Hey guys, did my first A/B using phosphoric acid and had some ideas about improving the process for next time. I used 380g MHRB and have thus far pulled less than 2g. I did 2 hour acid boils X 4.

I'd done an A/B with vinegar before on 200g MHRB and got a higher yield of 1.5g but not as pure end product. I feel like phosphoric is the way to go but I definitely had some issues along the way that I think contributed to the low yield. I still have the solution and could keep pulling from it but I'm only pulling about 100mg each time now so it does seem a bit futile.

Issues -

1. The pH was too low on the acid boils which may have destroyed some of the spice. I added the acid while the water was cold and got the pH to 3-4 but once it was heated the pH dropped to 1. With vinegar this isn't an issue as the pH will only go so low as it is not a strong acid. Is the right way to do it to wait till the water is heated each time before adding the acid?

2. Maybe the temperature was too high, I used the high setting on a slow cooker as I figured I needed it to be simmering. I did this with my previous vinegar attempt also. Would a low or medium setting be better?

3. I ended up with a huge amount of liquid. Instead of reducing it down by simmering in a pot I decided to split it in 2 and do 2 separate extractions. This also seemed to cause a problem because from the 2nd lot I could hardly pull anything. When you reduce in a pot on the stove how careful do you have to be when applying heat? Does it affect the quality of the end product or the yield? I've read about the heat turning the spice yellow.

4. I had a real problem getting the pH high enough after adding lye. I had to add a huge amount of lye. This is probably because I used too much acid. Doing what I said in 1. will probably remedy this I'm guessing as I'll be using less acid to get the required pH. Also if I reduce I can add some water first to neutralise before basifying.

You guys are incredibly knowledgeable on here and I appreciate any input

Much love

hello,

if you use the salt tek that cyb posted recently you can expect a 2% yield, 2g from 380g of bark is very low, the salt teck is gonna get you over 7g from 380g of bark.

Thanks, it looks interesting. The only real difference is that only 1 short acid is cook is done and then salt is added.

What is it that the salt is doing?

Also if I'm doing a larger batch surely I have to multiply the amounts of liquids used, I'd end up with about 4 litres of water on a 300g extraction.

Hi...Have a read of the 'Salt' thread
https://www.dmt-nexus.me...spx?g=posts&t=32567

Salt raises the ionic strength of the solution, pushing more 'clumps' of molecule over to the non polar solvent...

Good Luck

Also if I'm doing a larger batch surely I have to multiply the amounts of liquids used, I'd end up with about 4 litres of water on a 300g extraction

You don't need to extrapolate the water...Just use enough water to make the solution 'Watery' and not 'Sludgy'
380g would maybe need 1-1.5 litres...just eye it up...

i am a beginner at extracting and i would have to recomend Cybs vinegar/salt tek for people with less experience . It is easy to follow, fairly foolproof and if you follow it to the letter you will get good results

Thanks for the replies guys. I'm gonna give it a try.


Cyb would it not be an idea to filter it after the vinegar soak to get rid of the plant matter thus maybe pulling less gunk with the solvent?

Well no...not really...
The Tek is basically an STB .... I threw in the acid soak as an experiment to see if I got a greater yield....It can be omitted if you want.
The Saline solution does all the hard work for you...

A 'real' A/B would indeed discard the plant material....but would need more soaks/combine/reduce to salt out all the spice.

I just prefer to pull everything inc gunk and Re-x it later just to make sure I deplete all the bark...

Cool. I'm gonna give your tek a go today.

But if i was doing a genuine A/B at what point is best to add the salt? Just before adding the lye after all the acid boils have been combined?

Also gonna try and salt my last A/B which gave a poor yield. Will salt it and then pull and see what happens.

Yeah that's when I would do it...but any time is really OK..