Elfspice's Compleat Acacia Extraction Guide

Version 0.4
Last modified: 1 August 2003
Copyright © 2003 Elfspice
This document is licensed for redistribution under the GNU Free Documentation Licence
When modifications are made, put credits below this line.

Contents

WARNING (READ THIS FIRST)
Acknowledgements
Introduction
The Plant
Equipment and Chemicals
Step 1 - Prepare the Bark
Step 2 - Acidification
Step 3 - Non polar Wash (Defatting)
Step 4 - Basify to pH 13
Step 5 - Non polar Extraction
Step 6 - Polar Wash
Step 7 - Evaporate Non polar Extraction
Step 8 - Recrystallisation Purification
Conclusion
Extraction Reports
Changelog

WARNING

Something that was drawn to my attention regarding the content of this document was that there is no warnings about the materials discussed with regards to the dangers and effects of the materials produced, and not enough about the warnings about some of the chemicals used (in particular, shellite/naptha).

ABOUT DMT

DMT is widely regarded as the most potent psychedelic drug known. As has been said by someone else, the term 'mind blowing' could have easily been invented to describe this drug. It is not a 'high', or a party drug or any such thing.

To briefly sum up some of the sorts of nasty experiences that a person can have under the influence, it ranges from an experience of dying, being torn apart by vicious animals, being probed and having strange implants installed by cold uncaring aliens, extreme experiences of humiliation...

Now, after reading that list, one might wonder why a person would be interested in using this drug at all... Well, basically, because things completely off the other end of the scale can also happen during the experience. Contact with happy elves or clown-like entities, exchanges with entities who wish to teach you something, healing experiences, positive contacts with aliens.

The way it affects people is extremely idiosyncratic, but I can say one thing that is common to all experiences - it is always humbling, the awesome potency of this drug should not be underestimated.

MONOAMINEOXIDASE INHIBITORS (MAOI's)

The use of monoamineoxidase inhibitors, such as syrian rue, banisteriopsis caapi or synthetics such as moclobemide, which is a common way to activate oral doses of DMT, should be done with great caution. There are elements in most people's diets and drug intakes which, when combined with the use of MAOIs can lead to a serious medical emergency if proper precautions are not taken prior to ingesting MAOIs.

Monoamineoxidase inhibitors (MAOIs) should not be taken in if any stimulants (caffeine, amphetamines, cathinone, methcathinone), or SSRI antidepressants (prozac, citalopram, zoloft etc) have been taken less than 48 hours beforehand, the same goes for beer and wines, and there are foods which contain proteins which are dangerous if consumed within the same period of time, these are generally aged protein products (wurst, jerky, salami) and yeast-based products, such as yeast extracts, wines, beers and other brewed or fermented materials. Bread is not so bad, since the yeast is still fairly fresh when it is eaten, but at least 12 hours should be witheld to avoid problems. The main issues are aged proteins, which covers brewed alcohols, aged protein foods, and SSRI's and amphetamines are contraindicated, though the info on the dangers regarding MAOIs mainly applies to synthetic MAOIs (eg moclobemide). I have been told that syrian rue and harmala do not cause significant risk with amphetamines and fresh yeast products, however they do potentiate amphetamines. It is best to avoid them if you are unsure or have not done small scale tests to ensure it is safe...

In most cases, one will only get a nasty headache, but it is best to avoid any of these things with MAOIs, recently a teenager made CBS news from mixing a MAOI with something of this nature (and of course the news people, not really interested in the propagation of safety information, didn't say what it was that caused the problem, however it would have been one of the above, as you can see it covers a lot of common foods and drugs).

What happens is the MAOIs prevent the action of the monoamineoxidase by preventing it from being synthesised, which stops these enzymes from breaking down chemicals in the brain and blood to prevent their levels building up too high. The natural cycle in plasma is of precursors, such as amino acids, being synthesised into neurotransmitters by enzymes, and these neurotransmitters only have a limited useful life in the blood as free radicals and other agents can break them and cause toxicity problems (which is the suspected but not officially recognised cause of people going bezerk on prozac), and so they must be removed after a certain amount of time. Also a number of chemicals cause dramatic changes in physiology, such as stimulants, and the protein tyramine, found in aged proteins, which is a product of yeast I believe, and the monoamineoxidase enzyme is responsible for protecting us from this toxicity.

