SweetSue's Cannabis Oil Study Hall

[SweetSue]

I got lost in videos by Dr. William Courtney on the nutritional and medicinal benefits of cannabis. Whew! Open another can of worms, why not?

I left there smiling about his idea of saying to someone

"Grow an acre. Feed your family. Prevent disease."

What a lovely dream.

My favorite thought he expressed:

"The phytocannabinoids in this plant augment the body's attempt to restore and increase function toward a normal level."

He called cannabis "Homeostatin". I like that.

Also, the reality that THC is a synthetic molecule, produced by man. He's technically wrong there, since the simple process of drying and curing will produce THC, but I understood his point. The receptor that should be catching our eye is the GPR55. Time for more study.

But first, Callanetics. Gotta keep the body in balance. Maybe some food would be a good idea. Something other than brownies.

 

[CajunCelt]

cajuncelt,

Do you have a vacuum chamber? I have an older one without the heat that needs some dusting off and the oil changed. I have no experience with it though. Tips and tricks are welcome.

best

Yes, I've a 3 gal, 2-stage, heated chamber & vacuum

 

[Canyon]

cajuncelt,

Do you have anything up on this site of what you are doing? Concentrates fascinate me.

Best

 

[SweetSue]

OIL!!! Look at how easy that was.

It was a fairly straightforward process. Not much chance for failure here. If you can boil water and have ventilation, you can make oil this simply. Have respect for the boiling water. A good double boiler with this nice ceramic coating would be perfect. Already on the list.

Start off by retrieving the wash from the freezer. Typing that in was when I realized I hadn't reset the freezer. If this were something I did with regularity a small freezer would be a smart investment. Where's that list?

Empty the wash into the non-stick ceramic-coated pan and set it over boiling water. This part I wasn't as prepared for as I thought. The pot I'd intended to use is missing. I had a couple misses trying to find a suitable replacement. I eventually improvised and used the cast iron skillet, which worked wonderfully, so simplicity still won out.

All that messing around warmed the frosty wash up.

I did the reduction in the living room in front of the open window with a cross breeze pushing the fumes right on out. Couldn't have asked for better weather. The location is out of the way and I was very cautious with the boiling water.

About 4 minutes in the wash heated up enough to start bubbling. I changed out the water for fresh boiling and left it alone.

When I thought of it I switched out the water again. I probably did that about six times through to the end, but I was obsessive and impatient.

After 20 minutes I noticed an oil sheen beginning to appear on the surface. It was like watching some exotic ballet, little swirls breaking off and drifting away to bump into a member of the greater attachment and be pulled back in.

Oil beginning to collect. 34minutes in.

I kept the water hot and watched as the solvent evaporated. Here we are at 90 minutes.

When I got down this far I took it into the kitchen, set it on the pan of now briskly boiling water and sped the process up. Low to no flame, depending on my mood.

3 hours in.

You notice the pan was cleaner than the previous picture. Let me tell you, I quickly learned this is some of the stickiest stuff on earth. I'm stingy about this concoction. I thought about it a minute and reached for a cup of solvent (Everclear) and an eye dropper. Problem solved. I got to be really good at dissolving it with a drop and then using a string of drops to lead it back to the puddle without ever having to use another tool.

It was great, obsessive fun. Lol! Look how well it worked.

Time to start corralling it in. 3 hrs, 45 min in.

Right after this picture it was ready. Suddenly, all the bubbles were a uniform size. I grabbed the syringe and pulled up the oil.

I was finished with the oil by 10:00. All that was left to do was clean up the residue in the pot. I drizzled in a bit of Everclear, thinking about a suggestion by Cajun to use this in the bottom of a pan of brownies, so I thought why not?

I already baked brownies, so instead I soaked one for a treat tonight. It was appropriately yummy and is the reason this post is so late getting done.

Nothing left. I licked it clean to be sure.

Mmmmmmmm..........

The prize. Three grams of tasty sativa concentrated cannabis oil. Took me about four hours, start to finish. I took a break in there to pick up dinner, but I also took the lowest tech approach to see how easy it could be. And it was. Once I figured the syringe out it sucked the oil right up. Straight down into it. Simplicity itself.

I'll be deciding the best use for it soon.

The experience was mesmerizing and not at all as intimidating as I'd assumed. Pretty straight forward. I'll be searching for a nice double boiler. I have a distiller for a larger batch, but this time I knew I'd benefit more from watching it up close and personal. First time I spent an afternoon watching bubbles and vapors. Pretty fascinating, actually.

