thinning bho with propylene glycol to make flowable oil for pen vaporizers

[endora]

Again: the 1:10 only worked because my oil wasn't properly cured and was therefore still too fluid.

But even at 6:1 dilution with well-cured solid bho dissolved into the PG, the oil flows just fine at room temperature. Really, it does. It looks just like a heavy-weight motor oil. Trust me, I've done it with a dozen batches of different strains now; it's nearly ideal. Thinner batches will work; I just don't need a less-concentrated final product. FTWendy definitely knows her shit, so try her method too.

The final thinned 6:1 product is very smooth and has no harshness. You are dealing with >60% THC so there's gonna be some expansion qualities... ; )

I'd suggest that you first try 2 grams of bho dissolved with .35 gm/ml of PG. Do it in a small beaker or shot glass placed in a warm water bath at about 130 degrees F to get it nice and soft, then stir well with a bamboo skewer. Make sure to let it warm up, and leave it in the heatbath for a while then re-stir. Load up your Protank with a syringe and a #14 or #16 blunt-tip needle and see what you think. If you don't like it you can always thin it more; just warm up your protank and drain it back into the beaker for adjustments. I started by thinning 1:1 and was really bummed at how thin it was. You can always thin more, but you can't thicken without adding more bho.

Flavors should work. I have no experience with them. I use a bho/ethanol technique that brings in huge amounts of flavor anyway so to add flavor would be blasphemy. My patients rave about my flavor.

 

[germinator]

1 part bho to 3 parts pg...works for me.
After winterizing if I'm using an atomizer ( cotton filled carto) ill add a drop of warm ethenol to finish the dissolve and keep it gunk free.

 

[endora]

Keep in mind that 6:1 bho to pg is the thickest oil that will work in bottom-coil atomizers. But the overall working range is obviously from 6:1 to considerably more PG. There is no 'right' or 'wrong' here, just personal preferences. I am making medicine for medical patients, and the idea is to maximize active ingredients. I have flowers that have more THC than 1:3 bho to pg provides, so that seems pointless for my people. But some folks like it less strong, nothing wrong with that at all as long as it still functions properly.

 

[germinator]

Yes, the stronger the flower the stronger the bho .....therefore less bho required for efficacy in formulation. 1/3 works for my taste.
Ohh n correct me if im wrong but I think ftwendy is a guy.

 

[endora]

FTwendy, that true? Sorry buddy. I saw the 'wendy' and ass-umed...

 

[germinator]

Dont know whats up with that... but a 6 g bho to 1 mil of pg....with my shatter you friken pass out...and...I have a high tolerance due to saturation.
To me elick is about medicating stealth onies.
If I want someone to hit the floor they can hit my roor with my healthstone an a pinhead size shard.

 

[igrowheadband]

can just use the magic butter , an ounce of pot and food glycerin and has the setting to make a tincture i think i ouch requiters 5cups of glycerin

 

[endora]

Dont know whats up with that... but a 6 g bho to 1 mil of pg....with my shatter you friken pass out...and...I have a high tolerance due to saturation.
To me elick is about medicating stealth onies.
If I want someone to hit the floor they can hit my roor with my healthstone an a pinhead size shard.

Agreed, it's some strong stuff! My shatter has all come in at over 80%. It's weird, though, how you develop a tolerance to it. I now get more high from my flowers than from my oils. Go figure. I think it must have something to do with the additional active ingredients found in flowers that don't make it into the bho.

can just use the magic butter , an ounce of pot and food glycerin and has the setting to make a tincture i think i ouch requiters 5cups of glycerin

Hmm. This seems unwise. I think two months of rigorous testing has proven at least that much to me. Otherwise you'd see these bho carts everywhere. They are still fairly rare for a good reason: it takes time and research to dial it all in. But whatever works for you, my friend.

