I made a mess doing the easy caapi extraction tech. As alkaloids where not precipitating after adding lye I kept rising the ph up to 12 to see if it would work but nothing, think I over used lye. Whats the target ph for precipitation? what can I do now. thanks for the help.

Assuming you followed the tek closely you should have had some precipitate already. It very well could be a weak or mislabelled batch of vine.

You can try another supplier or go straight to rue extraction, which is cheaper, more potent, & much more consistant.

Major harmaloids should precipitate at even slightly basic pH (7-8 ).

More will precipitate by being pushed out of solution with excess lye, but this should be tiny amount.

Also depends how much acid you used since the base needs to neutralize the excess acid.

My experience with caapi extraction is that it takes quite a long time (overnight at least) until the precipitates settle to bottom and even then it formed a spongy heap.

I have on occasion extracted harmalas from very syruppy pre-made caapi concentrate. It turned out to be far more difficult to get a freebase to precipitate out from a concentrate than when doing the same from rue tea or caapi tea that I had prepared myself.

Use patience. After 3 days, you should find a good bottom layer of precipitates. When decanted into another container, a smaller amount may precipitate after a few more days.

thx blue.magic. and pitubo, what I started with was a reduced solution of 2 litres made with 500 grams of fine red vine(pretty much too concentrated), I added 3 litres of water( with the extra lye) . this morning there was a thick layer of alkaloids in the bottom, thing is that the extra work washing them is going to be tough with all that lye... but gladly all went fine and I didnt loose the precious medicine. thanks for being there!

I'd decant the supernatant and set it apart to see if more precipitate falls out.

Top off the alkaloid with clean water, stir and let it settle again.

When the washed alkaloids have settled again, decant the wash and redissolve the precipitates with vinegar until pH tested acidic again (pH 5 should be enough.)

Filter the solution and base again.