Is it just me or is this stuff hard to extract? I'm on my last leg here. I have simply added water, lye crystals, and D-limonene and done nothing else. Don't the laws of physics dictate that the non-polar layer will separate from the polar layer? I've basified cactus powder before, and mimosa many times before. Anyway, the layers aren't cleanly separating, and I have no idea what to do about it. Also I'm out of D-limonene so can I make do with Xylene?

Xylenes a better option, limo is partially miscible with water.

Basify the crap out of it...like ph13+

Hot water bath and time will help.

Screw the d-limo and use a real NP. Your going to salt out the mesc anyway.

Just eat that resin yall! or mix it with powdered caapi for a nice ride.

you can retrieve most of your dlimo, dont ruin it with some DANGEROUS NPS (xylene), you wouldnt ingest smalls amounts of xylene alone so why potentially do it with alkaloids. furthermore, get more dlimo, if you use it right, a gallon lasts you well over a year...

the trick is to barely hydrate the cactus powder AFTER making a homogenous mixture of cacti and bass (lye/hydrated lime) when this is done it makes a bass paste that is the consistency of soggy oatmeal and easily separates by falling into clumps to the bottom of your extraction vessel. simply mix the bass paste into the dlimo and let sit, pour of 4/5ths, add 4/5ths fresh limo and repeat, after 5 or so pulls (15 min each, mixing the first 10), combine all pulls and let sit for the night, decant/carefully pour off the top 4/5ths again to insure that you have no aqueous contamination (bass paste/ bass water) this way when you salt you are more likely to end up with nice amber orange waxy acetate, by not letting it settle the product tends to be supremely inferior, take your time on that part

ive also read that the bassified cacti tends to keep breaking down making pulls catch not just alkaloids but other non goodies that contaminate your product (unless you clean properly) typically im done pulling at 2 hours, however ive pulled for 2 days and not found an increase in yield, just more a reason to use a cleaning step


to filter the dlimo

plug a glass turkey baster with cotton balls, and fill it up, blow the solution through the filter (dlimo is safe enough to potentially get some on your lips, admittedly it tingles a bit but most often you dont get it on you)

this works really well
if youre trying to filter the salt and remove the particles use a paper towel, it will absorb the trace amounts of dlimo while letting the salt solution pass. wash the paper towel with clean salt solution to get the rest out


keep on trying, once you succeed youll see that your struggles only make you more grateful

I screwed that D-limonene hard and went for some Xylol, which could not be more toxic to work with, but good thing I have the dual cartridge respirator. Whatever. Complete separation was achieved. Now I have my mescaline HCl at long last. I was losing faith...I'll post pictures sometime tomorrow.

In summary: Use glassware only. Bare-bones minimum HCl if you don't know what concentration you're working with. Work with cactus powder from the get-go. Use Xylene. Use flat-bottomed jars which are magnetic stirrer friendly. And I daresay Ziplock bags make the darndest separation vessels.

....Or separatory funnel, best than ziplog, as plastic can be eaten by solvent, you might have some in the mix after.

I don't think you know toxic. Phosgene is toxic. Carbon Tet is toxic. They have an OSHA Health Safety rating of 4 and 3, respectively. You can't get them at a hardware store.

Xylene has a health rating of 2. I'd wash my hands with it.

and for the love of chem...use glass only.

This was extracted using vinegar, NaOH, Xylene, and dilute sulfuric acid, cleaned up with acetone/water.

Using ziplocks as separatory funnel for xylene?! Thats just so wrong!

If you don't have a sep funnel, you can always do the ol' freezer trick. Not as clean as a funnel, but it works.

1. Extract NP layer from vessel and put into glass container.
2. Add acidic H2O to "salt out" goodies. Shake or swirl gently for a minute or so.
3. Place acid water/NP in freezer. (The water will freeze and the NP will not)
4. Quickly pour off NP layer once the H2O is frozen solid.
5. Collect water/ice plug and repeat steps 1-4...3x
6. Evap water and collect goodies.

I considered that, but the solvent was only in the Ziplock bag for a matter of seconds, at which point I transferred the remaining solvent/basified cactus mixture to my less-than-gallon-sized separatory funnel. And ultimately I pipetted out the HCl solution from the Xylene so there was only that brief exposure to plastic.

I think you are assuming too much, that you know the solubility of unwanted leechable compounds, and also that "brief" contact is safe, without any evidence appart from your subjectively feeling.

We have no hard data of quantity of leeching in such cases, to estimate safety. It would be unsafe if others follower your footsteps even if (hopefully!) you dont develop any negative symptoms long term related to plastic/plasticizer ingestion if one keeps consuming from such extraction products.

https://wiki.dmt-nexus.m...use_for_my_extraction.3F

This is why I appreciate this community so much. Everyone really DOES care and is looking out for each other's best interests. Berzerker, unfortunately this is what I did. I haven't dosed my mescaline yet though, so no harm has yet been done. I was reluctant to use plastic, as I never do for extracting DMT, but then again I've never worked with this volume of liquid. I would just like to say this though: because I'm salting out the mescaline I was less concerned about plastic contamination, although I don't know if there's any logic in that. Also, NaOH is significantly less caustic once all of the heat has been released from the reaction with water. I might be mistaken but I believe my skin has come into contact with day-old NaOH without any sensation of pain and washed right off.

Basically, I basified, then I proceeded to add D-limonene, and when the D-limo did not separate, a day later I added Xylene. This was done in a pair of cleaned 1.75 liter glass alcohol bottles. I mixed thoroughly over several hours and let stand under moderate heat for complete separation. Once returned to room temperature, I poured into a gallon Ziplock, punctured, drained the basified layer into a glass pot, clamped the Ziplock, and poured most of the Xylene off into a mason jar and the rest into a small separatory funnel, which after separation I added to the same mason jar.

I wouldn't be terribly difficult for me to concede that I have plastic contaminant in my final product and let it go to waste, but is that completely necessary? Next time, I suppose I'll just do without the Ziplock.

Anyway, here is what I have so far. Each time I have evaporated the HCl/H2O pulls I have ended up with lighter colored "crust" in the center of the Pyrex dish and a darker brown crust along the edge of the dish. In the middle of the scrapings from my second set of pulls is a gel cap filled with Acetone and IPA washed scrapings from the first set of pulls, approximately 24 hour apart.

This is the final product from 100g San Pedro, cleaned and dried.

washing your hands with xylene leads to unpleasant dry/flaky hands... not something id dare put in my stomach, dlimo works wonders, its a shame its so unpopular in this thread...

as for your yield, it looks about right. ive noticed considerable toxic feelings in my gut from xylene (even after cleaning) comparatively to the dlimo's non toxic feeling, perhaps im just psychosomatic. either way, its definitely safer...

What weight is that coming out at and are you planning to further purify it?

My scale tells me 1.16 grams, which down at least 2 grams from what I scraped up from my evaporation dish, so I don't think I'll clean it any further. The color seems to have stabilized anyway.

a few weeks ago you asked about tropane alkaloid extraction. just sayin'.

limonene sucks. dcm, toluene, and xylene are more effective solvents.
if there's still solvent left in the product, there are several ways of removing it.