When an incident occurs with MAOIs, a mild incident will involve a headache, but if too much poisons are in the blood when the MAOI is ingested, they remain active, and what is called a 'hypertensive crisis' occurs. This means severe headache, high blood pressure and heart rate. If the blood pressure gets too high, a stroke can occur, and beyond that, death from major brain haemorrhage.

SAFETY WITH CHEMICALS

In this document are described the use of numerous chemicals, the ones of most concern are the Non polar solvents (turpentine and naptha/shellite) and sodium hydroxide.

I recommend the use of solvent resistant gloves whenever contact may be had with the solvents. One should be able to find nitrile gloves in the supermarket, they are marketed as 'non allergy', some people are allergic to latex apparently (personally I hate latex anyway, it makes my eyes red), there is also neoprene gloves available, but these will be easily distinguished by being thicker and 'insulating' will be mentioned on the packaging somewhere. Nitrile is the best to use as it is highly resistant to turpentine and shellite.

Turpentine is not so bad, and being such a high boiling material, it's vapours are unlikely to develop to an extent to cause breathing problems. However, shellite is very volatile, more volatile than petrol, and probably more explosive than petrol.

No sources of flame or sparks should be present when working with all nonpolar solvents, and one should take care to avoid inhaling the vapours as much as possible. Always work in an area with good ventilation when working with shellite.

I have personally been burned by an explosion with shellite, it was only second-degree (the skin was fully damaged, but it hadn't gotten down to the flesh). I was in pain for three days, constantly spraying it with xylocaine spray to stop it from being so painful I was unable to fall asleep. It also put carbon all over the space that it exploded in. This was from inadequate ventilation and a spark from moving a pot around on an electric hotplate while blowing the vapours out of the pot. The vapours of shellite/naptha are heavier than air, so they will fall downwards, so it is particularly crucial that there is nothing incendiary below any amount of such materials at close to it's boiling point. The vapours will also flash back to the source of vapour for quite a distance, at least two metres clearance should be given before anything with a slight risk (including a mobile phone) of causing a spark should be permitted nearby. It is also for this reason that, unlike numerous other guides, I don't recommend heating the solvent when extracting. Besides everything else, experience tells me that one does not need to increase the solvation power of 300ml of naptha to get everything desirable out of an expected 1-3g yield. The only time when it is sensible to heat naptha is when recrystallising, and this can be done in open space using boiling water from a jug.

Sodium hydroxide (NaOH) is also very dangerous, anyone who has seen the movie 'Fight Club' would recall the scene where Tyler Durden puts a pile of this material onto the protagonist's hands. When it comes into contact with water it reacts with a very strong exothermic reaction (it generates heat), and for this reason the NaOH should always be added to water and not the other way around as this ensures that the heat is absorbed by the water, rather than the heat inducing the hydroxide to react violently with the humidity in the air, and it can in fact explode, spraying highly reactive material everywhere, and when this gets on the skin or in the eyes, it burns severely.

It is recommended when working with sodium hydroxide to wear protective goggles in case it splashes in the face, it can destroy your vision .

Acknowledgements

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Introduction

I have written this guide to specifically cover the process of extracting alkaloids from the Acacia Obtusifolia tree's bark, which is the most consistently yielding of the acacia species with regards to it's yield of psychedelic tryptamines, primarily N,N Dimethyltryptamine. It is equally applicable to mimosa hostilis, and is likely to be useful for any other DMT source contained in the bark of a plant (eg, desmanthus illinoensis). Chlorophyll laden sources, such as phalaris and psychotria viridis et al have not been studied by the author, however at some point in the future the special considerations for these leaf materials will be added.

One thing that I have learned in recent months about the process of extracting alkaloids is that the long periods of time suggested in older guides are unnecessary, this suspicion started to come to me when I witnessed the acid/base extraction of alkaloids from an alkaloid synthesis and saw that the alkaloids can in fact cross phases in a matter of minutes, not hours or days.

