightly soluble in that solvent but even if so, it certainly won't be ideal, if you get anything, it will be a very small yield. You have to choose slightly more polar solvent like xylene/toluene/limonene.

That being said, it doesn't matter in the least what color the solvent is. If it is stained yellow, it doesn't mean there are alkaloids. Mescaline is anyways white when crystallized and transparent when dissolved. If you follow instructions right, it will work, forget the solvent color.

Since you are in the middle of something, you can fix it even if it wasnt the right solvent. what you can do now is pull the solvent out of the mixture, salt it out (and keep the acidic solution from salting), then add a correct solvent (like mentioned above) to the whole mix for the next pull, salt it out too (and repeat this many times with fresh solvent), and at the end mix the acidic solution from the first salting proceedure with the second third fourth etc runs.
 
doubledog said:
As far as I know, mescaline is not soluble in benzine.
You should use toluene instead.
Click to expand...

Mescaline free base is soluble in benzene, as per the Merck index.

To the op, When you say benzine, do you mean C6H6, or do you mean hydrocarbons like heptane and octane?

There are very few compounds, that will be soluble in toluene, and insoluble in benzene. Or vice versa

There is an old school mescaline extraction procedure floating around on the net which uses benzene.
 
Hi everyone!

Thanks a lot for your replies :)

The solvent used here is "benzine" (petroleum ether: Petroleum ether - Wikipedia). This is not "benzene" I believe...

Just to recap, now the bottle contains: San Pedro juice + vinegar + lye + benzine.

As per your advice, the next steps would be:

(1) Pull all the benzine out.
(2) Add xylene/toluene/limonene instead.
(3) Mix the bottle
(4) Wait until the layers separate, then the solvent used would have indeed captured all the alkaloids and would be floating on top.

But then at this point, if freezing doesn't work, how to extract the crystals... by pouring a few HCL drops and waiting for the crystals to form at ambient temperature?

Thanks in advance!!
 
@endlessness

Hey thanks a lot for your reply too!

I didn't understand this step:

"salt it out (and keep the acidic solution from salting), then add a correct solvent (like mentioned above) to the whole mix for the next pull, salt it out too (and repeat this many times with fresh solvent), and at the end mix the acidic solution from the first salting proceedure with the second third fourth etc runs."

I do not understand the meaning of salting out... could you please elaborate?

As far as my understanding goes, for an A/B extraction, once the mix has been acidified (vinegar) and then basified (lye), then you can pour the solvent and pull over and over again... without any further process in between pulls (salting?).

Thanks
 
pedrin said:
Hi everyone!

Thanks a lot for your replies :)

The solvent used here is "benzine" (petroleum ether: Petroleum ether - Wikipedia). This is not "benzene" I believe...

Just to recap, now the bottle contains: San Pedro juice + vinegar + lye + benzine.

As per your advice, the next steps would be:

(1) Pull all the benzine out.
(2) Add xylene/toluene/limonene instead.
(3) Mix the bottle
(4) Wait until the layers separate, then the solvent used would have indeed captured all the alkaloids and would be floating on top.

But then at this point, if freezing doesn't work, how to extract the crystals... by pouring a few HCL drops and waiting for the crystals to form at ambient temperature?

Thanks in advance!!
Click to expand...

Ah, I see. Then what the others have said is absolutely correct. Mescaline freebase is not soluble in pet ether.

As for your next question, once you have extracted your mix with toluene x3, then extract the toluene with an acidic solution. You could use some dilute hcl. Then evaporate this acidic solution to dryness. You can use some heat, but careful not to burn. You will be left with a dirty brown solid which can be scraped up and purified further using various procedures that are on this site. For example, dry acetone wash.

Hope that helps. Sorry about the confusion of benzine vs benzene......different countries, different language.
 
Thanks a lot for your reply!

I know that up until now what's been done is a normal A/B extraction: first the mixture was acidified (vinegar) and then it was basified (lye)...

Then the alkaloids have to be pulled out with the solvent...

But what is the name of this extra step consisting on putting an acid like HCL on the solvent to capture the mescaline?

Would this be a precipitation but using acid on solvent instead of cold on solvent like with the DMT?

Thanks
 
On the other hand, are there some alternatives to the HCL for this process?

Couldn't the mescaline-containing solvent (xylene/toluene/limonene) be acidified with vinegar or some other easy-to-get options?

Thanks a lot
 
Hcl is convenient because the excess evaporates off in the last step. You can't do that with every acid. Acetic acid is the other option.

Pedrin, go to the wiki and read kash's tek and 69ron tek. Both involve evaporating excess acid at the end to get the crude product. It should make sense after you read those.
 
Yes that muriatic acid would work. In that very same page you linked there is also xylene and toluene from that brand, not sure where you live but you should be able to find these substances both online and in hardware store in the paint solvent section. Check the ingredients well to make sure it only contains the solvent you want.

As for how to do the process, please check the wiki links mentioned earlier, the teks describe step by step how you need to do. If there's anything you dont understand from the teks, let us know. Please be sure to take proper precautions when working with these chemicals, googles, gloves, work in a well ventilated area, etc.
 
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