Hi. I had a problem with a tek. I mixed up some CaOH with mimosa and water and let it sit for a bit. It was a mud like consistency. Then I added naphtha and basically shook it as hard as I could for a few minutes. I opened the jar up and all the naptha appeared to be gone, it seemed to become a solution with the mud, so there was no way to separate the naphtha. I added more naphtha and did not shake it. But I'm wondering what happened to the original naphtha? Did I ruin the yeild by locking the naphtha within the mud? Can that naphtha be retreived if I add more water, thus maybe releasing the naphtha from the thick mud? Should I not shake the jar at all next time? Thanks.

You should gently stirr the solution for a while, not shake it. It will cause emulsions just as you experienced. Don't worry though! Add more lye and water and a very generous amount of table salt, and it should clear up.

If not, try to give the container several baths in hot water, cooling it between the baths. You can also try to give it subtle vibrations, techniques used by others in this forum is to put the container on a subwoofer playing something with loud bass or on a running engine.

Good luck!

Did you give the naphtha time to separate? If you opened the jar immediately then yea the naphtha will still be mixed with the water, it's got to float its way to the top. What was your original amount of bark/CaOH and volume of water? Maybe you didn't use enough water. On the other hand, if you did use enough to begin with, adding more water won't help. Add more CaOH or saturated NaCl solution to the jar and -gently- shake it more. This will increase the ionic strength of the water and help force the solvent out of it.

For future reference: do NOT shake it as hard as you can. You will form emulsions which are generally annoying to separate and can take several days to separate on their own, if at all. Instead swirl your mixture or roll it end over end. It will mix thoroughly without shaking.

EDIT: beat to the punch I see

Oh, so that's what an emulsion is. For some reason, I thought it was like a buble or something. I have heard in the past not to shake too hard or you'll get an emulsion, but I never saw any bubbles in my jars, so I figured I was avoiding emulsions. lol.

thanks foe the help.

Well, to be strict emulsions actually are bubbles of solvent not separated. But in the terms of a DMT extraction, it is useful to broaden the term to include cases such as the one you are experiencing. I certainly understand that can cause some confusion!