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Yield?

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stationdragon

stationdragon

Rising Star
Hi there, me again with another STB question relating to recent extractions.

Bear with me, I will get to the main point but let me lay the setting first.

I'm following almost the same tek as usual, I stick closely to Nomans tek because it is the most doable of teks in my circumstances.
This time I have used pre-powdered bark (MHRB)and I asked a question on here recently regarding water content when using pre=powdered bark. Nomans tek says to double the water content and a fellow Nexian said that I can use double the bark I've been previously using.
So I set up my two 1 litre mason jars and into each I have begun a 100g extraction.
I used 750ml water, 100g lye and 100g salt (not in Nomans but seems effective in boosting yield). I was previously working with 1.5g lye per gram of bark because it seemed to have an effect on yield for one particular Nexian in the past but I read also that once the water reaches a certain PH it really doesn't make any difference how much more lye you add, so I brought that down to save my supplies.
I decided to do a side by side coleman (UK version without blue chemical) and zippo premium.
I used 40ml/50ml of each per pull after gently warming the naphtha in a water bath and after collecting I put them in separate jars labelled appropriately. I did four pulls of this size, evaporated at least two thirds overnight and put into a very cold and frosty freezer.
The zippo evaporated far quicker than the coleman, by morning the zippo was very low and turned extra milky when I blew on it. Coleman took a further 8 hours to reduce down enough (this is with two fans running).
Before I put the zippo jar in the freezer it was already forming crystals and they grew during their time in the freezer but despite reducing down to barely anything, the naphtha remained very milky still and after a couple of days hadn't crashed out any more crystals but I could see that the naphtha was still very saturated because of it's opacity.
I decided my best move was to take it out, break off the crystals and pour it through a filter and catch the drips in a glass baking dish to evaporate completely.
The naphtha filtered VERY slowly through the filter and what came out the other side was clear. After drying the crystals I got 140mg from the freeze precip and the resulting naphtha is still evaporating but not showing any signs of crystal growth yet despite it being just a dribble.
I noticed that there is a noticeable stain left on the filter which I haven't yet seen with zippo premium so I wondered if I'd been ripped off and sold another solvent in zippo premium cans but I thought this very unlikely. So instead I held a lighter beneath the filter paper and let the heat warm it up, and hey presto, DMT vapours.
So my conclusion is all that milky DMT suspended in the naphtha got caught up in the fibres of the filter paper. So...that's lost, I'm not balling up filter paper and stuffing them into my machine for a blastoff.
The coleman on the other hand is producing some very white cystals and the solution is totally clear so this has crashed all it has to give I think, but still, this when weighed is not going to add up to the numbers I'm expecting.
I have other pulls sitting at the moment, I didn't have time to warm the naphtha so I'm leaving it for a day or so before collecting.
I've had a lot of extraction fails in recent attempts and it's been blowing my mind, because my very first attempt was absolutely priceless. We poured out the naphtha and wow, there was so much straight away. I've not managed to achieve that since the second extraction. I've had very, very low yields and trouble getting it to crash.
I much prefer the idea of freeze precip because of time, smell, saving naphtha for reuse, convenience and I'm concerned about any leftover residue from solvents. Coleman seems to evaporate ultra clean but takes forever and zippo seems pretty clean too, leaving just an almost invisible outer line where it dries.
I just can't seem to get the same results as the first two times recently despite changing either nothing or very little in our method and it's bugging me so much.
I am going to keep pulling these jars until there's nothing to pull just because I need accurate figures, I need to know what I'm dealing with weight wise.
Unfortunately the place we got the bark from first time around seems to have vanished and we've had two different sources recently. It's hard to say whether it's bark quality, it's hard to settle on any one cause really but we're just going to keep pushing on and hope for the best.
I did read somewhere that pre-powdered has the habit of yielding less DMT but I really don't know about that kind of thing.
Of course, the places we buy from aren't always legit in their own country and therefore might not be legit in their sourcing, storage and honesty if pressed on the subject so it's so hard to tell.
If anybody has any ideas then great, if not I'll just keep pushing on until I get it right. Just wish I hadn't started on such a high note only to be disappointed since. It's such a simple process with so few steps and very little chance to get something wrong I'm absolutely baffled as to how I can get such varying results from unchanging methods.
 
