~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~Lab 1~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
Materials:
50g Mimosa
50g Lye
750ml of water
50ml naptha (x3)
Ratio: 1/1/15

method:

1. Basify water by slowly adding lye and stirring. Have vinegar handy for spills.
2. add mimosa and stir. Let sit for one hour.
3. add first 50ml of naptha and roll around. Let seperate
4. seperate naptha, put in collection jar and set in freezer. Do 2 more pulls and add to collection jar.
a. one could leave a fourth pull into the base and let sit for a day or two for later
5. wait over night and voila! collection jar should have crystals.
a. evaporate the collection jar and re-crystalize residue for purer results.

The Dude:
Found a nice apple sauce jar with plastic seal.
added 750ml water(from tap)
slowly stirred 50g of lye until the water was semi-clear
added 50g of MHRB
rapidly rolled around in jar then let sit for over an hour
took 50ml of naptha and set the glass container into hot water bath before adding to base(hoping for more extraction I guess...?)
let seperate and pull
Continued that pulling process again(two times now) and collected all naptha pulls into a pyrex dish in the freezer.
already a couple hrs and 2 pulls in and results are being seen in the freezer
added third naptha pull, letting sit for a while longer with more rolling/mixing every once and a while
(overnight) one of the collection jars has shown a considerable amount of collection!
poured that off into jar with less crystals(to see if there's anything left), set full dish out to dry all morning til lunch.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~Lab 2~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
50g MHRB
50g Lye + 10g later
700ml water
60ml naptha
Ratio: 1/1.2/14

PREPARATION TIPS
get your naptha in a hot bath before getting anything ready! keep it hot(but not to hot, just the tap!)
pre-weigh everything into containers(sealed for lye)

METHOD

added lye to water, mixed
added MHRB, shook the shit out if it(new frosted glass-sealed RBF AWESOME!)
added 60ml naptha that was sitting in a hot bath during the preparation, shook the shit out of it.
seemed to have a bit of emulsion, added 10g Lye. Seemed to fix the problem
shook it some more.
keep in RBF the whole time your mixing/shaking!!! don't transfer to jars til ready to pull naptha. they leak to much to mix in
transferred base mixture to smaller jar...didn't fit all of it!!! had to decant the rest of the solvent in order to get it all to fit. a small amount of base mix was still in the RBF
Took first pull and it resembled light-tan milk...stuck in freezer for a while and decanted the naptha into clean dish for continued crystalization
drying the "gunk" that settled from the milky naptha and will clean up with minimal amount of heated solvent and add to clean dish.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~Lab 3 ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
50g MHRB
70g lye
600ml water
90ml naptha
Ratio: 1/1.4/12
The Dude:
Added lye to water, mixed.
added MHRB to water, stirred vigorously
added naptha to water slowly, stirred, then shook...bad idea without checking the cap on the flask. Explosion happened and the fastest cleanup ever was preformed.
after cleanup, sealed the flask completely and grabbed it with a paper towel and shook vigorously.
is going to try to let this one set for a while longer before the first pull is made. hoping the increased amount of solvent will allow more spice to be soaked up.
also changed the ratio for lye and water...hoping to decrease both emulsion settling time and over-all volume of the batch.
Results were rather oily/fatty. need to figure out how to treat this issue....Recrystallization is a bore.


~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~Other Notes & Tips~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
round bottom mixing flask:
(MAKE SURE IT'S SEALED TIGHT!!! AVOID EXPLOSIONS!!!)
funnel in water
funnel in lye, swirl
funnel in MHRB, swirl,shake
funnel in naptha, swirl, shake
after naptha is added, put container into a warm bath. this allows the naptha to soak up maximum amount.
add fresh warm water to the bath with each shaking, this will allow constant heating during the soak phase.

added naptha to water slowly, stirred, then shook...bad idea without checking the cap on the flask. Explosion happened and the fastest cleanup ever was preformed.

Would you please elaborate on what was the problem here and how to avoid it?

(I thought the explosion happened because of some kind of pressure building up in the closed flask, but later you say "after cleanup, sealed the flask completely and grabbed it with a paper towel and shook vigorously" which makes me think the problem was with the flask left open - but why?)

no.

analogous to the separatory funnel, the mixture should be vented.
we never put keck clamps on the sep funnel top in the lab, because the stopper is supposed to be removed (slightly) when swirling; otherwise pressure builds up, and you don't want that.
vent frequently when mixing, and leave the lid slightly loose when allowing to sit; remember, you're working with a volatile solvent. keep away from sparks and it'll be fine

added 60ml naptha that was sitting in a hot bath during the preparation, shook the shit out of it.
seemed to have a bit of emulsion,

you dont need to "shake the shit out of it".. simply rolling it around while watching your favorite movie or tv show is sufficient enough.. This will also help keep it from emulsifying.. I suggest 2-3 rollings throughout a 20 minute period, waiting for a minute or two between to let everything settle.