I put 300 ml of naphtha in my jug after taking 250 out. I mixed it around in my hdpe2 windshield wiper fluid jug for about a day.

Today, I had it on one of my shelves and it fell down and part of it cracked.

I would say a good 100 ml total of substance (maybe more) fell onto my floor and I'm working on cleaning that up.

Is my extraction somehow ruined though? I see the naphtha in there, and the lye/bark. Nothing got into the container.

I think I should just move the whole thing to another container?

If I were to do that, should I use a plastic funnel or, because of the lye and naphtha, will that be a poor choice and should I try an alternative?



I was thinking a quick fix could be seran wrap, but I need something longer lasting than that because I still have about 500 ml I'm using on this extraction.

Thanks in advance.

of course you should move, isnt it cracked?

dont use plastic funnel unless its hdpe. Maybe you can find hdpe funnels for transfering gasoline in hardware stores. Be damn careful in this transfer with spilling lye. Long sleeves and goggles and gloves !

Wait, what would be the problem transferring the solution through a plastic funnel, because of the lye? That's what I've been using. And yes, I would just transfer the whole thing to a different container.

lye and naphtha, both might be a problem with plastic... it might be that very quick contact wont be a problem depending on the plastic, but I really really wouldnt risk it. If you care about your health, dont do it.. its not hard to find an hdpe or glass funnel, or find a larger mouthed container that will be easy to pour into

An ordinary kitchen funnel will be absolutely fine

Isnt that a bit of a stretch to say so? I mean, you are assuming that an ordinary kitchen funnel wherever you are is made of the same material as where he is and giving an 'absolute' advice. And even it is the same, how do you know its ok? Maybe you used it once and didnt notice any problems.. But our eyes are no analytical instruments, I dont think its safe to judge a material resistance to certain chemicals by what we can see happening....

or maybe a usual kitchen funnel IS hdpe? I dont know... Personally I wouldnt like to risk ingesting or inhaling any plastic remain so I would only use hdpe or glass, with no 'unknowns' in the equation

each one to his own though

Would I be able to use the distilled water jug? It's hdpe2. It has a weak plastic cap though... do you know if that's also hdpe2?

If so it's basically the perfect size, although it's thinner than the old container, I think it should work, I mean, I'm not heating it or anything.

yeah sure if its hdpe its good to go. I dont know about the cap, I would guess its hdpe but in any case if the liquid is not touching the cap I would imagine it should be fine

Well I gotta mix it around, and swirling it or inverting it or rolling it all will make the liquid touch the cap.

It has a triangle on the cap that says "4"

Which indicates that the cap is LDPE

It stands for low density polyetheylene http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Polyethylene

LDPE is defined by a density range of 0.910–0.940 g/cm3. LDPE has a high degree of short and long chain branching, which means that the chains do not pack into the crystal structure as well. It has, therefore, less strong intermolecular forces as the instantaneous-dipole induced-dipole attraction is less. This results in a lower tensile strength and increased ductility. LDPE is created by free radical polymerization. The high degree of branching with long chains gives molten LDPE unique and desirable flow properties. LDPE is used for both rigid containers and plastic film applications such as plastic bags and film wrap. In 2009 the global LDPE market had a volume of circa 22.2 billion US-dollars (15.9 billion Euro)


HDPE is defined by a density of greater or equal to 0.941 g/cm3. HDPE has a low degree of branching and thus stronger intermolecular forces and tensile strength. HDPE can be produced by chromium/silica catalysts, Ziegler-Natta catalysts or metallocene catalysts. The lack of branching is ensured by an appropriate choice of catalyst (for example, chromium catalysts or Ziegler-Natta catalysts) and reaction conditions. HDPE is used in products and packaging such as milk jugs, detergent bottles, margarine tubs, garbage containers and water pipes. One third of all toys are manufactured from HDPE. In 2007 the global HDPE consumption reached a volume of more than 30 million tons

Think I should be good mixing it like I mixed the last one? Swirling as much as I want, inverting it, etc.

did you google LDPE lye or LDPE NaOH or LDPE Naphtha or LDPE chemical resistance or chemical compatibility charts? I suggest whenever youre in doubt about chemicals and containers, do this kind of search.

Cant you stir it around without touching the cap? Or cant you get an hdpe jug with hdpe top sold for storing gasoline in basically any hardware store?

just something to be aware of , its nothing to do with your question but double check that its ok to reuse that bottle, cause i was about to use the same kinda just when i noticed on the label that it said that i had to throw away the jug somewhere special cause the chemicals werent safe to dispose of yourself, just make sure theres nothing in your spice that you wouldnt want...

I switched to the hdpe windshield wiper jug.

One problem though, that I did not have with the previous jug, is that the lye/bark/water mix is leaving residue on the sides of the jug.

More than usual.

Before, with the last one, I would tilt the jug and move it back and forth by rolling it on its side, and the gunk would come off because the naphtha was basically cleaning the inside of it.

I used that as a gauge to see how well I was mixing it around, and also the level of separation.

But now im looking at it next to me and its got a lot of residue inside it.

Should I add more lye or water or something?

It's much more sludgey than last time. Though I just recalled that my older extraction went more like the way it is going now.

Maybe I had too much water?

I did 250/250 mimosa/lye in the last one and used the SAME amount of water. Maybe the crack was a godsend and it drained out unnecessary water so that it's at a level that allows the most DMT alkaloids to end up in the naphtha?

Idk.

This reality is odd.


Cool update:
The naphtha is separating seemingly faster than it was before. Within 1 hour I was able to mix it 4-5 times because the naphtha and lye/mimosa/water level were separated very well

If I wanted to put the jar in the freezer (I now have 600 ml of naphtha) could I?

I did a sodium carbonate wash and it still seems like there's water in the jar (did a pinch of sodium carbonate and 3 washes ranging from 50-75 ml of water) but it's not substantial enough for me to pipette it off, but it seems like the sides of and bottom of the jar have water there. I turned it upside down and it drips down into the naphtha. Not sure if it's water entirely though, because I see none collected on the bottom.

Either rate I'm going to put it in the freezer for 8 hours and see what happens.

Most likely I'll just check it out, and let it redissolve into the naphtha and then evap down and freeze again in a pan (right now it's in my mason jar, but I know the pyrex dish and 600 ml of naphtha will reek in my freezer, so if I can evap down it won't smell as bad)

Well I decided to just wait and start to evaporate so I can super saturate the naphtha.

The problem though, is that it looks like little water droplets are in the naphtha as it's evaporating, but they're wayy too small for me to get them out, even if I tilted the pyrex dish that I'm evapping on.

Can I still go on with this?

Once it's down to 50-100 ml, I'm going to seran wrap the top of the pyrex dish (since it has no cover) and put it in the freezer.

Haha I googled LDPE and naptha and the nexus was the first link.

just another reminder, hdpe is good , but it will degrade pretty quickly still, so never leave solvents or solutions with lye in ANY jug more than a week or so. Just got done cleaning a lye spill from not even a month of sitting in a jug and it ate a whole through the jug. HDPE2 of course.