You're wrong.

This is an extract from the DMT nexus FAQ's which I was previously pointed in the direction of when struggling with this method.

"How big should the pulls be / How much to pre-evaporate before freezing?

100ml per pull per 200g bark (or a 2:1 ratio of bark:naphtha) is a sensible recommendation. More wont hurt but it will waste solvent as you will have to evaporate much afterwards. Less solvent per pull is even better, as long as you repeat more pulls to compensate. Sometimes people use more solvent than this recommended amount, like when for example if using this ratio in one's container the layers are too thin and it is hard to separate the solvent (though there are tricks for better separation). If the plan is to freeze precipitate and one uses more naphtha than the recommended amount, it is recommended to pre-evaporate the naphtha before freezing."

And sorry I didn't realise the official help thread existed, so to answer why it is in this section instead is that I thought this was the correct place.

But yeah, telling me to use more napththa is ridiculous, the less the better, the more saturated the better. If I use more I'll be spending more money on solvents than it's bloody worth, already costing me a fortune in the damn stuff.
 
[...] I noticed that there is a noticeable stain left on the filter which I haven't yet seen with zippo premium so I wondered if I'd been ripped off and sold another solvent in zippo premium cans but I thought this very unlikely. So instead I held a lighter beneath the filter paper and let the heat warm it up, and hey presto, DMT vapours.
So my conclusion is all that milky DMT suspended in the naphtha got caught up in the fibres of the filter paper. So...that's lost, I'm not balling up filter paper and stuffing them into my machine for a blastoff.[...]
Click to expand...

If you've kept the filter, you could try washing it out with acetone, if you think there's a significant amount trapped in there. I guess it depends on how much fiddling around you're happy with, but if you did do it, it might give a useful(?) indication of how much spice your filter paper might trap.

I've had a lot of extraction fails in recent attempts and it's been blowing my mind, because my very first attempt was absolutely priceless. We poured out the naphtha and wow, there was so much straight away.[...]the place we got the bark from first time around seems to have vanished and we've had two different sources recently.
Click to expand...
It's entirely possible your current batch of bark is a bit low yielding; nature is variable.

zippo seems pretty clean too, leaving just an almost invisible outer line where it dries.
Click to expand...
That doesn't sound totally clean to me...
 
stationdragon said:
I'm sick to death of bad advice on this site
Click to expand...


And you have a bad attitude to people trying to help you go to hipforums or mycotopia if you dont like it here.
I was not wrong neither was what you read, if you want to make 10+ pulls so be it. The effective amount of NP used IME is mainly relative to the amount of solution and size of vessel.
I missed where you said you had done 4 pulls already thought you had done just one with each jar so it seems like you answered your own question that you have exhausted the
bark and it is of a low alkaloid content. Simple,find a reputable supplier and/ or try another solvent.

Im sick of people thinking they have a right to reply (or quick reply) on this site and acting like a child when they dont get what they want.
 
You see attitude but I don't when I'm replying, I'm just saying what I see, I'm just desperate for answers and sick of this failing on me.
I get advice that are complete polar opposites and it makes me angry because how am I supposed to know who knows what they're talking about?

As far as re-using my solvents goes, I'm instructed to evaporate two thirds before freezing in order to saturate it with DMT, I did this beyond two thirds (closer to four fifths) in this extraction and it still wouldn't crash out all the DMT which was evident due to the milky colour. When I ran it through the filter I lost some DMT to the paper and decided to evaporate the rest of that naphtha but it contained nothing.
I left some naphtha in the jars over night and collected it earlier. When I blew on it it turned white immediately, because of all the problems I've had and the losses I've suffered with these latest extractions I decided to evaporate the lot because I can't lose any more spice. So yeah, naphtha going down the drain with my money...
 
Man, I hope you didn't throw out that filter paper.
You can get the dmt out of it, like it has been said, with acetone or isopropyl alcohol. I always do this with my filters just to get as much as I can. There's always some trapped in there.

