Hello everyone!

So I have been kind of pulling my hair out over my first extraction, and need some help.
I am using Gir's tek that he posted on the forums exactly how it's written. When the naptha and mimosa gunk are in two distinct layers, and you separate the top layer and put it in a collection jar, I can't seem to do it without getting the bottom layer as well. I even went to a farm store, got a syringe and some fish tank hose and was trying to take it out that way, and it works for a while, but eventually, a bunch of gunk tries to get in there. So I did 2 pulls, of as much pure naptha as I could (the jug still has some in it, going to let it sit for a while I think) and this is what I ended up with total in the freezer. Is this enough to get a decent yield? And is there a "master technique" to seperating the two layers without getting any gunk in it?

Thank you!

I'm not familiar with that tek, what kind of container do you have that in? Looks like a jar to me and like it's a little too shallow for good separation.

I had mine in a big metal bowl and was able to get an un-tipped syringe right on the surface to get it up. Nice thing about the syringe is if you do get any of the mhrb sludge in there, you can just shoot it out because it will stay separated in the syringe. At least that's how it went for me..

Good luck to you. First extractions can be frustrating, I just went through mine, but there's a lot of knowledgeable people on here who will help you.

Thank you!! I need to find a tall/thin container, I think...

That's just a glass bowl. And yeah, that's what I thought, I'm going to try washing it through.

Let us all know how things progress from here data.

Will do! While I'm waiting for this other one, I decided to start another 100g MHRB extraction. This one will come with pictures for every step so I can show you guys and be confident everything is going the way it should

Legit. Look forward to seeing those. Gir tek is A/B right?

Nein, STB. It's pretty much Noman's tek with a hot bath and lots of animals.
Edit: and less Naptha. (~70ml)

Have you considered using more naptha then evapping? I admit I'm not very knowledgable about stb, but using more then evapping works very good for A/B in my opinion.

I've considered it. In fact, in about an hour or so, I'll be at the adding naptha part of my next extraction... I've just heard that when using less naptha saves some time and such. But maybe because separating it has been a little troublesome for me, I should add more and evaporate? Does anyone else think this is a good idea?

I've had great experience with this. Used to have your problem in my first two tries, then started adding more, makes it easier to pull most off, even if you leave a little behind the first couple times and just be sure to get ALL of it the last round with a syringe or the like.

How much naptha do you recommend using? And after I do my first pull, should I put it in the freezer then evap it? If so, for how long in the freezer, etc.

For my tek, which was Marsofold A/B, I used 500ml of naptha per pull for the first two pulls of each batch, evapping down to about 50-100ml over the course of either (hours if I'm in a rush, in front of fan uncovered), or else several days to a week(covered with holes).
EDIT: This long method is only necessary if your going for the huge beastly crystals you sometimes see pics of, and even then the yields sometimes aren't more than shards anyway. For a first time best to leave uncovered in front of a fan, check every hour or so, on high it usually only took about 3-7 hours(depending on room air flow and heat humidity air saturation and fan strength) for mine to evap down to the right level.

I usually evap down immediately after pulling the naptha from the basified extract, then cover if I haven't already, next put in fridge two hours, then freezer for four, then fridge for two, than the rest of the way in the freezer, staggering between fridge and freezer like this some people have theorized helps with keeping contaminants out through partial re-dissolving of the dmt in the fridge before re-x in the freezer.

When the crystals stop growing, then I decant, and dry the whole pyrex in front of a fan for several hours before they become completely dry. Then your ready for blast off.

Note: I know this first extraction sucks, mine got completely messed up, was in a friend's apartment, wasted lots of time and had no results to show for it. So if you can get anything, your doing better than me for a first try! It only ever gets easier! Keep at it, its worth it in the long run to refine your own process your own way!

I have found that for removing the Naptha from the top layer you really need something with a small tip. I have mostly used pipettes with a bulb. You may want to try ordering a nice fine tipped turkey baster(I recommend glass) off the web. I tried buying them from local shops but could not find a usable turkey baster anywhere near me. Hang in there, you will get the process down soon enough. We all learned most of this the hard way.

Hey Chemis, welcome to the nexus. Sounds like your pretty experienced with the process yourself, whats your favorite extraction to use? Favorite way to ingest spice?

Considered posting an intro essay for us all to get to know you a little bit better? I'm really new myself, and have been very drawn to getting to now all the new members recently, so kinda been pushing for more of them to do this...

It's always better to use more pulls and less volume. More volume of naphtha gives you a little more product but with just doing more pulls you are much more effective.

K = m2/m1 so to have 99.9% of your spice in your naphtha (m2) K has to be ~1000 to do it in one pull. Most times the K of this reaction is about 3-10. So let's take 10 as an example. With K = 10 you need: 1000/10 = 100 times the volume of naphtha that you got of your extraction solution. If you do more than one pull: 1st pull you get 10/1 = 88% then you get another 8% in the second pull etc. Which means this is much more effective.

I agree that more volume is more work and less efficient, but for people new to the process (as I myself was) I believe it to be a good modification to the tek allowing easy separation of naptha from basified extract.

To be honest, I have no idea where any of that math comes from(I can follow it obviously, like I get what your saying), ha. Would you mind too terribly much explaining the why of it to me like I'm a little kid? Like what is K, m2 and m1. WHy do you need 1000 as K? You say (m2) is naptha, so would M1 be the spice? If this is the case wouldn't this methodology be highly dependent on knowing the final amount of spice to be extracted?(If so thats another reason I switched to the overly large pull, before evapping.)

a more efficient method takes into account the octanol/water partition coefficients of the solvent and analyte; which is why vm&p naptha isn't a very efficient solvent...it's comprised of a slew of several aliphatics, and has xlogp of ~ 4. Chloroform, trichloroethylene, and methylene chloride are far more efficient, their coefficients are very similar to DMT's, (2.5). these aren't arbitrary values. understand this concept, and you can begin to explore various methods of separating analytes against a stationary phase...aka chromatography. it all starts with selecting an effective solvent system.

So where do I go about buying trichloroethylene at a local store or in a way that won't draw suspicion? and I just found it for 51.80 for 500ml online...which seems to be out of my price range. I don't know data's exact situation, but I would venture to say that him as well as me doesn't want to spend hundreds of dollars to come up with a reasonably pure end product.

In your opinion benzyme, is it worth it to get these other solvents? I get awesome yield percentages using the simplest solutions, i.e. vinegar with distilled water, naptha and xylene. From 3 kilos(over five or so extractions) I ended up with 25.6g pure white crystals. Would increasing the quality of my solvent increase my yields past this? I don't believe the bark holds much more ever than 1% DMT. Would the quality would be noticeably better? I mean, the color doesn't mean much, but compared to other spices I've smoked, its subjectively very good, and objectively it seems to be very pure, never any melting at room temp, or anything that would lead me to believe it has any leftover plant fats, and was completely dried and has no noticeable smell or taste or remaining solvents.