MHRB powder naptha pre-wash. Trading time for purity, an experiment.

[MeecroHyperion]

Ok so I've searched the forums for this, and come up largely empty. Here are the results of an experiment SWIM did.

SWIM was suffering nausea from A/B extractions. Something about the plant fats and other natural oils was making it impossible to properly experience consumption.

It was a deal-breaker. So she turned the extraction process on it's head, reasoning that she should be able to get the oils out preferentially first, all of them, before extraction.

SWIM ran naptha through 100g raw, dry MHRB powder in a soxhlet apparatus for 8 hours in a (80c) hot water bath under a fume hood(and a vigreux condenser). In two stages of 50g.

The waste naptha was reclaimed, and a thick foul smelling bright yellow/orange goo discarded. The washed MHRB powder was dried under ventilation.

The resulting A/B extraction and freeze-precipitation(-8c for 48 hours) was as pure as she had seen, with no measurable drop in yield. Incredibly. Yellow-ish just became pure white. Also, It was the first sample which did not cause some measure of nausea upon consumption.


Conclusion: MHRB plant oils can induce nausea, but natural DMT salts are so insoluble in naptha that SMIM removed every last trace of fats and oils before extraction in one go. When extraction-time comes, the only thing left in solution to compete for dissolution are alkaloids.

As far as producing the purest, most DMT saturated naptha without the oils, pre-washing with naptha is effective. While a soxhlet apparatus is very convenient, there must be a million ways to safely wash MHRB powder with solvents which don't dissolve the target salts.

From the original 100g MHRB powder, SWIM obtained just over 1.2g of pure-white powdery freebase DMT.

 

[RoundAbout]

A defatting step is often used for ACRB in particular, but many people skip it with MHRB to save time. A mini A/B (back-salting) or other recrystallization steps accomplish similar goals.

 

[MeecroHyperion]

Thanks! Yes, this takes longer, uses a different fat-extraction method, gets all the fat, leaves more of the alkaloids. If you've got time [edit: and gear] to pre-wash, even an STB extraction produces better crystals, and more of them, off more pulls, with less extraction solvent.

Maybe most people may not suffer nausea from unrefined MHRB extract, but it's not just the purity, its the yield. SWIM likes the idea of removing the nasties as the first step, completely and losslessly, rather than the last, all the while with oils competing with alkaloids for solvent. And reacting as the pH swings wildly...

I only posted because no-one else has. SWIM could just never seem to do enough defat cycles to fully remove all the yellow, while losing spice at every step. If you've got the time and some equipment, this just works.

A tool in the toolkit, at the very least. Namaste.

 

[AcaciaConfusedYah]

Thanks for sharing your experiment.

I only posted because no-one else has.

It's actually been posted and discussed quite a bit. As RoundAbout mentions, most people just use the method for ACRB, however the back-salting (mini A/B post extraction) seems to be favorable by many.

Cyb mentions the defat step in the popular Max Ion tek. And that has been published on here since... well before I ever joined the forum.

Soxhlet extractions are great! But many people do not have the equipment. Lacking equipment, but full of ingenuity, many members have been addressing the plant fats from acacia confusa for quite some time.

There are many approaches that can allow for pure products.
If you use the search function, and type in "back salt" or "mini A/B" then you'll likely get stronger hits.

Also.... I've never had issues with plant fats in an extraction from mimosa. I get nice white crystals. Are you pulling with heat? Heat during pulls can increase yield per pull, but also introduces fats. I usually do a single pull, yielding between 1.5 - 1.4 %.

There's a short write up of the procedure that I decided to try. The goal was to use the natural tannins of the bark to acidify the bark mix, and then titrate a minimum amount of sodium hydroxide needed to reach/maintain a pH of ~13.5.

I placed the bark in minimal DI water and set it on a hot plate/stirrer. I allowed it to stir for a few days and periodically introduced heat. After a few days, I checked the pH; it was ~3. I titrated, using a LOT less lye than suggested in teks.

Completed a single pull, and retrieved 1.4% yield of white snowballs.

i'm glad you found a method that works well for you.

Take Care,
ACY

 

[pete666]

Defat is usually done not because of purification of final product, but for avoiding emulsions. Mini-A/B is easier, but it is useless when emulsion ruins the initial extraction.

 

[downwardsfromzero]

Great experiment.

The conclusion that the material extracted by the naphtha is 'fats and oils' is not valid without further evidence. This is if we accept the definition of fats as being triglycerides of fatty acids. The material may indeed be of oily or greasy appearance but so are a great number of impure organic substances. Perhaps the material contains flavonoids? It would be very interesting to see a proper analysis of the extracted material. Perhaps you could send off a sample? (will add link when I find it)

 

[MeecroHyperion]

Cheers. SWIM learned everything SWIM pretends to know about this stuff from this site.

Maybe SWIMs MHRB is dud. Hadn't considered that. Nothing ever got all the crap out, until this.

It was the "back-salting" idea which gave SWIM the notion of "front-salting". Granted owning a soxhlet is about legality rather than cost.

Not trying to claim credit for inventing anything, or say the other methods are no good. Just that this is a little bit different and I truly would have preferred to read it rather than write it, if you get my drift

ACY That's a great idea and an amazing outcome. So clean.

downwardsfromzero you're right, of course. It's more than just all the oils. Whatever the naptha washes out is unholy. You would rather have ammonia squirted up your nose than have to handle the solvent-reclaimed waste. Some of that must end up in peoples crystals, even if they can't see or taste it. SWIM is just supersensitive to it, it seems.

 

[MeecroHyperion]

Perhaps the material contains flavonoids? It would be very interesting to see a proper analysis of the extracted material. Perhaps you could send off a sample? (will add link when I find it)

That would be pretty nice to know.