BHO and EHO exctractions discussion. Good? Bad? Benign? Dangerous?

[IamN2pot]

Hash Oil aka: Honey Oil is the end purpose for my grows, well, 90% of it. I started making 'Oil' back in the late 70's in a machine called the Iso 2. It used a light bulb for a heat source and looking back on the process, by using heat to circulate the alcohol through the weed to extract the THC, it was also decarbing it. Reverse the process to reclaim the alcohol/everclear from the oil left in the bottom of the bucket. Mexican brick weed ($90 lb) made a black green in color and VERY green tasting oil, but it did the trick. Added to a joint, it was a gooey mess, but well worth it.


Fast forward nearly a 1/2 century. Iso oil seems to have morphed into multipal forms. In the day, I had Isopropal or Everclear to work with and had never heard the word decarboxylation. Extracting canibinoids with extreemly cold alcohol/ethanol was unknown. Rosin pressing, butane or CO2 extraction was still decades away.
Nowdays there are Rosin, RSO, BHO, and CO2 to choose from, just to name a few of the forms. And the BHO comes in multipal forms. Diamonds, sauce, shatter, wax, crumble, bla bla...
Today I my go to BHO, and yes, mine is butane honey oil. See....
View attachment VID_20230609_103627.mp4

I understand there are pro's and conn's to each of the forms of extraction I mentioned, at least in some follks opinion. That's cool, and how it should be. Fell free to discuss those here.
I'd love to learn how to make a honey oil like the one above from an ethanol extraction I could vape, but not that green stuff from 45 years ago. My pallet has been spoiled.
Do you concentrate your THCa? How and why/what for?

 

[MDK]

I like all of the concentrates, I've heard of propane being used too PHO. In my ignorant opinion the solvent doesn't matter much as long as it's purged and decarbed properly.

Only shit I ever made was Qwiso and idk if I'll go back to it or not. 99% iso is the only way I'd do it again...91% just left too much water in it and I think there is a taste difference when that extra water sits in the concentrate waiting to purge. From my experience anyway. Probably wrong and like I said I'm ignorant to the truth much of the time.

 

[Moshmen]

I use etho and I press - both I guess have advantages, I don’t like the solvents so much even tho I’ve had some pretty tasty bho- now days we can add terps back in after extraction @Moe.Red is probably your mad scientist guy your lookin for , in my opinion pressing is the cleanest , tastiest most natural way to go but that’s my favorite - the wife still likes BHO the best

 

[MiGrampa]

Iso will extract far less chlorophyll if the ethanol has been chilled before adding the plant material and then keeping it cold while it soaks. You can then distill the alcohol out of the mixture using a home table top water distillation unit. Your end product is distillate. BHO is better tasting in my opinion, but making distillate is safer with less chance of blowing yourself up. If you're making ISO, be sure it's completely purged. I've only done this a couple of times and when I did I used food grade alcohol (everclear 190 proof).

Concentrates are cheap at the dispensaries in my area. Live resin "baller Jars" run $35 for 3.5G typically. I just buy it at the dispensary if that's what I'm looking for now a days. Open blasting with butane/propane is dangerous and nobody I know is doing it anymore with dispensary prices so low.

 

[Speedypete]

We have been making bho for awhile now.
I make a 5 sided box(open on top) out of parchment paper sized to fit inside my vacuum chamber then i just staple the corners at the top to hold its shape. Place the parchment box inside the vac chamber and shoot straight into the box. I only shoot outside for obvious reasons and only use purest butane i can find ( 5x refined 99.9). Its fairly expensive I think it comes from Scotland perhaps? Anyhow purity is important. I leave the chamber open to air outside until the majority of butane evaporates off. Then i use an old heating pad on low and gently heat the goop under vacuum for several days. I dont always get shatter but close to it. Its a nice change and have some friends who are squirrely over the stuff

 

[IamN2pot]

We have been making bho for awhile now.
I make a 5 sided box(open on top) out of parchment paper sized to fit inside my vacuum chamber then i just staple the corners at the top to hold its shape. Place the parchment box inside the vac chamber and shoot straight into the box. I only shoot outside for obvious reasons and only use purest butane i can find ( 5x refined 99.9). Its fairly expensive I think it comes from Scotland perhaps? Anyhow purity is important. I leave the chamber open to air outside until the majority of butane evaporates off. Then i use an old heating pad on low and gently heat the goop under vacuum for several days. I dont always get shatter but close to it. Its a nice change and have some friends who are squirrely over the stuff

BVV has some nice tri blend that is PURE! It's what I'm using these days.

 

[IamN2pot]

Iso will extract far less chlorophyll if the ethanol has been chilled before adding the plant material and then keeping it cold while it soaks. You can then distill the alcohol out of the mixture using a home table top water distillation unit. Your end product is distillate. BHO is better tasting in my opinion, but making distillate is safer with less chance of blowing yourself up. If you're making ISO, be sure it's completely purged. I've only done this a couple of times and when I did I used food grade alcohol (everclear 190 proof).

Concentrates are cheap at the dispensaries in my area. Live resin "baller Jars" run $35 for 3.5G typically. I just buy it at the dispensary if that's what I'm looking for now a days. Open blasting with butane/propane is dangerous and nobody I know is doing it anymore with dispensary prices so low.