Taking care to ensure certain pH levels are used also eases and improves the process, specifically in the acid phase the pH is better if it is about 4, and in the extraction less emulsion problems occur when working with a pH above 12.5 (sodium hydroxide does not raise the pH above 13.5 when diluted 5g/100ml, so the concern about 'pH spikes' is unnecessary so long as the base is diluted). When washing and extracting, use gentle agitation rather than violent, swirl, stir or turn it end over end gentlyrather than shaking it. Water washing is less of a problem in this respect, usually by that stage the majority of emulsion causing chemicals have been removed.

Something else which I have heard from others, which I have now verified, is the value of doing washes. Previously washing was little mentioned, and only the wash of the acidic extract was suggested (and again, a much longer than necessary time stated), when in fact the best results seem to be from doing a non polar wash of the acidic extract, and using a fairly low pH (like 8-9) and no salt, for washing the non polar extract (the best proceedure seems to be using sodium bicarbonate as it reacts with sodium hydroxide to produce sodium carbonate, which more readly comes free of the nonpolar fraction). Washes ensure the resulting product is as free from contaminants of a non-alkaloidal nature as possible, in particular residuals of the base being used. Again, gentle agitation is completely sufficient for extractions and washes, and in the case of water washes, violent agitation will not allieviate suspended droplets of the base, the bubbles of the wash water, being alkaline, will wash some out, but will also leave the suspended bubbles of base in the nonpolar solvent, though by this stage in the process it doesn't matter as much as it should be quite clean already.

Finally, the best methods for recrystallising the product seem to be coalescing for me as well, I will talk about this at the end, the purpose is not, properly speaking to make pretty rocks, though if large crystals are produced they have a longer shelf life due to lesser surface area per volume, but instead, the purpose of recrystallising is to eliminate the contaminants in the solvent commonly used (naptha), as well as reducing other contaminants. This requires slow cooling or progressive cool/warm steps.

This guide will not attempt to cover the extraction processes for other plant materials, however it is intended to be comprehensive and to the point, and should apply more or less to other materials.

I will also focus on the equipment which will ensure the best results with the least outlay without any compromise of efficacy of the process.

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The Plant

This guide is specifically targeted at the acacia obtusifolia, I cannot really enlarge upon other information already available through libraries and on the internet, but I intend to replace this section with a comprehensive guide to finding them based on a series of expeditions to likely locations and lots of photographs, and, of utmost importance, in plain english.

One of the problems with the botanical information regarding these plants is that they never go into much detail about the bark structures. When walking through a well developed forest, quite often the tree is so far above you that you can't see a thing of what they describe in the botanical description. As soon as possible, a photographic expedition will be made to bring back good photographs of the plant in it's mature natural state. The full extent of the obtusifolia's habitat is not fully known, it may well be more common than is currently thought.

The guide should be applicable to other sources of DMT, as the method described is very thorough.

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Equipment and Chemicals

Other, more advanced chemistry equipment can be used for this process, however my aim is to only talk about what I believe to be the minimum standard to ensure the best possible results.

