I've done a few STB's and I've noticed that in STB's the layer between lye/bark and naphtha is obvious. In this extraction naphtha pretty much floats with the bark. Is this normal? Did I not use enough lime?

Had a few question about this.

1)

1) If you heat it and let sit 24 hours, is the initial heating pointless?
2) If you let sit 24 hours, would it be better to heat it up right before sucking the naphtha out? (If you never heated it up at all before that).

Just kind of curious about this. I'd do an A/B test but time is of the essence!

2)

Also; is 24 hours necessary? In my experience it seems to be more useful to let it sit 24 hours with NO heating than heat it for 20 minutes. Yields are much better in my experience.

One more question:

I'm doing an A/B and my initial pull resulted in pretty much nothing. After 72 hours the yields increased exponentially. Did my mix pretty much turn into an STB somehow? I'm thinking of adding more calcium hydroxide if this is the case, but is it necessary if I'm getting decent yields? Thanks!