Liz Weir's Amazing ISO Oil Extraction!

This method works equally well using ISO alcohol or everclear (moonshine). Everclear is also consumable (I almost said "safe to consume" but that could be debatable!), which means you don't have to be as careful about evaporating off all the nasty stuff that's in ISO.

Safety

Alcohol is flammable. Very. ISO also stinks!

Do this is a well-ventilated area. If I'm doing this inside, I prefer the top of the kitchen stove under the vent fan.

If you have neighbors nearby, don't do this on a day when they are out doing yardwork.

Windy days are good for dissipating odors quickly.

Supplies

• Sugar leaf, popcorn buds, trim
• Alcohol - denatured (available at Lowes or Home Depot) or ISO 99% or 91%
• Glass (I like pyrex) dish - square or rectangle is easier to work with than round
• Mason jar with lid (or other water-tight glass jar)
• Coffee filters
• Holder, funnel, or strainer to hold coffee filters (the top section from a bleach-style bottle works well with the cone-shape filters)
• Strainer for jar (I use the bottom section of a nylon stocking)
• Heating pad (to speed up evaporation) or Electric frying pan and some chopsticks
• Towel to place under heating pad for insulation
• Timer or clock with second indicator
• Oven mitts or gloves to keep your hands from freezing

Notes

If I'm not in a hurry, I usually use a heating pad to evaporate the alcohol. It takes longer, but there is no risk of overheating the hash and destroying the potency as there is when using a hot plate or electric frying pan. Also safer - less chance of the alcohol catching fire because of too much heat!

For cleanest result, don't process more than about an ounce of trim at a time.

Freezing the trim causes the waxes on the surface to harden and hold the chlorophyll into the leaves, giving a cleaner hash oil. Freezing the alcohol slows down the process of the waxes warming up so you get even less chlorophyll in the hash oil.

You can do a second wash if you want, but the quantity will be small and it will have so much chlorophyll in it that it's not worth bothering with (IMHO).

Preparation

1. At least 4 hours before starting the extraction, place the alcohol, cannabis, and mason jar in the freezer. I usually fill the jar about 3/4 full with bud/trim before freezing it. If you have enough to process that it is more than one batch, prefill jars with the bud/trim and freeze them all. Pull them out one at a time to process.

2. Place folded towel on top of stove under the vent fan. This helps insulate the heat from the heating pad and give an even level surface for the dish to sit on. Place the heating pad on top of the towel and the clean glass dish on top of the heating pad. Turn the heating pad on high.

or

Put several wooden chopsticks or some other non-conductive spacer in the bottom of the electric fying pan to hold the pyrex dish off the heating surface. You can see here I used the base from an old wicker paper-plate holder. Set the pyrex dish on the chopsticks and put enough water in the frying pan to come up the side of the pyrex dish about 1/2". Turn the electric frying pan to about 175F - never more than 200F!

3. Place coffee filter inside funnel or holder and place this inside the pyrex dish.

Funnel, side view

Funnel, top view

Funnel inside strainer (the notch in the handle holds the strainer upright inside the strainer).

Strainer inside of collection dish, dish inside of electric frying pan, ready for solvent to be poured in.

4. Get the clock or timer set in a spot that's easy to see and have the oven mitts or gloves handy. Preset it to 2 minutes.

5. If you have any gear that needs to be cleaned (herb grinder, kief screen, etc.), get it handy. Don't clean pipes unless you like yucky charcoal flavored hash! Just clean stuff that touches herb before it's burned.

6. Turn on the vent fan

Extraction

If you are cleaning any gear, pour the alcohol over this first. If the item is small, hold it over the top of the jar that has the trim in it and pour the alcohol over the object so it drains into the jar. If the item is larger, you can place it inside another glass container to rinse and then pour the alcohol from that container into the jar of trim.

Pour frozen alcohol over the frozen trim. I usually pour enough alcohol in to cover about 3/4 of the amount of trim in the jar. Put the lid on tightly, start the timer or note the time, put on the oven mitts or gloves, and start swishing the alcohol around in the trim. I shake it lightly and turn the jar every which way, but I don't shake vigorously. Keep the alcohol moving to extract every bit of resin you can. Agitate for 2 minutes.

If you have more than one jar of bud/trim to process, pour the alcohol from the first jar into the second and continue processing. Use a chunk of nylon stocking or a piece of cheesecloth to strain the last bit of alcohol out of the first jar into the filter while you are agitating the second jar. You may need to add a bit of fresh frozen ISO to the second or subsequent jars as some of the liquid is lost to the vegetable matter.

Take the lid off the jar, place the nylon stocking or filter material over the mouth of the jar, and slowly pour the alcohol into the coffee filter. When you have extracted all that will come out by gravity, lightly squeeze the bottom (toe) of the filter to get the last few drops of alcohol out. Allow all the alcohol to run through the coffee filter and then dispose of the filter.

Straining started

Evaporation

It will take several hours for the alcohol to evaporate. If you have neighbors, do this on a windy day so the odor will dissipate quickly. I frequently wait until after 10 pm to start the extraction so the drying process is done overnight when there are less people around.

Evaporation Started

Evaporation Partially Done

Evaporated Further

You can choose how gooey you like your oil. All the alcohol is gone when the alcohol odor is gone and what is left is a sweet resin odor; this is usually about the time it reaches the consistency of thick molasses where it absolutely clings to your skin and won't come off without alcohol. You can stop the evaporation here or allow it to continue to dry. I like to let it go until it is just short of being dry; it's almost crystalline at this point. If you let it dry completely, it will turn into powder.

Evaporation Finished, Ready to Scrape Up

I use a razor blade in a scraper-type holder to scrape the hash oil off the glass into a small container. The blade of a pocket knife is handy for scraping the hash off of the razor blade into the container. I store my hash oils in sealed containers in the fridge.

Another tip: The oil is much easier to collect if your chill or freeze the pyrex dish before scraping.