1. Large Cooking Pot - for beginners it is wise to start small, 2-4L soup pots are good for this. Do NOT use aluminium pots for this stage, even organic acids will take up some of the aluminium oxide on the coating and the aluminium will react with strong acids to produce aluminium salts (eg aluminium chloride) and this is not something that one wants to need to get rid of, let alone ingest.
2. Glass baster - this is a large pipette used to suck up oils from fowl being roasted in the oven and coating them so they get nice and golden crispy on top. A baster has a long glass tube and a rubber squishy thing at the end and it works like a dropper. Generally they can hold about 30-40ml. Glass is essential because these devices can be used to separate immiscible phases. These devices are available at most kitchen shops. I just want to emphasise again - make sure it is glass - some of the solvents used will attack plastics (especially nylon, which is the common plastic baster material because of it's high melting point) and metal is completely useless for this purpose. Also it is good if the device has a tip on it which is very narrow for half a centimetre or so, this improves this device's ability to precisely separate fractions and how well it holds the fluid when removed when held mid-air.
3. pH meter - In my opinion it is worth the money to get a good pH meter. These can be purchased from hydroponics shops and aquarium shops, they are commonly called 'pH Pens' or something similar. When getting a pH meter be sure to get an ample container of pH 7 'buffer' solution for calibrating it, and do this at least once a month. pH papers can be used, however the extract has a very dark reddish colour and stains the papers. The only type of paper test which is suitable is the type with four different tests on each strip, and the reason why I suggest using an electronic tester is that dollar for dollar, it is hard to see what the effective advantage is, for the cost of 400 strips one can have an electronic one, and the electronic testers are accurate (if calibrated correctly) to about ±0.05 pH units, though this is not critical, using precisely measured pH levels every time is helpful in generating consistent results as the exact pH levels influence solubilities of various constituents of the plant material, and the best policy is to try and pick a pH which dissolves what you want and as little of what you don't want. Bear in mind that every extraction requires about 10 individual pH tests, thus for the same money as you can do 400 extractions with paper tests, you can do well over 1000 with a pen.
4. Large Jar - a jar like the ones that cranberry juice is sold in is perfectly suitable for the task, though a 2L canning jar can serve quite well also. If a canning jar is used, it should be tested with turpentine to ensure that the rubber used on the seal does not get damaged by it. The juice bottles also have the advantage of being able to rapidly vent, the clips on canning jars require much more time to open when venting. Shellite is safe to use with most common HDPE plastic bottles, but these bottles are unsuitable for use with aromatic solvents such as turpentine, xylene or toluene, which I suggest using. An empty turpentine bottle is suitable also. This is the container that the extractions and washes will be done in, so it needs to be as large as the quantities of material you work with, and the opening big enough to permit the use of the baster.
5. Colander - to catch bulky fibrous material from the acidic extract.
6. Strainer - This will catch the larger particles.
7. Fine Strainer/Tea Strainer - this will catch medium sized particles, which will block the coffee filters.
8. Cotton, Acrylic or Polyester felt - common pillow stuffing can be used here, so long as this is done before doing the Non polar washes. This material catches a lot of fine particles, it functions as a 'depth filter', which is a thick filter which is used to remove the majority of large and medium sized gunk before using filter papers. This kind of filter will also be helpful with the gunky gooey materials that are sometimes present.
9. Coffee Filters - to filter finer particles out of the solution. Particles of bark will make seeing the line between phases in the Non polar wash difficult to see. The coffee filters can be good for removing hairs and other junk when recrystallising as well.
10. Pyrex Measuring Jug - this is helpful with filtration and removing extract from broad containers (such as cooking pots) as well as measuring solvents for extraction and washing.
11. Drying Dish - The dish should be deep enough to accommodate the amount of solvent used. Ceramic plates can be used too, ones with gentle curving edges and plain white glaze are quite good for being easy to scrape, though they can only have about 100ml in them.Several such plates would be necessary for an extraction - this can be a good thing for seeing what each consecutive pass gets out.
12. Scraper Blades - These are essential for scraping up the final product, the best ones are the single sided ones used for removing stickers from glass. They have the advantage of being easy to handle and able to bend slightly for getting around corners in drying dishes.
