To Dry Or Not To Dry?

[grobag]

Hi everyone,

As moderators we get asked many questions via the PM system everyday and accordingly many are repeated. This is a question I get asked all the time and I thought this time that rather than give a basic answer again in reply to the PM, I would give a detailed answer on the boards so that others can see my reasoning, add to it, contradict it, etc. So that we may all learn. I’ve basically written an article in answer to the question but also look at it as the start to a debate and give your answer to the question with your techniques and reasoning behind them. There’s more than one way to cook an egg.

Shamoomoo asked the question again recently and was clear and straight to the point so it is their question I have quoted, though I’ll also explain the benefits of whether or not to grind as that is another FAQ which is connected. The two are easiest to explain hand in hand.

Dear Grobag, I’m new to the site and need your help. I’ve spent the summer growing some outdoor plants, and its looking like all my efforts are gonna be rewarded. Which is great, but I ain’t got nowhere reliable to dry my bud, and there’s gonna be lots of it!!! I’ve got bubble bags already and have used them with dried bud. If I freeze my bud from fresh and then bubble it. Will it work as well/ at all.

So basically the answer varies according to what you want to do with the trim/bud. Sham’s question above (I assume) applies to the whole plant for bubbling, whereas most people save the best buds for drying out and smoking, then using the trim and ‘popcorn’ buds for processing into hash or oil. So I will concentrate on this more common separate way of doing things but if anyone wants to know more about bubbling/hashing the whole plant then I advise looking at HydroNaut’s threads and asking the man himself as this is his preferred method and he has the most experience in that field. There are loads of different ways and means so I’ll concentrate on what I do in this post and explain why.

I must first re-enforce the point that it really does matter what you are trying to achieve as to what method you use. For this it is best to explain a few basics behind the methods, sorry if I am explaining at far to simple a level.

With all methods of extraction you are trying to get what is in the resin glands on the buds. These glands come in a few shapes and sizes but the most predominant and visible are the capitate resin glands; the ‘mushroom’ shaped ones. These are the ones with the ball heads on which you collect when bubbling or dry sifting, physically removing and separating them. Whilst other resin glands on the plant, though not as high yielding, still retain the goodies that we want. So whether we dry, grind, freeze etc, is dependant on how we are going to go about getting at what’s in all those resin glands, capitate or not.

Hash:

Dry Sift:

Obviously with Dry Sifting the answer is in the name, but why? The point with this method is to dry out totally the bud/trim you are using then pass that over some form of screen of a specific mesh size to collect the resin heads. The main point here being the ‘heads’ of the capitate glands. As the plants are dry they are brittle and the heads snap off readily, so when the correct size of screen is used it is mostly only the resin heads that fall through whilst most of the plant matter stays behind. It is best not to grind up the plant matter first as there is then more chance that fragments of this to will pass through the screen aswell. On the other hand though you want to break everything open enough and give it a large surface area so that all of the resin heads are exposed rather than nestled inside a bud where they are unlikely to fall off. So if you are dry sifting buds, you want to break them open first to expose the resin glands, but not grind them and break up the plant matter. Therefore, the quality and quantity of dry sift collected depends on two major factors amongst others. Firstly, the screen size. If the screen used has a weave that exactly matches the size of the resin heads on that strain of plant then if the right techniques are used, it will mostly only be the resin heads that pass through. A larger weave can then be used afterwards to collect any heads left behind, but this will also inevitably let through more plant matter with it making for a lower grade of resin. Secondly then are the techniques used. The more you break up the plant matter you are using and the more vigorous you are at rubbing it over the screen, the more chance you have of plant matter falling through the screen with the resin heads. After all, all you are doing is collecting particles all of the same size or less and dried cannabis will readily break up. So the best resin is collected by the gentlest of touches, but will also result in the lowest yield - you just have to decide what’s most important to you; quality or quantity. After an initial light sifting for the highest grade of dry sift you can also decide how you want to go about getting the remaining resin. As mentioned you can use a bigger weave and be more vigorous with a second dry sift or you can wash with a solvent for oil, again producing an extremely high grade product whilst getting every last drop of goodness. I’ll get to that in a mo’.

Bubbling:

I take a totally different approach with the bubble/water hash technique for extracting the resin. The reason is quite simple really - the resin glands are submersed in water and therefore aren’t brittle like with dry sift so a different approach is called for. How do you snap of and collect just the capitate heads when they are far from dry and brittle? The water hash technique relies on the fact that resin, being more dense than water will sink whilst the plant matter floats on the main, then the bubble bags are the screens that separate and filter the resin into grades as it works it’s way down to the bottom. All you need to concentrate on then again is trying to just separate those heads and not little particles of plant matter which will also inevitably become sodden and sink aswell into the awaiting catching sacks.

