New Hash Making Method

BobCajun said:

There's actually a separate forum for "concentrates and extracts", it's just way down the list. I tried using hydroxide on fresh buds before and nothing reacted even with heat, but I didn't grind them up first. How did you grind fresh bud, with a blender? It works if you make extract, like with alcohol, and then dissolve the extract with minimal alcohol, just enough to dissolve it, then slowly mix in the hydroxide solution, just a little at a time. You're left with a solution which is mostly water because the small amount of alcohol is diluted so much at that point that it's not even noticeable. Then when you add citric acid it precipitates out. If you use potassium carbonate instead of hydroxide then when you add the citric acid it forms a sponge of THCA, expands right up from the CO2 being formed. Use a large container because it really expands a lot. It shrinks back down as the water drains out though, in a filter, but it's still sponge just not blown right up like at first. After rinsing and drying it, you have a nice solid sponge THCA product, like sponge toffee but THCA. It's crispy. It gradually gets brownish from exposure to air but starts out white. It's in chunks not one big sponge.

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Doug Dawson said:

I will stick with the original way of making the worlds best hash, silk screen and press. If I want to extract I would use a rosin press. THC is not the only part of the plant to look at, terpine extraction is just as important and neither of these ways I mentioned use any chemicals so the finished products are the purest form of the plant and not a stripped down terpineless extract. Now don't get me wrong, to each their own.

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Chemichaelrxn said:

Basically what I stated before; I did this experiment in the past and it is best to use a blender to grind up your freshly picked wet bud with sodium hydroxide (carefully) and then filter with vacuum filtration. After the solution is collected, you’d make a brine with it and add a brine of acetic acid to precipitate out the THCA (neutralizing the Sodium hydroxide and sodium THC.). You would then filter again to collect the product.

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Chemichaelrxn said:

Have you ever made hash this way ? (what i may do with the less mature buds at harvest)

We all know cannabis contains THCA, which has a carboxylic acid group, meaning you can manipulate it...

Grind the fresh bud with added Sodium Hydroxide and water. The NaOH in stoichiometric amount in 100% excess from assumed THCA content of fresh bud. After, filter to collect the liquid with the dissolved Sodium THCA (the sodium from sodium hydroxide gets attached to the carboxylic acid group of the THCA and it is water soluble). Make a brine by adding salt then add stoichiometric amount of acetic acid from the amount of NaOH added, that you also make a brine with, to neutralize the base. When you add the acetic acid brine to the brine of the sodium THCA, you will notice a sand of precipitate of pure THCA that you can filter. It is almost pure material. You can wash it with a bit of water to remove the excess salt.
I am surprised they dont use this method in the industry, all you need to do is grind the fresh bud add the readily available specific compounds with some filtering…very simple. I came up with it because I know chemistry and it works!

Thought this would be a good first post to introduce myself!

Mike
CHEMichaelRXN

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BobCajun said:

I doubt if anywhere near all of it gets dissolved. I actually mashed the bud up pretty good with the hydroxide solution and got next to nothing. I used potassiom hydroxide though, maybe sodium works better. But fresh material is just too bulky. It makes more sense to dry it out and extract it with alcohol, all below freezing. The cold alcohol extract is actually about the same as the THCA so not much point in going farther than that.

In fact if you put the THCA in a microwave it turns back into what looks almost like the original extract when it melts together. It's no longer white but a gold color. A weird thing though is that it stays soft, it doesn't go back solid like the original extract. If you leave a chunk of it sitting on parchment it will gradually pancake out. It has a gooey consistency. The original form of the extract is actually more convenient because it says in a solid chunk. Maybe someone would like the gooey THCA product though, if you had a something to keep it in so it wouldn't spread out. Actually it would be a new product because nobody has ever produced THCA goo before that I know of. Who would think of microwaving THCA powder to fuse it together?

So there's not really much point because how does it being a white powder make it better than if it's a gold mass and how is working with a large amount of wet material more convenient than a much smaller volume of dried material? Thanks for sharing your experience though, it was interesting to read. Maybe somebody will find it useful sometime.

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Chemichaelrxn said:

It is chemistry; the carboxylic acid group will definitely form a water soluble sodium THC with sodium hydroxide. Potassium hydroxide would do the same thing and may be even more water soluble. It works for me anyway. I dont bother with extracts any longer, but I found it to be a great new method. You would need to really squeeze the filter cake of the fresh bud you are filtering with good vacuum, preferably not to ground so it doesnt take forever to filter.

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Chemichaelrxn said:

Ok so example:

1000grams x 0.2 (20% THCA) = 200grams
200grams / 314.45 g/mol of THCA x 1mol NaOH/ 1mol THCA x 40g/mol NaOH = 25.44grams of sodium hydroxide required

neutralization: 25.44g NaOH / 40g/mol NaOH x 1mol acetic acid / 1mol NaOH x 60.052g/mol acetic acid = 38.19 grams glacial acetic acid or divided by 1.05g/ml density to equal 36.37mL of glacial acetic acid or 727ml of 5% vinegar.

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Chemichaelrxn said:

I chose acetic acid because it does the job and whether citric or acetic, it would remove the sodium (or potassium) from the THCA molecule, precipitating out the product for collection by filtration. For me when I did this years ago, I recall it separating out like a sand and very pure.

Click to expand...

Chemichaelrxn said:

Have you ever made hash this way ? (what i may do with the less mature buds at harvest)

We all know cannabis contains THCA, which has a carboxylic acid group, meaning you can manipulate it...

Grind the fresh bud with added Sodium Hydroxide and water. The NaOH in stoichiometric amount in 100% excess from assumed THCA content of fresh bud. After, filter to collect the liquid with the dissolved Sodium THCA (the sodium from sodium hydroxide gets attached to the carboxylic acid group of the THCA and it is water soluble). Make a brine by adding salt then add stoichiometric amount of acetic acid from the amount of NaOH added, that you also make a brine with, to neutralize the base. When you add the acetic acid brine to the brine of the sodium THCA, you will notice a sand of precipitate of pure THCA that you can filter. It is almost pure material. You can wash it with a bit of water to remove the excess salt.
I am surprised they dont use this method in the industry, all you need to do is grind the fresh bud add the readily available specific compounds with some filtering…very simple. I came up with it because I know chemistry and it works!

Thought this would be a good first post to introduce myself!

Mike
CHEMichaelRXN

Click to expand...