I get that you are frustrated, but being frustrated at the forum isn't the best way to get the help you want. If you don't like what someone said, just ignore it. You can ignore me!

Do you know what temp your freezer is at? It sounds like it may not be getting cool enough for real nucleation to occur. Once you get crystals going, they build on themselves. So, if you have very clean glass and pure naphtha, you'll just get cloudiness and no crystals because they have nothing to start them.

Please be patient, as none of us here trying to help are there with you, seeing what's been going on, and it's quite difficult to troubleshoot problems over the net.
 
I do appreciate all of your attempts to help with these problems I've been having and yes it is very frustrating that no-one can be here by my side to help troubleshoot the issues, that's why I try and detail as much as I can but I do feel very repetitive when explaining this method because it has come up time and time again.
I don't know how cold my freezer gets, I don't currently have a thermometer to check that out but it is bloody cold in there, frost all over everything, ice build up has been a big problem in that freezer and it's required a fair bit of maintenance, I don't suspect the freezer temp is the problem. But out of interest do you know how cold it needs to be so I can get a proper reading and compare?
As far as processing the filter paper with isopropyl alcohol or acetone what is the method here? It's something I'd like to be prepared for in the future because I'm sure I've lost DMT to the paper in the past too.
I haven't meant to be rude to anyone on here, I've just had a really, really bad couple of months. I've had a cold followed by a horrific chest infection that went on for weeks, then I was prescribed an antibiotic that was very bad for me. The doctor didn't check my medical history and I have severe stomach problems and he prescribed me with an antibiotic which is very rough on the stomach. So I had a terrible week on those and after I finished the course it took weeks for my stomach to begin to heal and just as I started to feel better for the first time in 3 months, one of my housemates brought a cold into the household, which I caught and immediately turned back into a really bad chest infection. A few days later I developed a very painful water infection and I can't get down to the doctors for reasons not worth mentioning here.
On top of that I quit smoking yesterday because I simply cannot smoke any more with this chest infection and I also smoke weed daily and have done for as long as I can remember. So this is why my responses may have been a little snappy and grumpy.
I'm normally a lot calmer and easy going, in fact people often struggle to keep up to my standards in that department. So if I'm ever short with someone or give an inappropriate response it normally means I've been through hell for months and finally reached the end of my tether and that has been the case here and for that I am sorry.
I just want a yield like my first time, I was jumping for joy when I saw how much came out of those jars and I just can't understand what I've been doing wrong ever since.

For now I think information about the freezer temperature will be a good start and maybe I need to learn how to save spice lost to the filter paper.
I did another pull from each jar today which I left overnight and it turned milky just by my faint breath, I didn't even attempt to blow on it, so the spice is still coming. I just can't know how much. But once again, 200g of bark has been used up with very little to show for it so far. I should be looking at about 2g right now instead of 140mg, totally sucks.
Just wish there was a way to legitimately check out bark vendors and the quality of their product but all I can do is keep trying different ones. Still, there's too many variables for me to be sure about one thing or another and with my over analytical mind it's driving me mad trying to find the culprit.

Again thanks for your support and sorry if I caused anybody offence.
I really need to get better soon so I can use what I've extracted for personal improvement because I'm really not acting like myself recently, I haven't felt grounded for so long and being ill like this for this amount of time my mind has gone into hibernation or something, days, weeks and months are beginning to merge and are becoming undefinable. I just feel lost and trapped within this illness and I can't see the light at the end of the tunnel at the moment. But that's exactly what I'll be doing once I'm better, launching myself face first at that light and breaking through to the other side.

