Water cure first then make green dragon or tincture?

bobhamm

Active Member
well, been reading on water curing and think thats what I will do this weekend (I will use fresh weed staright from the plant)with my Iced Grapefruit, coupla reasons being
1) I dont care what the smoke is like as generally we vape and Im lookn at tinctures
2) I figure a week in the water will get rid of most of the nasty green stuff, then Ill probably dry it and soak it in everclear(95% alky) for green dragon, though I expect the "green" part to be less so due to the water cure.
The only part Im wondering about is our old friend decarboxylization(sp?)...
should I heat treat the dried (after water cured) weed to 106C for a while before I put it in the alcohol? this should change the THCV to THCA right? or does the alcohol accomplish this also? anyone?

water curing also gets rid of most of the smell/flavor which since I dont plan on smoking much of it which is fine by me, someday when its legal and I can actually enjoy finely cured weed
 

bobhamm

Active Member
ok, from another thread,yes heat to decarboxylate(after the water cure and before making the "Less than Green Dragon" :) I'm guessing that with a reasonable number of views and no comments that basically you agree with the premise that a water cure by leaching out most of the chlorophyll will make a less distasteful Green Dragon?
 

Hashster

Member
Actually I think it's probably because not too many people really know much about this subject or if they do, they don't want to share the info! ie. competition
Yea, you def should decarb before you extract although you can do it afterwards but it's harder to heat evenly; the alchohol doesn't decarb, only heat or lots of pressure.
 

bobhamm

Active Member
Actually I think it's probably because not too many people really know much about this subject or if they do, they don't want to share the info! ie. competition
Yea, you def should decarb before you extract although you can do it afterwards but it's harder to heat evenly; the alchohol doesn't decarb, only heat or lots of pressure.
yeah, I'll grind it then decarb it before extraction, just took the first bud Ive been water curing out after 5 days, water was much better today,wonder if I could justgo straight from the water into a 215F degree oven, to dry and decarb at the same time. I def wouldnt want to smoke it but for extraction I dont see why not
Pressure decarbs also? hadnt seen that before, wonder if smacking it with a hammer would decarb? :)
 

gobbly

Well-Known Member
I have no experience with water curing, but I have quite a bit of experience with refluxing and extractions. Personally I just use butane now because it's so simple, but I certainly can understanding wanting to try out new things :) How successful it would be will depend a lot on how effective water curing is for you. My experience with extracting has been that alcohol is not good at all because it's such a poor non-polar solvent compared to other chemicals. The extractions end up rather impure and need further refining to match what butane can do alone. For the water cure to work it would have to do a thorough job of removing the non-cannabinoids.

Most cities you can find >99% isopropyl alky, which i'd suggest over everclear, but it's mostly just an issue of added time to remove the additional water. The easiest way I have found to activate is to preheat the oven to 250f, when it is there, turn it off and put a tray of bud/trim in. Leave for 10-20 min. Repeat if more drying is needed. With the water cure as long as you could get it uniformly heated for 10 min or so you should be good. I can't help but think though, if you are vaporizing you are heating to activation anyway...
 

bobhamm

Active Member
I have no experience with water curing, but I have quite a bit of experience with refluxing and extractions. Personally I just use butane now because it's so simple, but I certainly can understanding wanting to try out new things :) How successful it would be will depend a lot on how effective water curing is for you. My experience with extracting has been that alcohol is not good at all because it's such a poor non-polar solvent compared to other chemicals. The extractions end up rather impure and need further refining to match what butane can do alone. For the water cure to work it would have to do a thorough job of removing the non-cannabinoids.

Most cities you can find >99% isopropyl alky, which i'd suggest over everclear, but it's mostly just an issue of added time to remove the additional water. The easiest way I have found to activate is to preheat the oven to 250f, when it is there, turn it off and put a tray of bud/trim in. Leave for 10-20 min. Repeat if more drying is needed. With the water cure as long as you could get it uniformly heated for 10 min or so you should be good. I can't help but think though, if you are vaporizing you are heating to activation anyway...
Ive looked at the butane extraction andd Im very tempted, if it wasnt so freaking cold outside(4 deg f) Id probably give it a shot, not exactly an indoor sport :)
 
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