It’s best to decide what you are going to be doing before you crop so you go about doing things in the best way for your needs. When I first chop the plants I trim them straight away from fresh. This way will give you the most options of what to do with the trim (you can always dry it separately if you want). I first chop off all of the fan/shade leaves without any visible resin glands on them and throw them away. Along with the stems and roots, these are the only waste from the plant with which I do nothing. I then perform a second manicure of the buds, removing and collecting all of the frosty leaves and the lower down smaller and looser buds which don’t make for quite as good a smoke on their own. All of the buds I then hang to dry for around a couple of weeks in a cool dark place before jarring for a cure, but all of the collected trim/air bud I freeze from fresh without drying at all. This is a key point with strong reasons behind it. Again I see these as twofold; firstly from the aspect of making the resin glands brittle. With the higher moisture content within the capitate glands themselves (as opposed to being dried out) they both stand out prouder and freeze more readily, making them easier to snap off. As long as the water is at a low enough temperature containing lots of individual ice cubes the trim/air bud will remain frozen when added. I always add cold water from the tap and then add a load of ice to the bucket, plus setting up all the bags in order, so that the water is cold enough, before adding any cannabis matter. The key is keeping it cold enough the whole time so you want a load of ice on hand throughout so that there is always lots of solid chunks in there. These both keep the temps down and bash about the trim knocking off the heads. If trim stays frozen then the resin heads will remain brittle and can be removed easier. The second benefit of freezing the trim from fresh is that the plant matter is more likely to remain intact. If dried before freezing (or without freezing), the plant matter is more likely to break up when being bashed about in the bubbling process, and therefore more likely to make it through the screens with the resin glands. Full Melt Clear Dome (FMCD) Bubble Hash is only made from resin heads alone with minimal amounts of plant matter; mostly only achieved using freshly frozen trim.

Again though a lot depends on technique and FMCD hash can only really be made with a gentle approach as with dry sifting. Ultimately it is the same balance of quality vs. quantity and what you want from your labours. Me, I want the best, and find this is best achieved by doing things by hand. Using electric mixers, drills with mixer paddles, etc (I’ve tried quite a few ways) is the easiest way to bubble but even on the lowest settings they tend to be far to vigorous. By hand, and by that I mean using a plain wooden spoon or chopstick even, you can be far more gentle and increase the chance of breaking off the resin heads alone with minimal plant matter with them. Plus you can get into all the nooks and crannies easier, avoid clumping, and just generally do a better and more thorough job of exposing the surface area and knocking it about in the iced water - the basic aim. With a few bouts of stirring it about to knock off the heads and expose different areas, then letting it settle for equal amounts of time in between, you allow the resin a chance to break off, float free and sink through the grades of bags. Like with dry sift, you could always do a second, more vigorous run to get any missed resin heads along with more plant matter making a second lower grade of hash(s). Or you can do as I do and dry the trim out after bubbling (oddly after being submersed in water cannabis dries out quicker than if it was just dried straight from fresh!), then oil wash it for the remaining cannabinoids. Remember aswell that the capitate heads are not the only resin glands, and even the stalks of the capitate glands are left behind. After both dry sifting and bubbling, oil washing is the best way get at all the remaining resin whilst producing an even more superior product to the original hashes made. Definitely something worth baring in mind.

With both of these methods of making your own hash, dry sift and bubbling, and whether or not you decide to dry it out first, best results are achieved through not grinding the trim at all. If you grind it up you are just increasing by far the chance of plant matter getting through the screens with the resin glands and making all other techniques used pointless. If all you are after is a high quantity of low grade hash then grind up dried trim and be extremely vigorous with passing it over the screen. You’ll get a greener product that won’t bind as well due to the added plant matter, but you’ll still get a far better hash than most you see on the streets of Britain nowadays and you’ll get a lot more of it. Personally I don’t see the point though. I like to make as pure and strong a product as possible and just smoke less of it, it is far more enjoyable. I, like most of us here at UK420, come from the perspective of supplying myself with the best smoke possible rather than for any financial gain. It’s a passion for me - plus a bit more!

[grobag]

Oil:

BHO (Butane Honey Oil):

If you decide that you want to oil wash the trim straight away then butane is the best widely available solvent to use for the purest type of oil - honey oil rather than regular oil. For this process the best results are achieved (plus the highest yields) when using dried trim. I still trim the plants from fresh when making BHO but I dry the trim out separately with the bud. This is also the only method in which grinding the trim could be beneficial but I never bother unless processing high quantities at once. I use a coffee pot in which the trim and solvent can steep, unlike the pipe method. Butane is extremely selective with what it extracts from the plant no matter what timescale is used, unlike using alcohols as the solvent (IPA for example) which I’ll explain next. Making oil involves dissolving the resin in a liquid solvent before filtering it from the plant matter then evaporating off the solvent again leaving just the cannabis oil. You are therefore getting the resin from within every type of resin gland and getting effectively a higher yield of cannabinoids from the same starting material than when making hash. All you are trying to do with the trim before adding the solvent is to dry it out as much as possible as the moisture content interferes, plus increase the surface area of the trim/bud which will be exposed to the solvent. As you are filtering a liquid from the plant matter rather than particles, you can use a much finer filter. Paper coffee filters are the best for this (I double them up), and they have a 5 micron weave whereas the lowest grade bubble bag is 25 micron and best results are achieved with a larger weave again for dry sift. As a result the most effect way of oiling is to break up the trim enough to expose the greatest surface area, but not too much that it will get through the filter aswell; as it does when ground in a coffee grinder when dry. If grinding then a hand herb-grinder is more than ample.

