Rosin Press, Bubble Hash, et al.

Amended -- didn't want this to impact harvest statistics and such. It's not a harvest for one reason. If you recently looked at this, that is the only thing that is different. Everything else was cut and paste. This is GGxWW buds, larf and a small amount of trim. The entirity of the previous harvest was added. It was a lot. 4-5 cycles and no discoloration, but i was pooped. ---------------------- Biggest tip - Soak it. Longer than you think, then walk away and let it soak longer. If dried buds do at least 45 minutes. Fossilized dried something or other? Give it an hour. Keep it ice cold durin gthat time too. A nice thick layer of ice will keep it submerged, and by the time you are read for a cycle, the ice should be at a nice low level. You don't want to agitate the material. The swirling water is what knocks the brittle, partially frozen trichomes off the plant material. Ice should not be jagged or cut up the plant material. Some swirling aound to help keep the temperature down is a good idea, of course. The same reason as soaking it -- avoid beating up the material. It'll break down gently as it swirls, but you want to avoid excess internal oils and other liquids easily seaping out. Bubble hash is a water-sieve and the goal is what is on the exterior of the plant, not the interior. Weight is only for the A portion only (25u-120u). Another 10-12grams from the B portion, but I expect both to lose another ~10% of that weight. I left a lot on the plate this time. It was hot out, and I didn't feel like running to buy 22lbs of ice for another 3-4 runs. So, I probably left 20-40grams on the table. It was good to test out a larger run like this. I will find a happy medium where ~6 cycles is the point at which i don't want to do it anymore for the amount returned from "one more" cycle. Staying 100g-300g worth of material may be wiser in future, if i am going to be lazy, or if i cannot easily keep the water cold for a long enough period of time. The picture is labeled well. The last wash is heavy because i rinse down the buds more and run a lot more water through the sives - 8-9gallons. The third wash I ran for 30minutes, because i realized how low on ice i was. Fourth wash i was worried i'd get chlorophyl if i did that again. Overall, it came out a nice color. That picture is quite a while from scraping. Gently patted through 25u pressing screen but will still lose some water-weight. ------ August Update ----- I will just add weeks when i do a bubble run. Week 2 will go more indepth on the steps I take with pictures. Plan on using less material. Once i hit 200-300grams in the freezer, I'll do another run. 40-60 grams will be worth it. Think a full pound or more that i did this time was a bit too much for the equipment and it would have required significant added effort (plus, no ice). The goal is to find the amount i can get *most* of the yield in 4 washes. Or, i have to be gentler with my wash cycle and run it more often and invest more effort for only a negligible-to-modest gain in grams of the higher quality results. After 4 washes, i can start to taste a difference in my bubble hash. It retains the honey-blonde color for many more cycles, but it is harsher for sure. Anyway, once it builds up and the weather gets cooler outside, i'll do another run and try to map it out better -- explain different options and the cost/benefit of those choices. I have strong preferences, and you'll have different preferences. Apply a little deductive reasoning and shorten the learning curve to get there.

3.4 grams.. Up to 18-20g at most of Durban Poison and Gorilla Glue x White Widow. Forgot to picture the flattened 'puck'. It was quite thin. Well, first try with a rosin press. DIY 20T press with a 4x7 platen kit. Has a insulator, but intend to put a chunk of a leather belt in there next time. I could feel a little warmth above top plate. The bamboo on the bottom worked well. Couldn't feel anything on arbors. I may have warmed up the buds under initial light pressure a bit too long as i ran to get the camera... FFS, what a horrible excuse. Genuinely embarassed. Probably should have bought the 3x6 bags vs the 4x7 bags. The back didn't pinch out, so no problems this time. Need to pack a little emore into the back. Forgot to weigh what went in. A 32oz mason jar of small-ish nugs has ~14 grams left. So, 16-20grams is a good guess for those nugs. So approaching 20% yield or a bit above with buds harvested in.. i think early august. There were two types of buds in this. Not optimal, but meh. The durban poison side spat out more, i think, but also a bit more moisture in those buds for whatever reason. Fingers get sticky with the GGxWW, but with DP it's a thinner-spreading oil is best i can describe. Folded the parchment well enough. Some lost bits along edge of bag. Cut a bit too much off top flap and have to clean the top platen a bit more than i should. Summary -- I have a much better idea of how to do this know after the first attempt. I can fill the bag a bit more to shorten up width - bump up to 30 grams and see what happens. Wrap parchment more tightly, but a little room for squish. Reduce amount of time for intiial pressure and a bit of heat (don't run for something stupid while doing it!). Increase pressure slowly like this time, but much better idea of what to feel. If i crunch it at end, i may try to separate it before doing so - maybe, scrape it down a bit or anything alike. I have abunch of frozen trim and larf, but not sure about the water content... probably evaporated a bit by this point. I'll be adding more weeks with each press. Any expert advice is always appreciated. Thanks to @the_canna_scientist for some tips and info. As well as numerous sources on the internet. Nearly as many contradicting statements as anything else. If i had a drill press, i'd make the platens myself and save a bunch of money. As it was, a 20T press with 4x7 platnes is about $450-500. These have dual heaters in both plates - 300x4=1200w, must be 10amps or so. They heat up quickly.

115g Green Poison Fast Version from Sweet Seeds - Some good buds and some airy larf too. 15g Rosin output - 15g in jar plus whatever is on parchment in picture (*for more immediate use) Well, beginner's luck ran out, as well as some impact from laziness. I folded paper wrong first time as well as not leaving a little room for give, so had a parchment blowout. Second time i had another blowout at the back of parchment. Third time i didn't have enough overlap on top, so i got a leak out the back left corner.... Last one only had the problem with a fraction of overhang and likely absorbing some portion of rosin like others. A circus of errors and stupidity. It was easy to run a knife along the warm platens to gather what leaked out. After that i let it cool enough to use some paper towel w/ rubbing alcohol without combusting, LoL. Oh, the chunk of leather belt helped a bit with heat transference to jack. If i didn't have to clean it, i think a short break between might still be best. Once heating element stops, the jack cools faster than the insulating plate and faster yet than the platens.. so, it's a net-positive to shut it off for a bit relative to jack temperature. Started with about 115 grams, give or take. Ended up with a little over 15 grams of rosin, but definitely lost some along edges of bags that i'm not going to scrounge to get. I don't think this would be a 20+% yield, though. Definitely got better results from Durban Poison and GGxWW. Lots of attempts left... another ounce of DP and a couple more ounces in freezer formerly for bubble hash. How to improve: Focus a bit more. Re-watch how to fold parchment, but may have etched that into memory this time. Definitely need 3x7 bags. The width needs the extra 1" overlap, but the width needs to be shorter than 4". If i pack less, i can keep it more easily centered with less overhan. This is what caused the waste this time. The first rosin run the bags weren't as thick and didn't spread out as much. This time i had 1mm overhanging in front while back was lined up. This allowed alot of rosin to soak up in this area. I ran the backside of a knife across to squeeze out as much as i could before removing from press. Probably lost a good chunk on each from this and similar issues related to my mistakes. Got a better hang on pressure and when to apply. Time between uses will slow down the learning curve for familiarity. Increase pressure to the point it squishes a bit... allow to sit until some drips form... once those slow or stop, increase pressure. Need to be quicker removing from press. Tonight my mistakes required a lot of cleanup too. Had to clean platens each time.