I am in Peru and NaOH here almost impossible to find, and when it is found it is diluted.
This is due to cocaine trafficking which I have little to no interest in.
I have used a STB tek in the US several times with consistently good yields using lye.
I have found medical grade caustic soda here but I don't think it is strong enough to pull the DMT from the plant material, I am also trying to find some ph strips to check the levels but have found none as of yet.

ANY suggestions would be greatly appreciated, I have 2 kilo's of beautiful MHRB and nothing to bathe it in!

medical grade caustic soda? in what form is it, liquid or solid? why do you think its not strong enough?

how diluted is the NaOH you find there? maybe its enough, check the dilution factor or pH.. You can find pH meters or strips or similar sometimes in pet shops for acquarium, or in hardware stores/ pool supply stores for measuring pH of pools.

Alternatively, you can make an A/B instead of STB, and then use a more diluted caustic soda (depending on pH) or even sodium carbonate as a base.

Presumably if you evaporate down a dilute solution of NaOH you will get a stronger one. Of course cost and dillution will come into it... Medical grade is rather dilute I believe.

Thanks for the reply,
1--The caustic soda came from a farmacia and is in flakes but I didn't think it would bring up the ph to extract the target chemical.
Will the 1:1 ratio with bark work?

2--I have shopped the local pet stores and all they have are liquid sample kits that measure to 9 on the ph scale, pool supply stores here are nonexistent.

I have never done an A/B extraction but I guess it could be time to learn a new trick.
Any advice on a simple and effective A/B tek?

caustic soda in flakes sounds good, if its pure caustic soda then it will def bring pH up to desired level.. check it out, maybe its what you want

for an A/B its quite simple.. only difference is low-fire boiling/simmering the powdered mimosa in water with vinegar for maybe half an hour, filtering, storing the liquid, putting back the solids in the pot with fresh water+vinegar, repeating this for a total of maybe 4x ... Then throw solids away, put liquids together and the liquid has the goodies.. you can reduce the liquid on very low fire/simmer if less volume is better for you... then just proceed to adding base and do the rest like you do the STB, except now the pH doesnt need to be so high as in an STB

I will find litmus paper this weekend if it is at all possible. As a test last night I used 100G of chopped bark with 100G caustic in 1.5 liters of H2o, it looked great. Then I added the naphtha and worked it for 15 minutes and I have a weird pinkish cloudy layer between my naphtha and base, new to me.
I tried to precip 100ml of naphtha and 2 hours in the freezer made a few tiny crystals, significantly smaller and fewer than I am used to.
I saved my plant material and have the "experiment" in a 3 liter bottle, in three well defined layers, while I decide what to do with it.
thanks for the suggestions

one last post before I sleep:

the middle layer is an emulsion.. it can be broken up by adding more basic water, warming up the whole thing (careful no open fire and open the top to prevent building of pressure) or just adding plenty of pure salt.

sounds like very little crystals because it was too much naphtha... make smaller pulls next time, or evap half the amount of naphtha or more and then stick in the freezer again. Also its recommended to stir the naphtha/mimosa mix and let the layers separate, repeating the process a few times before pulling off the naphtha

good luck

Thanks again,I tried warming the solution up to about 120f with little improvement and adding 90G of table salt to my 1.5 liter concoction was a dud too, I kept the solution rolling and mixing 15 or 20 minutes each time.
I am now waiting for an accurate way to test the pH, I still have my used plant material stored, no matter how much is available I can not bear the thought of tossing possible molecules, old habits...

Does anyone know the ratio I would need to use if caustic soda is my basing agent?
In the past I have used 100G of solids to 1.5L with great results using NaOH.
I am going to have to make some litmus paper myself it seems... I miss the easy availability of everything in the states sometimes.

add more caustic soda, an emulion wont form if the ph is high enough. and even if yuou manage to get an emulsion it usualy setles within 5-10 minutes

Thanks, the emulsion didn't separate in 2 days time and I finally tossed the wasted blend.
Today I'm restarting with an Lextek A/B and my modified STB, each with 100G of shredded MHRB.
I am trying to find a workable, simple method with small "experiments" prior to extracting large batches.
I am still looking for pH strips and if the yield sux I will wait till they are found.