Alright, the mellow Motown saxophone jazz is done, the buzz was epic and ongoing and I need to call it a night.

Goodnight everyone.

 

[SweetSue]

I looked at the post and decided to keep it in a jar.

 

[MagicJim]

I looked at the post and decided to keep it in a jar.

Good job. I knew you'd do it. Hooray. You've made CCO.

I'll be interested in your comments about the flavor of your oil and of course your body's reaction. Haha Stoners gotta know!

 

[Canna Montana]

I've hears of making dabs with butane, but it really intimidated me to put a pan with butane in it over a fire. Never did I think of a double boiler, duh. Lol. I'm glad I was able to watch your process. You make it look relatively easy.
Please let us know how it turned out and how you plan on dosing.

 

[SweetSue]

I've hears of making dabs with butane, but it really intimidated me to put a pan with butane in it over a fire. Never did I think of a double boiler, duh. Lol. I'm glad I was able to watch your process. You make it look relatively easy.
Please let us know how it turned out and how you plan on dosing.

Playing with butane is how houses get blown up and stoners get a bad name. This process is so easy and so much safer. I could reduce this outside on the balcony if need be. I chose to do it in my living room because it's as far from flames as you can get. Once it reduced down to about 1/2 cup I stopped worrying about fumes and threw it over the gas flame. With a good vent over the stove and I could have done the whole process on the stove.

MagicJim, I'll be trying it out today in lieu of my morning brownie. I'll let you know. Last night's experience was tainted by the rush of adrenaline and the addition of the brownie. Whew! That was a racy high.

 

[SweetSue]

Small Batch CCO: Supplies and Equipment.

SAFETY CONCERNS: Have some respect for the volatility of the fumes and the safety concerns with handling boiling water. Have your workspace adequately ventilated and use caution at all times. Flames and fumes don't mix well without explosive results, so take steps to minimize the risk. Remember there are others to consider. There are always others to consider before we act.

Supplies
- one ounce decarbed and crumbled plant material
- solvent, the highest proof ethanol alcohol you can find

Equipment
- freezer
- Jars to strain the washes into. I used canning jars with volume markings on the side. It made it easier to know the final volume.
- Coffee filters. It matters not what kind. Go cheap.
- Some way to secure the filters to the jars. Rubber bands would be the easiest. Next time, for sure, I'll have some on hand.
- Non-stick pan. I used an 8-inch ceramic-coated skillet.
- Another pot to hold boiling water. A double boiler, if you can get one with the ceramic coating.
- silicon spatula
- eye dropper, if your the anal type, like me
- syringe
- boiling water
- oven bag for decarbing

 

[Canna Montana]

You said you have a still, right? And the highest content of alcohol you can get is 151? Can you run your 151 through the still to make it more potent, then use it as the solvent? That may help with the green color you spoke of earlier. Just my 2 cents worth, but I think I may be on to something. Have a great day Sue!

 

[Canyon]

Good morning Sue,
Nice job. You are so tidy.

"I believe the green tint may be due to my having to use the lower proof, higher water content Everclear??? Am I correct in this? If so, can faster washes be done to counter this tendency? This oil's for my own personal enjoyment, so it doesn't matter. This is my initial run. From here in out they improve."

That is not that green in the cannabis world. [;>) }

There are a few things you can do.
Get your freezer as cold as it will go.
Put the jars and filter combination back in the freezer to drain.
For the quantities you have I think one filter per rinse should be fine.
After the rinses are mostly drained poor a little alcohol over what is in the filter.
Keep your rinses separate, the first is the best.

Doing the math, you probably have something over a gram still in your filters and plant material. I would gather it all up, including the filters, and do another rinse for about thirty minutes, with some shaking.

I have to try the eye dropper.

Best
canyon

 

[SweetSue]

You said you have a still, right? And the highest content of alcohol you can get is 151? Can you run your 151 through the still to make it more potent, then use it as the solvent? That may help with the green color you spoke of earlier. Just my 2 cents worth, but I think I may be on to something. Have a great day Sue!

I was thinking the same thing. This was the first attempt. Before I do another batch I'll see how much I can improve on the alcohol content, or more precisely, on the reduction of water in my solvent.

This was great fun Canna. It was an evening watching thermome dynamics and the powerful mechanism of evaporation in action. Fascinating stuff, helped along with tiny tastes when I licked the spatula.