DreaMTripper - can you please expand on your advice regarding using more naphtha for the first two pulls? Why is this needed and how much of this should I evaporate before freezing? I'm willing to give anything a go, it's just I tried more naphtha previously and it wouldn't crash out, just turned slimy and stringy and after hours upon hours upon hours of scrawling through everything I could online to solve the problem I found that the general opinion is the less the better, otherwise you're going to be evaporating all the time to saturate the naphtha with spice.
This is why it wound me up, because I've been back and forth and back again regarding this subject and I kinda assumed that because that advice is on the FAQ page of this site it was gospel and I just thought "here we go again, another person to steer me off track", but like I said it's a mixture of that and the quitting smoking and months of being ill that instigated my short response. I'm sorry if I came across as a total ass, but really I'm not. Otherwise I'd be taking a whole other class of drugs. I only take the drugs I do to expand my consciousness, better myself and advance spiritually. I guess I'm doing something very wrong if I'm this ill for so long. I can't help but feel that if I was spiritually well I'd be physically well too, but despite me feeling more spiritually connected than ever before in my life I'm the illest I've been for a very long time.
This is why I need to go back in and ask them what's up, how I can stay well and what imbalance needs fixing to prevent this kind of physical attack.
 
Well, freezer temp is just a guess.

Frost buildup is more a product of a bad seal or constant opening, than low temps. Water freezes at 32 F, but usually freezers are a fair amount colder than this. I don't know what temp is needed for good freeze precipitation, so I realize I asked the wrong question. I still think it's your freezer temp, though.

Here's my reasoning:
-it turned cloudy, meaning saturated solvent
-you smelled the distinct odor of DMT on your filter paper, meaning you do have the right bark with DMT

So what else could there be? DMT-saturated solvent should be good to go! Freezing is the last step, so it seems to me that is where your problem is.

Don't worry about checking the temp, just crank the temp adjuster down a notch or two.

My last bit of advice: never throw anything out until you have your end product. There are very few way that you can lose DMT, and not be able to salvage at least some of it, if not salvage it all.

And don't worry about being grumpy, it happens to us all from time to time. :thumb_up:
 
Ok, fair enough sounds like you've had a rough time you're only human we all let our frustrations get to us now and again forget about it its no big deal I hope you are on the mend now.
We just make suggestions to for you to mull over and apply to your situation if you see fit it shouldnt be taken as gospel kitchen extractions arent an exact science and there are many ways to reach the end. Personally I base these suggestions on my own experience and what Ive read, and I read the nexus alot!
As for the NPS issue; after second thoughts I think it can be done with many 50ml pulls or 4/5 150ml pulls and this isnt your problem thats just a matter of preference and like Mr.Peabody said its likely your freezer just isnt cold enough as everything seems ok up to that point and it also could well be low content bark because youve had success before. (Did you use same NPS as first time?)
Something Ive concluded about my own freezer recently I think it should be really really cold to work well so much so you cant leave your hand in longer than a few seconds.
Regarding the pulling itself there is more to it than just the solubility of the DMT in the naptha. There is the actual 'pulling' by the NPS of the DMT out of suspension to the NPS in the first place so that it can be dissolved.
The more solvent you use in the solution the more DMT that is attracted to it and therefore the more you can physically dissolve into it and the more saturated it will be and the less you will have to evaporate.
Thats my understanding of it someone please correct me if I am wrong or not quite right!
I just think that in a 100g extraction of 750ml using 40/50ml per pull would take up to 12 pulls to exhaust the bark of alkaloids, especially using room temperature NP and if it was me I would have ran out of patience after about 6 of those!

You said you had more pulls sitting, how many have you done now and whats the total yield? Did you do 4 pulls with each solvent?
Get those filters extracted from too! If say 1ml of naptha can hold 2mg of DMT and you soaked 20mg into the filter then thats another 40mg lost!

Thinking over it again the thing that makes me think its both poor bark and a too warm freezer is where you said firstly you had success before. Has your freezer been tampered with since that first satisfactory extraction?


You say it went slimey-stringy when you tried using more naptha, Ive read that before somewhere but I cant remember the reason I think it couldve been to do with borderline saturation..

In short imo if freezers exactly the same and NPS is the same then its surely its just low content bark as you seem to have done everything right.
 
OK guys, now we're getting somewhere, been looking for a good old in depth discussion about this for a while now.