13. Acid - I recommend tartaric acid, which can be bought from supermarkets from the cakes and lollies section. Other acids can be used, but hydrochloric acid, in particular, should only be used with fully intact enamel pots or with pyrex pots. Tartaric acid is handy because it only takes a teaspoon to turn 10L of water to around pH 3-4. Citric, acetic, and ascorbic acids can be used too, though beware of acetic acid if DCM is used in nonpolar washing as the acetate salts of DMT are fairly soluble in DCM
14. Base - Sodium Hydroxide (NaOH - often sold as drain cleaner, but be sure that the drain cleaner you get says '99% sodium hydroxide', it is also known as 'caustic soda' and in the US the brand Red Devil Lye is allegedly good - in fact anything called 'lye' is a base, but traditionally it was potassium hydroxide), Potassium Hydroxide (KOH, sold at hydroponic shops as pH up, and used to make liquid soaps). NaOH and KOH are both strong bases and should be dissolved 1:10 at least before using (premixed solutions from the hydro shop are fine as is). Some suggest using ammonia, but domestic sources of it are not as clean as NaOH, thus I do not recommend it.
    Always add sodium hydroxide and potassium hydroxide to water, and not the other way around. When working with strongly alkaline solutions it is recommended to wear safety glasses and gloves. Read my warning for more information
15. Non polar Wash Solvent - Turpentine (paint thinner, available anywhere, dissolves oil paints), toluene (commonly used as an octane booster, also used to dissolve vinyl glues, for laying vinyl flooring), and xylene (available in many hardware stores, I have heard of it being used to remove the resins that are used to coat tiles - presumably urethanes). The aromatic solvent is used in this technique because it dissolves a lot of stuff, in the defatting stage, where a solvent which clears a lot of gunk is useful. I recommend turpentine for the simple reason it is much easier to get, much cheaper, does the job just as well, and is less toxic.
16. Extraction Solvent - There is basically three choices for this, and which one used determines how one must do the separations. Ethyl ether (from automotive stores as starter spray) and methylene chloride (also known as dichloromethane, or DCM) both share the property of having a very low boiling point (around 40°C) and consequently, when using them at room temperature, using a turkey baster, sucking up these solvents will be an exercise in frustration. The solvents evolve a lot of gas, often at higher than ambient air pressure, so they pump themselves straight back out. Thus if a turkey baster is used and the Non polar is one of these, one must remove the polar phase, as this will not cause the same problem. With DCM this means pulling the top layer (DCM sinks) and ether, pulling the bottom layer. A separatory funnel makes the use of DCM much more enjoyable, since the tap is at the bottom and that's where the DCM ends up too. DCM also absorbs a lot of the desirables very quickly. Naptha (aka shellite) is readily available, and is easy to work with using a baster.
    Be very careful with shellite and ether, they are highly volatile and explosive. Read my warning for more information. Dichloromethane can damage the lungs, care should be taken when using it too.
17. Recrystallising Dish - From limited experience, it seems that the best container for this is a dish which has a curved inner surface (like a noodle bowl), and plastic wrap is used to prevent the solvent from rapidly escaping. Scraper blades will probably need to be bent into a curve to scrape the edges properly, though a scalpel might serve better for removing the crystals. A double layer of plastic wrap is good for ensuring that it doesn't stretch down too much when it cools (the gas trapped inside will contract when it cools).
18. Recrystallising Solvent - Due to it's higher boiling point than any other available, and it's fairly reliable homogeneity, if possible, the best solvent is isopropyl alcohol (IPA). Naptha will also work, though the lower the boiling point of the solvent, the more it will evaporate away while handling, which can be a pain. Acetone can probably be used, as can methanol and ethanol. Ethanol seems to need very little to dissolve the material, which can be problematic with very small quantities (a gram or less). Slightly polar solvents are good in this step as tannins dissolve quite well in them, if they get to the final product. Acetone and ethanol have not been tested as far as I know, but I do know that acetone dissolves DMT freebase quite well
19. Dropper Bottle - This is used to transfer the hot recrystallisation solvent into the recrystallisation dish (specifically, the dropper)
20. Nitrile Gloves - most domestic glove manufacturers now sell a special kind of glove for people who are allergic to latex (IMHO latex is nasty anyway), there are two types, neoprene and nitrile, the former are thicker and are particularly good for handling hot liquids, the latter are good for handling Non polar solvents, particularly aromatics which will very rapidly decompose latex. I have come to the conclusion that it is crazy to work with these materials without using good protective gloves. In particular when agitating washes and extractions involving highly volatile solvents (ether, dcm, naptha) this permits venting of jars without exposure to the solvents.
21. Safety Glasses - This is recommended for any stage involving the use of sodium hydroxide, and to a lesser degree, non polar solvents, as protection against damage to the eyes that can occur. In particular, sodium and potassium hydroxide can burn the eyes and even blind you if they damage the eyes enough.