I tried a dose this morning. Not being famaliar with using the syringe with this material I ended up with 200mg before I realized it. So, that was what I took.

You can't really make it out, but this amounted to a 200 mg dose.

I took it on a piece of bread. From here on out I'll be dosing using the bio bomb, but I wanted this initial experience to be just oil, eaten simply, to gauge the effect.

I took the dose at 11:50 AM. It's now two hours later.

Feeling p-r-e-t-t-y good right about now. I was thinking yesterday that being high has become a normal experience for me, to the point that I identify it as my "normal", so how would I judge the difference with CCO? I can tell you this feels awesome. Nice head rushes anytime I move, and my mental attitude is clear and upbeat. I'm getting ready to go grocery shopping with the daughter, so I'll see how that excursion goes. At this point, after two hours, I'd say this may be my preferred dose. Feels like what I like "normal" to feel like. Lol!

I'm looking forward to cranking it up with some carrier oil and lecithin. More bang for the buck. Need to get some capsules, or possibly simply mix it in a small jar and keep it in the dark. Then I could just scoop out what I wanted.

Nah, I need to figure out proper dosing, and that means capsules will come into play. Might as well get that part of my education going. Off to order now. What else could I need?.....................

Edit: I was thinking that since I took that dose I've been sitting here flying between threads, but hadn't gotten up to notice any body effects. Yes indeed, ladies and gentlemen. Sweet racy beating of the heart I love so much, waves of tingly across the top of the head, I am the music. This feeling is the equivalent of that "over-the-edge" I'm always searching for when I smoke or vape, but it's more sustained. I like it. A lot. Yep.

I could get used to feeling like this. I need to grow more. Hahaha!

 

[SweetSue]

Good morning Sue,
Nice job. You are so tidy.

"I believe the green tint may be due to my having to use the lower proof, higher water content Everclear??? Am I correct in this? If so, can faster washes be done to counter this tendency? This oil's for my own personal enjoyment, so it doesn't matter. This is my initial run. From here in out they improve."

That is not that green in the cannabis world. [;>) }

There are a few things you can do.
Get your freezer as cold as it will go.
Put the jars and filter combination back in the freezer to drain.
For the quantities you have I think one filter per rinse should be fine.
After the rinses are mostly drained poor a little alcohol over what is in the filter.
Keep your rinses separate, the first is the best.

Doing the math, you probably have something over a gram still in your filters and plant material. I would gather it all up, including the filters, and do another rinse for about thirty minutes, with some shaking.

I have to try the eye dropper.

Best
canyon

I did save everything, so I'll run it through another wash as you suggested. And thank you for the clarification on the color Canyon. I decided not to be concerned with it, but it's nice to hear that from someone else. I'd also wondered about tossing it back in the freezer to drain and I like that idea. SkunkPharms had mentioned they let their plant material dry out in between and then start the freezing process all over again for the second wash. I seem to recall they only do two washes. I may try that next time. Right now I'm gonna toss all the refuse and soak it for thirty minutes and give it a go, if only for experimental purposes.

Reps for the helpful inspiration. You've apparently been brilliant enough somewhere else in the past 24 hours and I'll have to wait to give you those reps.

I'm stingy with the trichomes Canyon. I'm looking to catch every possible one. Thank you for the suggestions.

Next time I also plan to keep the washes separate to see what quality differences I can note. This time I was concerned with getting a baseline. Now I can begin to improve on technique and come up with something that really works for me.

The eye dropper took some playing around before I figured out economical use of the solvent, but it very effectively corralled all that oil into a nice pool. I thought it worth the waste of solvent. It was fun to coax the oil droplets back to home base.

 

[SweetSue]

I'll roll it around on the floor while I surf threads. I can see that any oil resulting from this may be best suited for topical use, not a bad thing at all, and in my plans. I'll be interested in seeing how it tastes in comparison.

Thank you Canyon. I get to make oil again today. Sweet!!

 

[Canyon]

Thank you Sue, please be careful around a gas stove. I have too much training in upper and lower explosion levels and flash points to not bring it up. Even with a small amount of solvent a flash over could burn up your meds before you could get things under control.

I wasted a lot of cannabis just going with trial and error. It is nice to have a few tips to pass along.

DD & Oil report please.

canyon

 

[SweetSue]

Ok, I see now. This is green. Lol!

Need to run out with the daughter to grab some groceries. When I get back I'll reduce this and see what we get.

