My question came up in this thread, but I’m moving the Source Turbo replacement question to its own thread since it really is a new topic.
I live in Chile. Yes, the one in South America. So almost everything is hard to get here. I want to concentrate cannabis and for the moment QWET seems like the best way to get the THC out of the plant matter. The question then becomes how to get the ETOH out of the hash oil.
The “Source Turbo” appliance mentioned in the other thread seems perfect, but also impossible to acquire here. I’ve called and e-mailed Extract Craft several times without response, and statements on their website are ambiguous, but seem to imply they have a strict N. America Only shipping policy. I already have the transformer needed to run U.S. voltage appliances here, and hoped to persaude them to sell me a U.S. model and make an exception to their shipping policy, but they won’t even return my e-mails.
So what are my other options to get the alcohol out of a QWET tincture and reduce it to pure hash oil? That’s the real point of this thread. I really liked the Source Turbo’s design approach of using vacuum to lower the boiling point of the alcohol, but so far as I can tell there is no other source for that feature.
I suppose a still like this one which is available for shipment to Chile could be used. The desired product would end up in the bottom of the source pot and require some spatula work to get loose, so it’s a long way from ideal.
@allinherhead suggested this electronic distiller from Amazon in the other thread. It seems to be designed for this purpose, but it doesn’t use vacuum so presumably this uses a much higher operating temperature than source turbo. Is that really a big deal or just a little one? I really can’t tell and would love the advice of any experts here.
p.s. I’m also open to considering another extraction technique instead of QWET, and welcome suggestions for how to solve the problem another way. I have approximately 3 POUNDS of very weak weed due to being forced to harvest early. Smoking or vaping it is painful (anyone here remember the early years of the Reagan drug war? Even worse than that!). It takes 5x as many hits to catch a buzz because all the plants were harvested several weeks before optimal THC production was achieved.
I’ve been thinking a lot about our discussions and started thinking about how to use vacuumed instead of temperature and am determined to try a couple approaches hopefully this week. Im a hvac technician and have a vacuum pump on my van as well as an refrigerant recovery machine. I’m going to attempt to recover the alcohol from a container and condense it back into another receptacle similar to the way I would do refrigerant and I’m going to attempt the same using only my vacuum pump. We pulled a vacuum on a jar of water and made it boil at ambient temp so this should work. The concern is the flammability of the alcohol. Although the evacuation section of the vacuum pump and recovery machine are isolated from the electric motor ill do it outside for safety of the experiment. If the vacuum pump works they’re available at harbor freight if avail in chile’ and on Amazon for 60 dollars u.s. so this , a length of 1/4" copper tubing and a few fittings all needed. I’ll be sure to share the results. On another note have you considered extracting into butter and. Making some edibles
Thanks! I’ll look forward to hearing about your results.
Yes, I’ve thought a lot about just making butter/edibles and calling it a day. The problem is that for my lifestyle, edibles take too long. The effect is quite pleasant but lasts many hours. I like to be able to vape and get high for an hour and be back to normal a couple of hours later. I don’t know how to do that with edibles.
I have an ETOH pro. I used the water distillers before that. Apparently Megahome makes an oil distiller which distilles at lower temps. Takes longer, but less harmful to the terpenes.
I can’t find a link to the oil one, and it’s not always available, but this is the one I own and used for many runs.
I wasn’t able to tell how well this would work, since it’s still designed and intended for people who see the alcohol as the product they are trying to get, with the leftovers discarded. In this case we want to boil off the alcohol and the leftovers (hash oil) was the goal. The device in the above link has some sort of metal flap in the bottom of the reservoir, so scraping off something taken all the way to “shatter” consistency would be a real bitch. I’m thinking the trick is mix a little oil with the ETOH and then reduce it to a liquid oil that can be vaped.
@AAA, do I understand you correctly to be saying you’ve done all this, used this type of device and then scraped the good stuff out of the bottom the reservoir and it all worked out?
Even this device is pretty expensive for me. $169 (amazon price) seems reasonable enough but that price literally doubles after shipping and import duties. So it would kind of suck to buy this and then find it just wasn’t suitable, but it sounds to me based on what @AAA said like it’s a pretty strong match.
Finally spoke to Dylan at Extract Craft. Nice guy but their policy is not to ship to Chile. He also seemed to agree that buying a source turbo just for one project was probably overkill.
I’m leaning toward just getting the alcohol distiller from Amazon that @Allinherhead suggested, but will wait to see Dylan’s quote to send me a source turbo with all warranty support subject to me paying shipping both ways. That was the only way they would even consider shipping here.
There are third party shippers that can accept your package in the US and then ship to another country. I’m not sure which would be most reputable or have best pricing though. I also agree that it would be pretty substantial investment for a single run.
@xPat Yes, I’ve used the distiller to make FECO. Essentially QWET, but decarbed.
I measure the amount of alcohol I put in and distill just before it’s all done. That leaves a more viscous oil behind you can pour out then just evaporate the rest off.
But, why not just do a quick wash, strain out material, then evaporate on a counter top with a fan? You don’t need a fancy tool if you don’t mind losing the alcohol.
The 2 advantages of using a distiller or a source is the speed and ability to reclaim the alcohol. The source is preferred as the low heat saves the terps.
So, if you don’t mind losing the alcohol you don’t need anything.
