Alright so SWIMs last batch went as follows:

-Mixed 3000ml water with about 500g sodium hydroxide (probably overkill) into milk jug.
-Added 200g root bark and shook around occasionally.
-Waited a day and added 150 ml warm naptha (Recochem camping fuel), did the mixing thing, and pulled a few hours later and ended up getting nice off white crystals after evaporating down.
-The next pulls SWIM starts putting more warm naptha in (200+ml) and instead of pulling a few hours later waits a day or two and mixes every time he got a chance. He ended up getting a more orange/yellow spice.. there was also a layer of what looked like red jungle away from the crystals.. this red jungle stuff SWIM vowed to never smoke again.

SWIM wonders if the color was due to the fact that he waited a day or two to remove the naptha. He also never pulled that red junk on the first evap, so this makes SWIM wonder.

SWIM is planning on starting a new batch soon and trying things a little differently.

-Instead of adding 500g sodium hydroxide, SWIM will be adding 300g.
-SWIM might add the naptha sooner, rather than the next day (not sure if this will help)
-Instead of waiting a few days to pull the naptha, this will be done within a couple of hours.
-Naptha may or may not be heated.. unsure.
-SWIM will probably start with 200+ml of naptha as the thicker layer makes it easier to pull with a turkey baster

Any thoughts from anyone with more experience?

your naphtha must have aromatics in it because otherwise it shouldnt pull red, maybe yellow but red seems to indicate either impurity of the solvent (but you said on other thread it evapped clean), or that your naphtha has at least a certain percentage of aromatic hydrocarbons (like xylene and co...), carrying red with it (plant oils, more polar components of the rootbark, the so called 'jungle spice).

it cant be about the time of pull, if its aliphatic hydrocarbons that naphtha should usually be, then it wont pull red.

so I would say find another solvent.

Are you sure you added 500mg of NaOH? That's only .5g

Did you mean you used 500g?

Just to clarify for anybody who decides to follow your method.

Yeah sorry, SWIM meant 500g.

What I am curious about is why SWIMs first pull had none of this red stuff after evap.

The dude had this same problem on his last extractions!

he's got some very crayon consistency/light brown stuff in a vial...it melts in your hands, and is very clumpy(like the some of the jungle pics) He actually had to spread it around the drying pan with a razor before it would start to harden up after the acetone evaporated.

but he's afraid to smoke it.

If it is the same stuff SWIM got.. I would say don't smoke it. SWIMs friends dubbed it "the retard molecule" .Psychoactive, but SWIM didn't like the aftereffects.

doesnt sound nice calling it retard molecule.. maybe your own expectations influenced it? dmt trips are so so different every time, can be completely different even from the same batch, how can you know it wasnt just a different trip independent of the colour/product?

Its not like mimosa has any nasty alkaloids in it to justify, even pulling straight with more polar solvents and getting the real red stuff wont really be consistently making bad experiences as you describe, so I am kinda skeptical that you 'blame' it on the molecule like this. The other possibility is that you had still solvent traces, and/or that the extra plant oils gave a harsher taste, also influencing the trip. Or maybe your solvent has something that you didnt notice on the evap test but that is appearing on the final product? who knows

in any case, you should do whatever your heart feels its right, but I would say be careful when forming a definite opinion and spreading a definition such as 'retard molecule' because of one or another subjective experiences you personally have had.

as for why the first pull didnt get the red, was the first pull quicker or less warm or something? maybe the amount of xylene in your naphtha is small, so it first pulled the dmt and if the other ones you left for longer they had time to pull the plant oils and so on.. there's many hypothetical explanations, but fact is, if it happened and you didnt like it, then insisting in using the same chemicals is a bad move, changing your naphtha would definitely be recommended

good luck!

hmm

The dude read your previous thread and decided he may have what your friend is calling "the retarded molecule" but dissolved his previously dark reddish/brown stuff into some acetone, warmed it a bit under hot tap and poured it off. What remained was a slightly cleaner version of the same stuff. lighter in color and seemingly more pure. Obviously he doesn't know cause he hasn't smoked it yet tho..

Well it was SWIMs friends that dubbed it this name.. we all felt brain dead for about an hour or two and the next day had terrible headaches.. SWIM only recently heard from another member that camping fuel isn't the best thing to use. Right now SWIM only has recochem camping fuel, and coleman camping fuel.. and to his knowledge he thought that they were both naptha. Is SWIMs only option zippo lighter fluid?

maybe indeed it was solvent traces or something nasty in your solvent, no way mimosa extractions should make you feel brain dead and with terrible headaches. Can you only find fuel? what about any chem/lab supply store in a big city nearest to you and getting pure solvents, or going to hardware stores and looking in paint/solvent section and looking for solvents, then researching MSDS of the brands you can find on the internet to see if you can find out if they are pure. Or order some limonene and extract with that instead.

think about it, 'FUELS' are not supposed to be smoked/ingested, they dont need to be specific about all the crap they might add/mix to their fuel, like anti-rust chemicals or whatever else. I would avoid using something sold as fuel unless I was sure of its purity.

Do you know what the top ingredients are supposed to be in the solvent?.. there are a lot of different names on that list that I really have no idea about.

top ingredients? what do you mean? names on what list?

its supposed to be naphtha, which is usually a mix of aliphatic hidrocarbons, around the c6-c9 range or something (c6=hexane, c7 heptane, etc), though that can vary a bit (maybe im just making this more confusing?). It shouldnt have anything else appart from this.

just look msds of the brand you can find and see what ingredients it has.. if youre unsure about anything it contains, google/ask us

So..

1- n-hexane
2- 2-methylhexane
3- 2,3-dimethylpentane
4- 3-methylhexane
5- n-heptane

What is wrong with that?

I am starting to wonder one of two things of this red stuff

-Maybe SWIM did by chance accidently suck up a little base without knowing
-Maybe it was still plant oils that needed to evaporate more and still had solvent attached

The spice SWIM extracted was great experientially. SWIM just needed to seperate them from the red area. SWIM is hoping his solvent will still be good enough, but wants to play it safe.