 

[JBUptown]

Good Afternoon Sue!
Sorry for the being tardy and absent .. life happened!

When I started juicing, I wanted only raw green whole plant material (stems, leaves and buds) in the juicer or blender, but I just couldn't take the taste everyday and it caused a bit of digestive upset initially. I couldn't keep enough produce ready for ingestion when using whole plant twice a day in a shake, especially including the bud reserves desired for recreational purposes. I decided to just use COO for the next 9 months while I grew out two full cycles and froze the cured buds. That allowed me to have enough in frozen reserves to start the green shakes again, but with a reduced amount of fresh green and supplemented with frozen buds and leaves. 1 gram of dried buds and about 10 whole leaves per shake 2x a day, and that's about all my MM garden can sustain.

I truly wish I could determine the strength of my CCO capsules, but my best guess is all that I can offer. That is one sucky measurement ... guess. I seldom see milligrams used as the measurement of THC or CBD or CBN, and that's is the biggest challenge I face when trying to determine dosages. The percentages of THC & CBD in a particular strain as stated by the seed bank is all I have to truly guess at the strength of any given batch or product. As for the CCO capsules, I get about 6 grams of oil per ounce of bud, and ingest about 3/4 of a gram per day. The two shakes contain about 1 gram of bud and 10 or so fresh whole leaves. I'm totally unsure what the numbers are in milligrams, but would love to know the real numbers. I also wish I could have blood tests to determine the therapeutic serum levels of MM in my system, but that isn't even a possibility yet. Hopefully one day!

Best of Buds

JB

Hahaha! I don't think we have to worry about Cajun's big head. I could be wrong about this but my sense is he's about as enamoured with the idea of star potential as I am. Thanks for that laugh. Yeah, he kinda changed my life too, the crazy cajun.

This has been my thinking for quite a while now JB. Get as many different forms of cannabis in by as many different delivery systems as you can without stressing about it. Be diverse. That's usually a good path to happiness.

So, if I understand you correctly you modified the shakes to be dried bud plus the ten leaves instead of trying to grow enough plants to supply more leaves? I take it you started out trying for 50 leaves per shake? That would be difficult to achieve on a regular basis.

May I ask, what dosage do you make the capsules? You may have shared this already, so forgive me if I've forgotten. I'm trying to get a sense of your daily dose.

 

[JBUptown]

TOTALLY Sue ...

Anybody else as frustrated as I am by the lack of data available?

 

[JBUptown]

I write this as someone who has yet to see CCO up close and personal, so I know nothing about the characteristics of the finished oil.

I call it Goo, it is a sticky gooey mess! A good blunt BD Glass syringe is essential to handle the goo!

 

[SweetSue]

Good Afternoon Sue!
Sorry for the being tardy and absent .. life happened!

When I started juicing, I wanted only raw green whole plant material (stems, leaves and buds) in the juicer or blender, but I just couldn't take the taste everyday and it caused a bit of digestive upset initially. I couldn't keep enough produce ready for ingestion when using whole plant twice a day in a shake, especially including the bud reserves desired for recreational purposes. I decided to just use COO for the next 9 months while I grew out two full cycles and froze the cured buds. That allowed me to have enough in frozen reserves to start the green shakes again, but with a reduced amount of fresh green and supplemented with frozen buds and leaves. 1 gram of dried buds and about 10 whole leaves per shake 2x a day, and that's about all my MM garden can sustain.

I truly wish I could determine the strength of my CCO capsules, but my best guess is all that I can offer. That is one sucky measurement ... guess. I seldom see milligrams used as the measurement of THC or CBD or CBN, and that's is the biggest challenge I face when trying to determine dosages. The percentages of THC & CBD in a particular strain as stated by the seed bank is all I have to truly guess at the strength of any given batch or product. As for the CCO capsules, I get about 6 grams of oil per ounce of bud, and ingest about 3/4 of a gram per day. The two shakes contain about 1 gram of bud and 10 or so fresh whole leaves. I'm totally unsure what the numbers are in milligrams, but would love to know the real numbers. I also wish I could have blood tests to determine the therapeutic serum levels of MM in my system, but that isn't even a possibility yet. Hopefully one day!

Best of Buds

JB

Thank you JB. This was quite thorough, even given the sucky lack of careful determination of dosages. Thankfully we work with a plant that can't kill you. Someday those labs for both blood and concentrates will be commonplace and we'll finally know what we're dealing with.