Can you squish bud on the parchment paper with no mesh bag? (Can’t get them locally today)
What is the average temp to start with? I’ll figure out the press name soon. It has a wheel on top for pressure, maybe 5” x 3” plates.
My friend is freaking out to try this press he bought with a whole grow room of stuff. We gotta order bags but he’s jonesing to see some rosin today. Thx, peace
Absolutely you can, it just won’t be as clean. Might have to pick out some plant material but nothing serious. The loose Bud will expand a bit more without a bag so might require a bit of added pressure as well. Start anywhere from 180f to 220f
A quick search yielded this -
How long do you keep the pressure on?
I usually run between a minute to 2 min, 3 min on the long end. Depends on material, pressure, and temp. Lots of variables to play with
Thank you all! We’ll be doing dried bud. Will that work ok? will it help to add some moisture to it first?
Crap, the more I ask the more questions I get, ha. We’ll read that link. Peace
Yep dried Bud is good. If it’s cured well it’ll press better. I wouldn’t add moisture, if it’s too dry you can try bringing it up with a Boveda etc…
Lol, yea it’s a bit of a rabbit hole at first! Best advice is to just start playing around, you’ll get a feel for it. Happy pressing!
I do it all the time with my wife’s hair straightener hells yeah you can press a bud in a heated press And make some quick rosin that’s pretty clean for what it is in a piece of parchment paper.I use a hand ratcheting work handheld vise and press it till I feel it stop and hold for a sec not to hard to break the straightener and I get not a huge amount but enough for a couple good nice size dabs take care in scraping off the parch and stay away from pressed material and collect your rosin and your good Homie
Hey Gman, there are so many methods it may take some time to find one you like.
The best method for me because it was easy and didn’t use much material is a method called “chottle tech” (who comes up with these names right??).
I use chottle and press slow increasing pressure every 30 seconds for 5 total minutes of pressing, usually at 180-190F.
A bit more discussion on all this over in another thread:
https://overgrow.com/t/the-press-room/
Some good info in there and people discussing their methods for all the different aspects of pressing.
Sorry, @GMan, I must dissent. I don’t think that’s a stupid question at all.
As my dear departed mother used to say, and I’m a big supporter of, “the only stupid question is the one that does not get asked.” By it’s very definition, yours is not a stupid question!
Okay, off the soapbox. 
Thanks everyone! you made one happy boy (my young friend). The unit was already set at 181ºF on both plates, so I told him to leave it there as the previous owner must have dialed it in to that temp. Once we made it work so easily, he decided to take it back to his place for the night, haaa.
The very first press had the rosin bubbling out the edge and was a beautiful color. We used the full pressure for 1 minute and that seemed to be the sweet spot. The dude was losing it, lol.
We squished a few times and came up with a good third to a half gram of nice golden rosin. So, once we all did a big hit it was unanimous. Everyone approved. He lives off of a generator and or solar and was worried his system wouldn’t handle it. I was tired and sore as hell from the day and wasn’t ready to sit at a table and squish all night. So, they left me with what was left of the first few goes at it. He’s gonna bring it back eventually. The bud we used was from my volunteers that were massive but not much on the smoke side of it. No real loud terps. It turns out it’s really tasty as rosin and gives a long lasting stone.
Everything about it went flawlessly and I really appreciate the fast response from you all. He was tripping to try it, ha. I was impressed with the ease of it all. I’ve seen a bit of it online so it all came together perfectly. I’ll be making a butt load of rosin in the future with my massive excess of bud that i never expected. 
Welcome to the cool kids club. 
I still haven’t heard from him, lol. If his woman let him I bet he was squishing all night. It was pretty amazing the taste that came from the bud I used. It had almost no terp taste to it, but had a really nice bright terpy flavor from the rosin.
Hey, is there any use for the left over flat squished bud? It seems like I remember people used them for something.
Soak them in coconut oil and make edibles.
I’ve got a bare bones 4 ton Dabpress. For flower I use a hammer-style pre-press in conjunction with 90 micron mesh bags. I usually press for 3 minutes at 185-190°. My buddy does QWISO with the spent pucks.
You can also put them in a jar w/ Everclear, then into the freezer. Shaken not stirred!
I haven’t used bags yet, I just pre-press pucks in a hash press. No loose material, it all stays together in one spot.
The thicker the parchment, the less bleed thru. Dulytek has been good for me.