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Step 1 - Prepare the Bark

The bark must be prepared for extraction, a simple but effective method that can be used is to simply pull strips of fibres off using fingernails (or assisted with a pocket knife) so that thin pieces are removed - this must be done when it is still fresh. The bark can be cut up into small pieces and put through a blender or coffee grinder, this is best done when dry, though cutting it up when dry can be difficult, it would be best done when still fresh (it is best to ensure cutting goes from the inside of the bark to the outside because the inner fibres are long and resistant to being cut). If bulk quantities are being worked with (like 10kg or more) a mulcher can be very effective. A small garden shredder is very helpful in any case, and for anyone intending to powderise the material, it needs to be broken into small pieces before putting into a blender.

The more the bark is munched up the faster and more thorough first two steps are.

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Step 2 - Acidification

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Step 3 - Non polar Wash (Defatting)

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Step 4 - Basify to pH 13

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Step 5 - Non polar Extraction

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Step 6 - Polar Wash

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Step 7- Evaporate Non polar Extract

Next, put the combined Non polar extracts onto a drying dish, something that will permit the easy scraping of the materials.

Using an electric fan to blow the drying dish vigorously is a good idea, it dramatically increases the rate at which the solvent evaporates off.

If the proper equipment were available, a vacuum desiccators would be even faster, and would permit recovery of the solvent, though this is not accessible to most people who wish to do this process. The shellite evaporates very quickly anyway, and ether and DCM are even faster.

Although it probably helps with getting all of the extract out of the dish, it is not absolutely necessary to bring it fully to crystallisation at this stage. This will take at least 12 hours to fully happen under a fan. The extract is easier to remove from the drying dish if it is fully dry as it has a much harder consistency and comes free of the glass much more readily.

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Step 8 - Recrystallisation Purification

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Conclusion

I have written this extraction procedure in the hope that others who find the lack of clarity and good chemistry information in most guides offputting, also this guide exposes a number of myths regarding times required for processes, in particular the Non polar extraction. The product resulting from following this guide, assuming one begins with a good source, should be just about as pure as the product can be made. Also, if a neophyte follows this process, and they have started with good material (good material is equally important as the right technique, you can't get gold out of you put garbage in), is guaranteed to get a good result.

I will be revising this process until it becomes clear that it covers the topic in a thorough and concise way, it is my hope that this document will ease the transition from neophyte to journeyman that can be extremely frustrating and drawn out. Accurate information will ensure that so long as the directions are followed, good results will come out at the end.

Reports of using this guide will be appended to the end, I encourage anyone who has had success with this technique to send me their reports so I can add this to this document to demonstrate the efficacy of the technique, and to encourage neophytes to keep trying if they do not do as well as they expected.

One final comment, most people will not get as much as they hope for out of extractions. Over a process of a number of extractions one gets a better idea of how much to expect, the visual appearance of quantities of freebase of various weights will take a while to know, as will the amounts of plant material that produces it, and in some cases, the right times and ways to collect the material will also influence the results. Do not be disheartened if yields are lower than you expect, only experience will teach you how much to expect in practice.