I agree with most of what you say. Having worked for a year in a Butane concentrate lab, I can not trust the dispensary/lab lable. They lie and cheat and I have been privy to see it first hand...! Just sayin'. I know exactly what is in my concentrate, Wish I could say the same for what I could buy off the shelf of a dispensary, but not so, sorry!!!

 

[Speedypete]

I agree with most of what you say. Having worked for a year in a Butane concentrate lab, I can not trust the dispensary/lab lable. They lie and cheat and I have been privy to see it first hand...! Just sayin'. I know exactly what is in my concentrate, Wish I could say the same for what I could buy off the shelf of a dispensary, but not so, sorry!!!

I dont doubt that man. Put it this way, i try and use the purest butane i can get my mitts on and the best product. I only bought shatter once and it wasnt worth it

 

[MiGrampa]

I agree with most of what you say. Having worked for a year in a Butane concentrate lab, I can not trust the dispensary/lab lable. They lie and cheat and I have been privy to see it first hand...! Just sayin'. I know exactly what is in my concentrate, Wish I could say the same for what I could buy off the shelf of a dispensary, but not so, sorry!!!

I'm not sure if you're in Michigan, but from what you're saying ... it sounds like what's happened here. Regulators busted labs for inflating THC numbers. I don't remember the labs involved or the full scope of what occurred.

I rarely buy concentrates anyway. My wife and I use it for baking and we'll make up a quart jar of either magic butter or magic coconut oil. A quart of magic butter lasts us a long time.

 

[SSgrower]

Hash Oil aka: Honey Oil is the end purpose for my grows, well, 90% of it. I started making 'Oil' back in the late 70's in a machine called the Iso 2. It used a light bulb for a heat source and looking back on the process, by using heat to circulate the alcohol through the weed to extract the THC, it was also decarbing it. Reverse the process to reclaim the alcohol/everclear from the oil left in the bottom of the bucket. Mexican brick weed ($90 lb) made a black green in color and VERY green tasting oil, but it did the trick. Added to a joint, it was a gooey mess, but well worth it.
View attachment 6327

Fast forward nearly a 1/2 century. Iso oil seems to have morphed into multipal forms. In the day, I had Isopropal or Everclear to work with and had never heard the word decarboxylation. Extracting canibinoids with extreemly cold alcohol/ethanol was unknown. Rosin pressing, butane or CO2 extraction was still decades away.
Nowdays there are Rosin, RSO, BHO, and CO2 to choose from, just to name a few of the forms. And the BHO comes in multipal forms. Diamonds, sauce, shatter, wax, crumble, bla bla...
Today I my go to BHO, and yes, mine is butane honey oil. See....
View attachment 6338

I understand there are pro's and conn's to each of the forms of extraction I mentioned, at least in some follks opinion. That's cool, and how it should be. Fell free to discuss those here.
I'd love to learn how to make a honey oil like the one above from an ethanol extraction I could vape, but not that green stuff from 45 years ago. My pallet has been spoiled.
Do you concentrate your THCa? How and why/what for?

I remember those Iso 2 devices as I Knew a guy who had one in the late 70's brother, that really took me back dude, dang. I want a Press to do fresh press. SSgrower

 

[MysticEpipedon]

I'm not a big fan of extracts, because no matter how powerful the cannabis product smoked, I will reach saturation of my central nervous system within a few days. So getting used to higher levels of THC leaves me right where I was before I stepped up intake by going to extracts.

That said, I think BHO is the best product. Rosin usually tastes like popcorn to me, but I think that's because whoever made it wasn't an expert.

I used to have an Iso-2, back in the 70s, until my father found it. "Is this some kind of pipe or something?" It's definitely or something, dad.

 

[IamN2pot]

I'm not sure if you're in Michigan, but from what you're saying ... it sounds like what's happened here. Regulators busted labs for inflating THC numbers. I don't remember the labs involved or the full scope of what occurred.

I rarely buy concentrates anyway. My wife and I use it for baking and we'll make up a quart jar of either magic butter or magic coconut oil. A quart of magic butter lasts us a long time.

LOL, nope. I'm in Colorado, so I'm guessing they all cheat. Not that the cannabis industry has any exclusive on cheating, but some of the players are just ..., well, today I recieved another allert from the MED (Matijuana Enforcment Division) on a mold failure. We used to get moldy weed all the time. Run it through the right CRC filter and you have shatter that will pass. Trouble for me is, I know where that concentrate came from. This report is about some flower that was caught in a spot check and was already being sold. I supose it got moldy on the shelf of the dispo??? LOL!!! ...and this is a regular thing... See below. Guess that's what happens when the foxes guard the chicken coop.

 

[Habosabin]

That Isomiser is a blast from the past. I remember those.

 

[Moshmen]

Bho or co2 may get your best return but can’t beat fresh pressed bud - just my opinion

 

[GoodShit97]

Bho or co2 may get your best return but can’t beat fresh pressed bud - just my opinion

And the flavors that come with fresh press are just far more delicious than bho. Co2 isnt terrible, but ive never had good tasting bho.

Fresh press is definitely where its at dude im with ya.