I don't get naptha around where I live. What i did find at the hardware store is xylene, however it's not 100% xylene its got some impurities. I'd go for zippo fluid but it's a tad but expensive as I'm a student and 1kg bark is gonna need quite some naptha I'd suppose. What are my alternatives, without compromising yield or quality?

You could look up the datasheet of the xylene to find out what additives it contains.
Depending on the addtitives you can use it anyways. Could you look up the datasheet so we know?

That's where it gets funny lol it just mentions that it contains xylene with a small mixture of other substances. Basically wasn't specified. I don't even know how they sell stuff like that. Seeing that I decided not to buy it at the store. Another paint thinner was made of nitrocellulose.. I don't suppose that's any good? Not very informed about this stuff.
I'd do an evap test but i don't wanna buy the whole thing just to test it

n-heptane works like a charm. More often than not, you can find it as "Bestine" in hobby shops, hardware stores, or sometimes little local art shops carry it (or online even, it is a rubber cement thinner/reducer). Of course, I have no idea where you actually live so it is hard to give any sound advice. I am in the US.

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Where do you live? If your in Canada, go to Rona and find their "Camping Fuel" 100% Pure naphtha. If you live somewhere else try searching for camping fuel naphtha otften sells under that name as well, and it is usually cheaper. I believe it is also sold as "white gas" or something along those lines, a quick google search of what else naphtha is sold as would probably give you a great answer as to what your looking for in your area! I thought naphtha was going to be hard to find as well because searches for the regulars where coming up dull until I found out that it was sold as camping fuel, and then another member told me of the RONA stuff and that changed the whole game for me!

You cant use Nitrocellulose that will just blow up. And it's not a solvent at all.
Maybe look up Naptha or Xylene online? Normally you find some retailers that sell industrial or even research grade chemicals.

As asked above, if you tell us which country you are in then we may be able to help.

I was of the same opinion in the UK until I researched and realised that there's MANY options available to me.

I second that. If we search together we can maybe find a solution for you.
It's easy if you live in europe because I know some good chemical retailers for europe.

? Which country do you live in OP that would really help. And may I ask why you need to do 1kg, why not just do smaller batches if naphtha is too expensive and just re-use your naphtha on each small batch? If it is your first extraction I definitely would advice against using 1kg all at once anyways, that's a lot of product to possibly mess up!

I was wondering anyways he cant afford zippo fluid but has 1kg of bark.

Rather sorry for the late response had been busy with some stuff. I'm from India, and there aren't many people I've seen over here who are from India so despite searching for a lot of alternatives on the forums i simply didn't find any viable product that's sold here. As most industrial grade stuff is domestically produced it isn't the same as most products discussed over here.
And I'm not particularly sure why- maybe because there's an issue of using paint thinners as inhalants in a lot of areas-, it's not exactly available online. Even when i went to the hardware shop they were all suspicious about what I needed the stuff for lol
So well what about acetone? Is that any good? Heard of some people use it but idk about the results. And D- lemonene is fuck expensive too. 15ml costs like the equivalent of $6 and I'm sure as heck not going for a litre of that.

Well I'd definitely look for a cheaper alternative. How much zippo would I need for 1kg ACRB? I just hadn't expected the non polar solvent to be such a pain to acquire nor had I thought It'd cost all that much. On that wrong assumption, i just thought I'd best get as much bark i could within my budget and leave a bit aside for the solvent. And crap that's how i got where i am. Otherwise I'd just order naptha from amazon(not amazon India), but shipping is expensive.

Hey Phat,

I'm from India as i mentioned and also I already ordered the bark, so I guess I'll use all of it eventually. Though of course i would not do the whole batch at once. I'll start with say 50 or 100 grams and get the hang of it first. But either way i figured I'll be needing the solvent for the rest of the bark anyway so might as well get it all loaded up.
And then there's the thing that the Zippo fluid might not be pure. Seen numerous threads complaining of some residue after the evap test. Furthermore, how is it that i reuse the zippo fluid given i do use it? I didn't get that bit although i saw mentions of it here and there. Isn't it just,well, gonna evaporate?

I can use White Spirit Petroleum right?

This isnt really an awnser because im not sure if you cant use it but its heavier compared to Naphta or Xylene. It will take longer to evaporate. Naptha is just the lighter 1/3 of White Spirit.

White spirit is heavy naphtha.

It is highly unlikely. I tried a few brands and it was just too heavy, took about a month to evaporate!

As for effective alternatives, in the UK we have some of the same issues however d-limonene is usually easy to get or hexane is possible (often sold as panel-wipe for auto spray shops).

http://m.wikihow.com/Extract-Oil-from-Orange-Peels

Can this be used as limonene?
I'll check out hexane at the shops in a couple days. What I did find is methanol, how about using that?

Santaonacid:

Anyone who already has trouble sourcing useful naphtha should perhaps not yet consider produce limonene by extracting it themselves. Also mind that you cannot freeze precipitate dmt from limonene nor is it practical to evaporate the limonene off.

Methanol is not a nonpolar solvent, it readily mixes with water in any proportion, so it is not a substitute for naphtha. Really, stick to the time tested and proven teks before trying any variations, especially if you do not understand the mechanisms and techniques very well. Make sure that you thoroughly understand a tek before inventing variations or short cuts.

Light naphtha is also sold as "white gas". The lightest (liquid at stp) naphtha fraction is called "petroleum ether".

zknarc:

When using the technique of freeze precipitation, you need not evaporate very much solvent, only the tiny bits that still wet the filtered product crystals, so this would be quite doable even with white spirit. In fact fully evaporating all solvent is a bad idea, because you get a much more impure product as the end result, containing possible nonvolatile impurities from the solvent as well as other impurities stemming from the plant matter and other parts of the extraction process.

Alternative procedures, especially useful when a heavy naphtha solvent is not saturated enough for efficient freeze precipitation, are:
1. - FASA or FASI (search the wiki for details);
2. - backwash the solvent into a smaller volume of acidic water (eg. vinegar). This can then be processed in multiple ways, like:
.2 a. - basing and extracting with a smaller amount of solvent such that it can be freeze precipitated;
.2 b. - evaporating to near dryness and mixing with sodium carbonate, further drying and the extracting with alcohol.

I'm sure that there are many more options that have been explored and reported here on the forum. Look around a bit. Really, everybody, try to learn a bit before asking questions that have been answered here so many times before.