Elfspice
email me: Elfspice8@eml.cc

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Extraction Reports

Need I say it, all of these reports are from people who have done these processes where doing so is legal, and all are anonymously sent to me to add here.
Mimosa Hostilis Extraction (13 April 2003) Materials; A few 500ml flasks/beakers, a jar, separatory funnels, vacuum hand pump, glass funnels, cotton, cheese cloth, evaporation dish, PH papers. I used Mimosa Hostilis Root Bark, Muriatic acid (HCL), Lab grade Sodium Hydroxide (NaOH), distilled water, and Naptha (evaporates cleanly). I started by boiling 325ml of distilled water, then took it out of the pan and into a beaker where I acidified to a PH of about 3 or 4 using muriatic acid. Then I poured this acidic water in a jar containing 88.4 grams of finely powdered mimosa hostilis root bark. Since I used hydrochloric acid I decided not to add all three acidic water extracts together and reduce volume because I didn't want to concentrate the acid. So what I did was each of the 3 extracts on there own. After putting the acidic water with the root bark I waited 1 hour and poured the liquid/root bark into a cheese cloth on a beaker, and squeezed all of the water out. I then took the dry root bark and put it back in the jar with the same amount of acidic hot water as the first time. And while waiting another hour for that to finish up I filtered the liquid from the first extract into a funnel with cotton and a vacuum pump connected to the flask. Then I defatted by putting 80ml of xylene and throwing away the xylene/emulsion. I defatted 2 more times with naptha(80ml). Then I basified with NaOH, when it was about half way threw I added some naptha and kept basifying until it turned a slippery black type colour. Then I separated the naptha with the emulsion and added 80ml of warm naptha. I separated that naptha/emulsion and added another 80ml of warm naptha. Again I separated and kept the naptha/emulsion. Now I took the naptha/emulsion and added some PH 8 distilled water and threw away the water. This got rid of most of the emulsion, I put the rest in a graduated cylinder to further separate. I washed the naptha 2 more times with PH 8 dH2O. I evaporated the naptha via fan and dish to reveal .4grams (400mg)of white fluffy crystals. By this time the second soak of root bark was ready to be further extracted so I put that through a cheese cloth and cotton funnel and then put more acidic water with the root bark. I defatted this time with only naptha 3 times. Basified and extracted and washed just as before. I evaporated this to find .22grams of crystals. I extracted the last of the acidified water by filtering, defatting, basifying, added naptha, washed naptha and evaporated just as before to get .06grams of crystals. I did this whole extraction in under a day, and my yield tells me I really don't have to wait as long as some teks say. My total yield was .68grams of spice from 86.4g of mimosa root bark. That's .4grams the first one, .22 the second and .06 the third one. As you can see the last extract is low but not completely insignificant. If I were doing an extraction with a different acid like say acetic(vinegar) acid I would have combined my extracts and boiled down to about half or 1/4th it's original volume, but since I used HCl I decided it would be better to do each separately.
Photographs of Mimosa Hostilis Extraction Dry Mimosa Hostilis Rootbark Ground mimosa hostilis rootbark Mimosa hostilis rootbark soaking in acidified water Filtering the liquid from the rootbark soak Defatting the acidic extract (see the colour in the naptha layer?) Basifying (notice how the base immediately makes the solution turn opaque pinkish) Basifying Basifying when the solution is fully pink, the pH is between 10 and 12, Naptha added to basified extract - as it turns black (seen here at the bottom of the flask) the pH is over 12 - this is how high it needs to be for proper extraction First extraction run (see the pink stuff - that's emulsion, wait until it settles and the margin between the layers is mirror-like) Water washing (note the dark colour in the lower layer - this is why you water wash) (also, for this first step, use sodium bicarbonate as this will eliminate the residual sodium hydroxide, transforming it into sodium carbonate) Water washing - see how it gets lighter Water washing - never stop water washing until there is absolutely no colour in the water being used to wash with Crystals Crystals scraped together (note how clean looking they are - this is achieved through proper defatting)

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Changelog

12 April 2003

Elfspice: First draft written

13 April 2003

Elfspice: New instruction format implemented - using simple instructions on the left and notes and clarifications on the right. This makes it a lot easier to read. The recrystallisation technique was condensed to one step. Thanks to mesqualero for the idea

14 April 2003

Elfspice: Prettified the two column sections by making all the note columns grey coloured, added a report, fixed the paragraphing. Thankyou to andrew for the report.

15 April 2003

Elfspice: modified polar wash directions to specify using water basified to at least 12.5 after a suggestion from glorfindel from DMT world.

16 April 2003

Elfspice: Added notes about doing further filtration.

19 April 2003

Elfspice: Expanded filtration information, added a 'warning' section (thanks gumby), added more equipment to the equipment section (strainers, filters and safety glasses).

27 April 2003

Elfspice: Made minor corrections, refined the notes a little bit, removed the use of high pH water for the water wash, removed the reference to ammonia as a base due to it's not being available anywhere near as pure as NaOH, reduced the section on the acid to only specifying tartaric acid, and mentioned the incompatibility of hydrochloric acid with any kind of metal.

1 august 2003

Elfspice: added a sequence of photographs showing the all the steps of the process

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