 

[Mr. Molecule]

Thanks endora and everyone. One last silly question... I sure would love to avoid all the extra work of winterizing... would it be accurate to say that if I used a much more dilute ratio than endora is describing, and used something like 2:1 (PG:BHO), that winterizing simply wouldn't be necessary because the resulting solution would be so relatively thin that it would thus prevent early fouling of the atomizer?? Or will that fouling happen regardless of the dilution of the solution due to the waxes etc that remain?

I seem to be seeing many reports online of people who are not winterizing but are still getting decent results.

I know it sounds weird to some of you that I actually want the solution to be somewhat LESS potent instead of as potent as I can get it, but the reason for that is that HO is extremely harsh on my throat, and I would like it to be really dilute and non-chokey. My reasoning is that since BHO is potent enough undiluted that one or two hits is enough, then twice or three times as many hits but of a much less harsh vapor would be a desirable outcome.

 

[germinator]

I use cartomizers or tanks (cheap ones do leak)...my daily drivers are the itaste and a eroll with no leaks at all. And remember if you use separates. to match your carto resistance to battery voltage, this should help enhance the smoothness of your vapor.

 

[endora]

I honestly haven't experimented with skipping the winterizing. If others are having good results out there you might just try a batch and see what happens. I'm sure some strains will work better than others. The problem I run into is that if my cartos fail my patients just call me to fix it rather than deal with it themselves, which is a huge pain. So I try to avoid snafus at all costs.

And there's nothing at all wrong with a less-potent or more diluted oil. What's important (IMO) is that you tailor your oil to your own preferences while maintaining the full functionality of your carto. With experimentation you'll find a good ratio for each strain you process.

 

[ftwendy]

Endora nailed it: you have to fine tune the entire process to fit your needs. It's fun :)

Strain, batteries, cartomizers, dilution of pg to oil, purity of starting material, etc... these are some of the major variables.

 

[Mr. Molecule]

Well one thing's for sure, one will never grow feeble-minded while trying to figure all this out...! Quite a mental workout.

But here's the latest wrinkle for me: I'm now reading that a lot of people get throat irritation, dry mouth, sore throat etc from PG. These are all precisely the things I hope to get away from by no longer vaping trichomes, in whatever form, through a Vapor Bros type vaporizer. The same people report far less irritation from VG, which is now starting to make me want to consider VG as the carrier---but of course the snag is that VG is known to be far more difficult to dissolve BHO into, right? Ack... back to the drawing board...

 

[Mr. Molecule]

Hi friends, well I thought I'd report back now that I've gotten a vape device and done a solubility (and vape) test.

Turns out that BHO does indeed stay dissolved in PG at 3g BHO:10mL PG. Very nicely, in fact. And I'm stoked to report that in addition, this method of volatizing BHO is much easier on my throat and lungs (so far) than any other way I've used it, such as straight, or on top of weed in an older-school vaporizer, or actually smoking it, which I can't even do without significant irritation.

I was concerned that PG itself would turn out to be irritating for me after reading stories about people being allergic to it... but it appears not in my case. So this method of medicating is just an all-around winner, it seems to me. The idea that I now have a way to carry a portable and discreet device is a lot of fun.

Note the nice amber color, which is slightly darker in hue somehow than the oil itself was (puzzling, since dilution should have made it lighter in hue, you'd think).

And I haven't even started playing with flavors yet! I have gummi bear, maple and boysenberry on the way. (Some purists might find it heresy for me to add flavoring to BHO, but my position is that I've been familiar with the flavor of hash oil since I first tried it in 1975 or 1976, so I don't think it's a crime to try a little tasty cocktail at this point!)

 

[ftwendy]

View attachment 389553 So this method of medicating is just an all-around winner, it seems to me. The idea that I now have a way to carry a portable and discreet device is a lot of fun.

:) you will be amazed at where you can medicate if you add a flavor with a strong odor. Vanilla is especially pungent and makes the hash taste like a frosted treat. That said, be smart, use discretion... and share with somebody in need!!

Happy Spring guys, ftw

 

[germinator]

View attachment 389553 Hi friends, well I thought I'd report back now that I've gotten a vape device and done a solubility (and vape) test.