First off unfortunately there is no temperature adjuster on my freezer, just a boost switch, which I use for the freeze precip stage. I flick it on when I begin the extraction (making the aqueous solution) and by the time the first jar is in there it's dropped considerably in temperature.
I can think of a problem with the freezer at this point though. Tell me if you know more about this.
When I first moved into this house it was pretty much only me living here, the others were due to move in months later, so I pretty much had the freezer to myself when I did the first extraction and the only contents of the freezer were my own. That is when I did the first couple of extractions. Since then the others moved in and packed the freezer to bulging, leaving just one small space for my jars. Now, I assumed that because there's more stuff in the freezer then it means there are more freezing items and therefore more angles that cold is coming from. But perhaps I am wrong, perhaps with the freezer packed full, all of that cold is being sucked up by all the contents, leaving less for the jars to absorb? Do you think this might be possible? It makes me think of an igloo, it's made of ice but it stays warm enough inside to sustain human life, perhaps that is happening here, an insulation of the jars by freezing bags of food perhaps?
As for the frost and ice build up, you could be right. The freezer is opened and closed a lot in this house and also we have had some problems with the seal recently. So perhaps this is the problem.
I agree that everything else seems good to go right up until the final stage so it seems the culprit very likely is the freezer, but it's the only one we have. I guess with a dodgy seal I could swing the landlord to get a new one maybe, I dunno.
I doubt it's the bark after all the worrying because the solvent always goes very white when I blow on it.

DreaMTripper - I had to halt the evaporation process overnight because I only had one of our bedrooms to evaporate in and I'm not inhaling that stuff while I sleep haha. So I don't have a result from that just yet but I will continue to pull until literally nothing comes out because if nothing else I need to know the quality of this bark for future reference.
It is going very slowly though because I'm not giving it all the attention I normally would due to being so ill. Normally I'd rush to get it all done rather quickly but there's a lot of putting stuff to one side and picking it up later or tomorrow or whatever. It's very hard to have any motivation in this state.
I am able to get to see the doctor tomorrow and I can get some medication to begin healing again so, once I'm back home again after the holiday season I should (fingers crossed) be back in good health and I can get to giving some results.
Ooh, you asked if I did 4 pulls with each solvent.
Well I did 4 pulls with each solvent in each jar and collected them into one jar each and evaporated before freezing.
Then when I decieded to try more pulls to see how it's going, I realised coleman wasn't producing a great amount so I just pulled both jars with zippo instead, and that is what is currently evaporating. Definitely still more DMT to come though.
Also I have plenty of bark to play around with after this too, not all is lost.
Also zippo premium is the solvent I used the first time and the one I favour though not in price. We can't get VM&P over here so we don't have the luxury of a big 5ltr jug for a few quid unfortunately. 1.5ltr of this stuff cost me £35, very disappointing naphtha situation over here
 
stationdragon said:
a problem with the freezer at this point though. Tell me if you know more about this.
When I first moved into this house it was pretty much only me living here, the others were due to move in months later, so I pretty much had the freezer to myself when I did the first extraction and the only contents of the freezer were my own. That is when I did the first couple of extractions. Since then the others moved in and packed the freezer to bulging, leaving just one small space for my jars. Now, I assumed that because there's more stuff in the freezer then it means there are more freezing items and therefore more angles that cold is coming from. But perhaps I am wrong, perhaps with the freezer packed full, all of that cold is being sucked up by all the contents, leaving less for the jars to absorb? Do you think this might be possible? It makes me think of an igloo, it's made of ice but it stays warm enough inside to sustain human life, perhaps that is happening here, an insulation of the jars by freezing bags of food perhaps?
Click to expand...

This shouldn't be an issue-- once your freezer has brought the food down to the freezer temperature it won't be expending any extra energy to keep the food that way. The reason an igloo works is because the human body is constantly producing heat, and the insulation slows down the rate that this heat is taken away by the environment.

Can't say I have much other advice as I have been having similar problems as you. What I will be trying on my next runs is keeping the pulls in the freezer for a much longer time (48hr+) to encourage the growth of the largest crystals possible.
 
