Iv'e read Noman's tek many times, read the revisions thread, and many other threads about STB. I recieved my bark last week. Yesterday I shredded 50g as good as can be done with some pliers. But I'm still having doubts. The reason is that for example Noman says to leave the bark for an hour which is what I wanted to do. But others are using long periods of 3/4/5 or more hours. And with pulls, I wanted to follow the tek and stir WARM naptha for a few min(5) and let sit for 5 because frankly it should separate pretty quikly. But others are saying to agitate for much longer and leave for much longer to sep. or else I will get a poor yield. The reason I am worried is b/c my girl comes home from work about 2.5 hours later then me and I'm pressed for time. Can anyone tell me if I'll be alright with short soak and pulls? Thanks

well honestly, having 2,5hours, being in a mindset where you have to be quick and be hiding from someone sounds like a bad setting to make this extraction. I think patience is always important in these cases.. wait for sometime when you can have enough time, even if that takes long, or do at a friends house where it can be done or something.

but if you go ahead and do it anyways, remember to leave half an hour for the cleaning later!

and the other questions.. What do you mean with 'noman says to leave the bark for an hour'. Leave where? Like inside the basic acqueous solution? Well if it is not finely powdered, then yes its recommended to let it stand a few hours as parts of the dmt will be 'hidden' inside the layers of mimosa. SWIM once remembers boiling pieces of jurema for hours in a brew, and in the end he peeled the layers and still in the middle there was some dry parts. Sure now you have smaller pieces than SWIM had, but still you get the point.

As for the pulls, dont just stir for 5 mins and let sit for 5 and separate.. In the end you'll see its even hard to keep mixing for 5 whole minutes. SWIM mixes for maybe 1 minute, stiring with a stick very fast (never shaking! and careful not to spill some of the liquid). Then he leaves it for maybe 10 minutes to separate, and repeats the process at least 3,4 times before making the pull. It does make a difference in yield, SWIM has observed.

hope that helps

Thanks, I'll make sure to powder it even more so it takes less time to basify. So your saying it is better to do many quick stirrings then one major one. But why should I wait 10 min for the layers to separate when it only takes like two min and I'll end up mixing it again anyway? And rushing, can I still expect around 250mg from the 50 gms bark?

if it separates in 2 mins you could mix it again, endlessness just wants time to separate completely for best results but it seems like as long as it separates then its not converting the alkaloids out from the bark as much as it would if it was mixed again. the point is make sure its mixed well.

For the naphtha mixing, people over do it in my opinion, the naphtha separates out fast if its watery enough and has a ph higher then 13.5(this is important for MHRB, remember!), swim would mix it 2-3 more times and let it separate one last time and pull that. it shouldn't take more then an hour. for a first time extract expect not to get all 250mg out of 50grams. but one could. any questions at all, i'd be happy to help.

Thanks Damiana, I was just afraid I was going to do it all too fast and be left with nothing. If everything go's well, I'll post some pics

Not telling your partner is a bad idea. It will be much easier to discuss with her upfront than to explain to her later.

Just my $0.02