Turns out that BHO does indeed stay dissolved in PG at 3g BHO:10mL PG. Very nicely, in fact. And I'm stoked to report that in addition, this method of volatizing BHO is much easier on my throat and lungs (so far) than any other way I've used it, such as straight, or on top of weed in an older-school vaporizer, or actually smoking it, which I can't even do without significant irritation.

I was concerned that PG itself would turn out to be irritating for me after reading stories about people being allergic to it... but it appears not in my case. So this method of medicating is just an all-around winner, it seems to me. The idea that I now have a way to carry a portable and discreet device is a lot of fun.

Note the nice amber color, which is slightly darker in hue somehow than the oil itself was (puzzling, since dilution should have made it lighter in hue, you'd think).

And I haven't even started playing with flavors yet! I have gummi bear, maple and boysenberry on the way. (Some purists might find it heresy for me to add flavoring to BHO, but my position is that I've been familiar with the flavor of hash oil since I first tried it in 1975 or 1976, so I don't think it's a crime to try a little tasty cocktail at this point!)

I think you can expect that your elick will continue to darken as you continue to bang the button. Heat will darkening it up as you vape away.

 

[Mr. Molecule]

I think you can expect that your elick will continue to darken as you continue to bang the button. Heat will darkening it up as you vape away.

Yeah I'd expect some of that for sure, but what I was talking about was the color I observed just after mixing and loading and before I had even hit the button at all.

Just now I realized that the cause of the slightly darker hue was probably the heating of it when it was (briefly) mixed with 100F degree PG. That would do it too.

I do look forward to playing with flavors because the vapor, while subtly "hash-oily," isn't what I'd call delicious.

 

[Shanon]

Does anyone know specifically how to do this? For example, the rough ratio of bho to p. glycol?

I'm told (a bit too vaguely) that you make your bho as usual, then winterize for 48 hours, then filter off the solids. The ethanol is then evaporated off and the remaining bho is thinned to a flowable consistency with propylene glycol.

I honestly thought that this info would be one of the top stickies here since these pens are everywhere now. Atmos, eGo, etcetera. Dabs are great, but flowable pen vapes are sooo much more convenient than top-load globe-style pen dab cartridges IMO.

(I did see a thinning-with-glycerine question. P. glycol is different, and is used everywhere for flowable oils and e-ciggies. Glycerine isn't.)

A second key question would be: can you add the p. glycol while some of the ethanol is still present (this seeming much easier than dissolving dried bho into the p. glycol)?

So much great information here, thank you guys for sharing your experiences!

I was also wondering what stuff works best and were to find it?

 

[cccplus]

Does anyone know specifically how to do this? For example, the rough ratio of bho to p. glycol?

I'm told (a bit too vaguely) that you make your bho as usual, then winterize for 48 hours, then filter off the solids. The ethanol is then evaporated off and the remaining bho is thinned to a flowable consistency with propylene glycol.

I honestly thought that this info would be one of the top stickies here since these pens are everywhere now. Atmos, eGo, etcetera. Dabs are great, but flowable pen vapes are sooo much more convenient than top-load globe-style pen dab cartridges IMO.

(I did see a thinning-with-glycerine question. P. glycol is different, and is used everywhere for flowable oils and e-ciggies. Glycerine isn't.)

A second key question would be: can you add the p. glycol while some of the ethanol is still present (this seeming much easier than dissolving dried bho into the p. glycol)?

So much great information here, thank you guys for sharing your experiences!

i just stated this in another post, but use vapeur extract.

PG won't work, i have tried with different final products, never mixes properly. it is possible to use pg when you actually soak flowers in it, and get your self a tincture. and vg works just the same.

but if you already have the final product you will need to use some type of suspension liquid.

 

[cccplus]

i just stated this in another post, but use vapeur extract.

PG won't work, i have tried with different final products, never mixes properly. it is possible to use pg when you actually soak flowers in it, and get your self a tincture. and vg works just the same.

but if you already have the final product you will need to use some type of suspension liquid.

https://www.vapeurextract.com