Ok so the bark itself seems reasonable and still a few more pulls to go and you say you used just zippo last time. Am I right in saying this time you mixed the Napthas then did a freeze precip? That could be an issue colemans could have heavy hydrocarbons that arent good for freeze precip.



I still think its just a freezer issue if its getting opened all the time and the seal is dodgey then the temp isnt going to stay down.
Have you considered salting out the spice from the naptha and doing a reduce to goo then a conversion with sodium carbonate? BLAB step 6..
Pain in the arse being stuck at the last hurdle I know. I had one once where I could see the snowglobe at room temp but couldnt freeze precip them because of the crap freezer so I evaporated outside only to catch a load of flies and heavily contaminate my batch! There are so many flies in the air you just dont realise and many are apparently attracted to naptha!
 
I've done the whole over 2 days in the freezer thing only to still have milky naphtha so I think temperature must be the issue. It definitely gets damn cold in there but I now have my doubts about it.

I didn't mix the naphtha's, I don't know enough to be comfortable doing that. I put the coleman in a jar labelled C and the zippo in one labelled Z before evaporating and freezing. After seeing the difference in potential yield I decided to stick with zippo for the moment to get the most I can. So no, I have done no mixing of solvents.
The only thing close to that is there may have been a tiny layer of coleman left in the mason jar from before and that would mean the zippo that is currently evaporating may have particles of coleman in there but I'm hoping that won't be a problem if it is the case.

Also I haven't considered the other steps you mentioned because I'm unaware of them. It sounds like too much messing about for something I previously had some great success with.
I'll look into it but if it seems too much effort I think I'll leave it.
I just hope I can be back to great results again soon.
 
I would recommend deicing a portion of your freezer, near the fan output (which should be the coldest area). The ice buildup will make your freezer a bit warmer. It will act as an insulator, slowing the transfer of heat from your fridge. All of the other stuff in there will impede the convection currents leading to warmer spots.

There is no such thing as cold, there are hot things and things that aren't as hot. Think of heat like water. If you have a bucket of water, it is kind of like having a hot thing. The water will flow out of the bucket, given the right path (a hole in the bucket, or tipping it over). The heat flows out of your freezer with the right path, too (the compressor and all that junk). The flow of heat will be slowed by thick ice covered walls, meaning your freezer will keep a bit more heat (it becomes less efficient).

It's still just a guess, so I don't recommend busting out all of that ice, or shutting your fridge down. Wait, yeah, go ahead and clean that freezer, this is a great excuse, even if it turns out wrong!:lol:

If you don't feel like deicing the whole thing, like I said, you should be good if you deice a portion near the fan outlet area in the back, and put your jars near there.

Good luck!:thumb_up:
 
Yeah Mr.Peabody, I think that is a good call to be honest. I was recently at a family members house and whilst there I checked the freezer out while on my own in the kitchen and it had no ice build up at all, very clean. I put my hand in and it was super cold, there was icy mist flowing and I could only keep my hand in there 10 seconds at most. This is not like mine is currently at home, so I'm gonna free up some of that build up and see if I can convince my housemates to work through some of that food to give up some good space for cold airflow, if only just to test it. I definitely had better results once upon a time so it's all down to testing things out now I guess. My best guess though is that this is exactly the problem, the freezer just ain't getting as cold as it used to be.
For now I'm going to evap and re-x, or maybe not even bother re-xing. I got over 200mg of yellow earwax type DMT from the last evap (so far on about 400mg back from 200g bark and still got pulls waiting, just delayed due to being so ill) and if I like it, which I suspect I will (when I can eventually hit some again) then I probably won't bother re-xing, though I do like some nice pure crystal.
Evap is a complete and royal pain in the A though so if I don't have any luck with the freezer temp does anybody know any other effective home freezing methods? I know liquid nitrogen would be an option and also dry ice which I believe is solid CO2 and I'm guessing this would have the freeze evap stage completed is a phenomenal amount of time. This also sounds a bit pain is the A but a pretty awesome and fast way to get results I would imagine.
Don't assume I'm not a man of patience, I'm not too bad with that, I just think it would be cool to try it out that way (excuse the pun).
 
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