Activated charcoal pellets from the aquarium store work just fine. Be careful when you pull the black plastic cover from the top of the condenser unit as it can easily snap and break.
I would love to be able to post the two manuals here, but am afraid that the space limitations would prevent me. The first one, as a PDF file, comes out to about 5.97 MB, while the second manual is about 6.68 MB. I will send you a private email with my address. Send me a message to that email and I will then forward the booklets to you.
The ISO-II will not make Simpson oil. Simpson oil is just a cold, very quick (3 minutes) extract of the whole bud material with naphtha. Rick then boils off the solvent and scrapes up the extract. Although crude, it gets most of the goodies in the plant and, as we all know, is quite effective. Iso-II oil is more like a hash oil that has been heated and refined. The act of heating the oil in the solvent causes decarboxylation of the THC and increases psychoactive potency. If you follow the steps in the second manual, you can isomerize the cannabinoids into delta-9-thc, which is the active ingredient in marinol. Personally, I find the whole bud, cold quick extract, more effective, with a broader spectrum of effects, since we've left the cannabidiol and cannabinol intact.
I have an iso2 machine i've been playing with recently, and with no guidance the best method i've found was running at 4 days set at a little under 5... apparently i've been wasting countless hours.
I'd love to take a look at those manuals, can anyone who has them throw them up on a file hosting site like www.filesonic.com and post the links here ?
elfstone, iv'e had my machine since the 70's, but last year a fire burned down everything here and i lost my manuals. i did salvage the machine and after repairs got it back working again. i remember the part about adding acid and neutralizing with baking soda and washing with water but i'm lost about getting the final product. any help would be appreciated.
shineman
All the details on isomerization technique are in chapter II of the manual. It details all the steps very thoroughly. Personally, I have found the isomerized oil to be too much like marinol. I prefer the full blend of cannabinoids and terpenes.
i tried to download the manuals, but couldn't get them, i'm not too good with the computer stuff, i'll give it another try later on.
i agree, in the past i've tried isomerization and it's not worth the extra work, and i prefer the taste of the oil extract right out of the collection pot.
shineman
had one, used it. would like to buy one. don't have instructions. use ethynol (everclear 190proof=95%) psychoactive dissolve in alcohol, machine vaporizes alcohol, then liquifies it down center. basket wtih product is flushed of oils. I ran it ~ 24 hrs. then pull product, insert glass, 24hrs more, and most of alcohol recovered. Product left in stainless pan.
If anyone is interested, get me exploded drawings and I can probably manage to make a simple version of one of these units. I have an "off the scale aptitude" for anything like this. Seems no one makes these nowadays so maybe we can make our own?
Hey anyone that could help me! I have the iso2 and no manuals Could someone help me out?
It would be so greatly appreciated. Im lookin to put this thing to use!
I actually got a chance to check out one of the original ISO2 machines at the Subcool School of Dank. Someone brought one in and did a lecture on how it works and even had a pan full of oil that he made the night before. It was probably one of the most efficient machines I've seen yet. And, all that was used is Grain alcohol. Which, isn't nearly as hazardous as butane.
This machine takes the guess work out of solvent removal from the oil extraction. It is quantified, because you recapture the alcohol. Doing the extraction outside of the machine and then reclaiming the alcohol inside the machine results in a cleaner oil. The shorter the duration of the alcohol soak the cleaner the oil that results. Buds and trim should be soaked for less then 10 minutes for cleaner extractions, but yield will be slightly less. Use the machine to remove the alcohol from the oil. To overcome the volume limitations of the machine, process kief or bubble hash instead of trim or buds. 73-90 micron bubble hash is best. You can get 80% or more oil return using kief instead of trim or buds which return 25% weight oil to plant material used. The potency is high doing the extraction inside the machine with trim, buds, or kief. It just results in more non desirable constituents ending up in the oil. Your trying to get the cannabinoids not the chlorophyll. So anything that limits these non desirables from entering the extract is very good idea. If your lazy the machine will do it pretty damn good. If you want the best shit with the biggest return, external extractions of trichome heads is the way to go. Use the machine to get the solvent out of the filtered extract. Make your bubble even better, about 20% better then the best bubble(73-90 micron) out there.
You don't have to use water in the base of the condensing tower, it never gets that hot. You get only minor vapor loss without it. The tower is tall enough that the vapor condenses before it gets all the way to the top where the charcoal is. For me it is an uneccesary risk that doesn't reward. The reclamation bowl captures the alcohol, so when it stops capturing alcohol you know the oil is purged. Vapor loss is minimal, the charcoal captures the smell, until you open the machine to remove the alcohol captured in the bowl, and collect your oil.
don't waste your time with isomerization. Just use your machine to remove alcohol from alcohol extractions. Thats what it is good for, and making better alcohol for the extraction. Isomerization is a sales pitch from the 70's to sell the original machines in an environment lacking access to high quality trim, buds, or kief. Oil is a concentrate. You already increased the amount of thc by getting rid of the plant that produced it, and finally the trichomes themselves that contain it.