IPA Oil:

Using an alcohol as the solvent (IPA being the most effective whilst widely available and thus most common) is far less selective with what it removes, making for a cruder oil. Along with the cannabinoids you want to extract, you also strip the plant of chlorophyll, tars, waxes and other contaminants which gives a higher yield of a lower quality oil. As a way of countering this the ‘QWISO’ technique is used, which stands for Quick Wash ISO. Quick being the operative word. The basic reason is that most of the cannabinoids you are trying to extract are dissolved in a very short time whilst most of the contaminants take longer. The timing then becomes crucial for extracting as much resin as possible along with as few contaminants. Again you want to dry the trim out first, but if you grind up the trim then you want to reduce the exposure time accordingly and I have found that it is a much finer line when ground and easier to time right if just broken up thoroughly. Again a hand grinder is perfect. Through experimenting and trial and error I have found that with hand ground weed in a sealed jar with IPA and shaken, 30 seconds is about the perfect time before pouring out though paper coffee filters again into the evaporation dish. Like with other methods, you can always do a second, longer wash to get any remaining cannabinoids along with the inevitable higher levels of contaminants and make a cruder oil again. I never bother with a second wash personally as I don’t like the resulting oil, but then I rarely even use IPA at all as I much prefer honey oil and am not keen on the taste of IPA oil. You will get about a third again in yield with IPA as opposed to butane, along with a corresponding weakening of quality.

In General:

Coming back to the original question of whether to dry out the trim or not before you use it, as I have shown, it depends on what you want to make and at what quality. Personally, I mostly either Butane wash straight away or I bubble first then butane wash. I get my dry sift through a little ‘tax’ by my crystal catcher grinder every time I smoke or grind trim. If oiling straight away then I will dry the trim out first (as I would if dry sifting obviously and IPA washing), but if bubbling then I will just freeze it from fresh then dry it out again afterwards for oiling. Bubbling is the only method with which it is worth using fresh frozen trim.

It’s a simple question eh and I’ve gone a very long arsed way of answering, but this covers many of the same questions I get asked on a regular basis and thought this post might go a bit of the way to clearing up a few things for some people. Feel free to ask if there is anything you would like me to explain or expand on. That answer your question Shamoomoo?!? Good luck mate and happy hashing.

Onwards & Upwards

Grobag

[Burns]

Cracking post grobag, it`s explained loads of things I have wondered about.

Nice one

Burns B)

[buildAbong]

Grobag,

Thanks for posting this, it not only explains a lot, but was a really good read.

Sticky?

bAb

[Tasty]

What can I say? Grobag, I always enjoy reading your threads and always seem to know twice as much as I did before.

Can't wait for my next grow to put my new found knowledge to the test.

Cheers m8

Peace

Tasty

[withnail]

Excellent work grobag,Informative without being too technical,I managed to understand almost all of it

Got a couple of weeks left on my first grow and then I'll be using some of your knowledge to help me hopefuly create some delicious hash

[madgiz]

You certainly are an expert in your field.... Well done.

Edited October 9, 2007 by madgiz

[silver.rizla]

Great post grobag, after reading this you've inspired me to try some bubbe type experiments

[DrGiggles]

Thats a fantastic post grobag..very inspiring stuff!You've broken it down it made it all sound so simple, I've gotta have a crack at the BHO it sounds special..thanks I feel educated.

[shamoomoo]

Nice one Grobag. Thanks for the quick reply, time is of the essence at the moment and your answers on, TO DRY OR NOT TO DRY. Was a massive help and exactly what I wanted to hear. Thank you very much mate. Sham.

[bazza82]

Great posts Grobag , i'm gonna keep an eye out for the same sort of coffee pot you use when making oil as i'd like to give it a go, i've ordered the 1 gallon, 7 bubblebag set which i can't wait to use,hopefully its gonna be a huge step-up from the tights method, where do you get the Butane you use?, do you think Joolz would start stocking it in the shop?, peace mate, Baz

[Stixman]

great post,im off to put it into practice

[908]

Great post,answered a few questions for me 908

[LargeSalad]

Cheers Grobag, great post, interesting & informative read!

LS

[skunkyone]

top thread grobag.....gonna be very useful :wink: