“…add a little water and run it through the machine.” Add a little water? You’re adding water to what now, and why?
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Got it on 4/20/2018.
Yes, I had a failure after the first year or so. Customer service took care of it, payed for the shipping and were super quick with the repair.
No, don’t want to void the warranty.
Other than the one failure, it is still working as good as when I bought it.
The typical cycle is two hours. One could probably do 4-5 batches in a “day”.
That’s an awful lot to do at one time with the source. My typical batch of Green Dragon uses an 1/8 oz. If it were me, I would do an ounce batch, reclaim the alcohol, then do another batch.
After I filter the alcohol I add a little water (about a tablespoon or so) to the remaining cannabis and run it through the machine. This will cause the little alcohol to be reclaimed, but the water to remain. I usually do the same with the filters that still have some alcohol in them.
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Ok. Yea, it is a lot for a machine that size. Not all at one time, but say over a weekend or something like that.
I get it now.
Thanks for the prompt, concise answers.
Another question; Do you think the crucible could be lined with a silicone container, or parchment - or something? That way the distilling could be pushed a little further without having to worry about the difficulty of getting the thicker oil out of the crucible.
Doesn’t having to remove the solution before it’s fully purged of alcohol, then having to put it on a heat source (hotter than that of the ST) is counter productive?
They/it is suggested that you can remove while still liquid enough to flow, and use another vacuum chamber with heat to purge the rest. Hah, I don’t want to buy an additional $400-600 setup just to get the last bit of alcohol out that the source wouldn’t do.
Edit: I’ve been wondering if a multiple washes of different cannabis using the same alcohol would increast the concentration of cannabinoids in the alcohol, thus being able to get more done (more oil out) with a single run (same amount of alcohol, but washing, for example 2 or 3oz cannabis with the 300mL alcohol). I know of this working (with coconut oil, for eg.) but I don’t know what the point of diminishing returns is (where the alcohol can’t hold anymore cannabinoids).
Thanks again.
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Yes, you probably could. That being said, it’s made of a non-stick material. When it’s warm, you can easily pour the thicker oil out using a rubber spatula to get the remaining out of the bottom.
I do this, but just let it evaporate in a Pyrex pan. I lose about 10% of the alcohol doing this.
You can definitely do this, it would take a whole lot to fully saturate the alcohol.
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sort of related to your thread - I know you have a green dragon & roots cream recipe above (bookmarked) but I was wondering if you ever use fan leaves (from male or female) for topicals as well or is there really no great case for it?
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I think the best use for fan leaves would be juicing. I usually don’t bother, and just compost everything. I rarely even bother with trim anymore.
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Bingo, this is exactly where I am in the discovery process…
hot, under the tongue… ie: dragon’s breath spray
Thanks @ReikoX
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I had to stop all meds , My stools were to dang hard
Ripped me butt Good.
Hey @ReikoX I’m in the process of making another tincture following your recipe, but for an oz at a time. Was getting out this “Mighty Fast Herbal Infuser” out I got gifted to make my first ever butter with and while looking through the manual found it does alcohol tinctures as well.
Any thoughts on the process? Would final product be anywhere near the same quality? Or is this product more for butter/oils?
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Looks like this is more for butters & oils. If you heat the bud and alcohol together for 4 hours, I believe you’re gonna end up with something closer to RSO/FECO - including the waxes and resins. You could put it in the freezer afterwards to let them precipitate out of the solution, but it’s not gonna get everything out. With oil, you’re not gonna pull the waxes and resins in the first place, but you’re also not gonna pull as much of the THC as you could with an alcohol extraction.
Then again, I could be wrong. I’m still having trouble wrapping my head around using 151 proof alcohol rather than 190 to avoid boiling. As far as I know, 151 proof is just ethanol diluted with more water than 190 proof; the alcohol would boil off first at the boiling point of ethanol regardless, if this thing gets hot enough to boil ethanol. There’s more ethanol in 190 proof than 151, so it would take longer for the ethanol to fully boil off with 190, but either way it seems like you should end up with buds in water, with a skim of oil floating on top. Maybe I should have left this to @ReikoX after all. 
Or maybe I’m just confusing their use of the term ‘evaporate’ with boiling here…
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@Cormoran is correct. Using heat in an alcohol extraction will make for a very green tincture. Based on testing, the freezer method outlined gets about 70% of the cannabinoids yet still has a nice golden color.
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I do love the nice golden color! Your tech never fails me and I’ve had many people tell me it helps with their aches and pains, both oral and topical ingestion
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Hey @ReikoX, do you think doing this in larger batches will reduce the extraction rate significantly? What about a second quick wash the get what was left behind?
I’m about to do another QWET. Ive been thinking about trying a natural evaporation over a temp controlled heat mat this time. I plan to reduce to very strong RSO, and then cut it lightly with another oil to suck up and store in oral syringes.
Thoughts?
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Batches I’m doing now are an oz each, just upped his instructions 4x for the extra volume of the weed/alcohol and it looks the same as when I small batch it
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That looks like a Magic Butter machine ‘clone’; as Cormoran said FECO.
I’ve been using 190 ethanol for years in a MB machine, it makes perfect Green Dragon.
Follow ReikoX’s advice if you want a strictly THC/CBD extraction.
Cheers
G
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@Gpaw Out of curiosity can I see your final product brother? I’m all about whole plant medicine just don’t have enough product to experiment. I’m always happy to learn something new, knowledge is where it’s at
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It’s so dark green it looks black… I store in that amber mason jar in a cupboard.
That’s about 3mm (1/8") in the white saucer. (Sorry about the focus, the camera is being ‘cranky’).
I make chocolates out of it. The added flavour profile works very well with the dark chocolate.
Cheers
G
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I’ve got 2 oz of trim left I didn’t decarb that i could use for that, I might give it a shot when I find another fifth of everclear, just to have some. Different tinctures for different things! Appreciate your input brother
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That’s been my experience. As well. As long as you keep the ratio of alcohol to cannabis you can scale it up with the same results.
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I generally don’t measure anything. I just use round numbers, lol. For instance, this run I have a half gallon jar of trim and chopped buds in the jar totaling 100g. The plan is to basically fill with EC until the bud I covered. Both the EC and jar have been pre-frozen for the last couple weeks.
From here I’m debating either rolling around, or maybe more of a violent shake? Then back in the freezer, but for how long? Do I think the size of the batch will require special attention? Possibly.
After that, it’s out of the freeze, shake, filter, probably add some more frozen EC to remaining plant matter, one last shake, and filter remaining.
Any suggestions from the group?
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