DIY butane extractor and storage tank

The tank to hold the butane.

1 lb empty propane tank
Mr. Heater F273754 1″-20 Connects to 1lb tank
1/4" ball valve connects to Mr Heater pc
1/4" gas fitting connects to other end of ball valve

other than the actual tank which most ppl will have a half used one kicking around....total cost "should" be around 15 to 20 bucks.

Propane tanks are higher working pressure rated so butane would be no problem.

So.....I made up my little valve assembly and hooked it up to the propane bottle. Then I bled off all the propane.

When you look into the neck of the propane tank there is a stem valve exactly like a tire stem has in it. You need to unscrew this. Once it is unscrewed, there is still a little sleeve of nylon that keeps it from falling out. Just reach in with a nail or something and pry out the nylon sleeve. Behind it will be the stem valve which will drop out.

Now take the valve assembly you put together and remove the brass nipple from the Mr heater part....if left in there it would severely impede the flow of butane. It simply unscrews.
Sounds far more complicated that it really is.

Screw on your valve assembly and fill with butane. I already have the can tapper but it is very easy to simply get a 1/4" NPT brass plug and drill a hole in it to accept the can's nozzle.

I loaded mine with butane this morning and as it is my first time doing the hot to cold transfer...It took me about 45 mins to load 7 small cans of colibri into the main tank.
Trying to think of a way to make the main part to be cost effective. One thing you will notice is that the cans of butane are made of incredibly thin aluminum...so whatever we are doing is about 1000x overkill. With the temperature transfering, the pressure can never get above 100psi and usually far lower. At 25 degrees Celcius the pressure is only 35.4psi

here is the finished and ready to use storage tank filled with butane.

total cost was 22.80 including buying a new tank

You will need to buy a hose to transfer the butane from storage tank to extractor and back again. Only one hose is needed and can be obtained from ebay for under ten dollars.

Now the parts list for the extractor....

Total Pipe fitting extractor from top to bottom

$5.00 ¼ ball valve
$0.88 ¼ short nipple JP619
$1.51 ¼ to ½ reducing bushing IMNJ6
$6.25 ½ to 1-1/4 adaptor 4WJA4
$7.38 1-1/4 x 9” pipe nipple 5P712
$6.25 ½ to 1-1/4 adaptor 4WJA4
$0.88 ½ short nipple 5P650
$6.46 ½ union 4WJT3
$0.88 ½ short nipple 5P650
$3.09 ½ x ½ x ¼ Tee 5P485
$0.88 ½ short nipple 5P650
$7.95 ½ to 1 ½ adaptor 4WJA8
$9.78 1 ½ x 12” pipe nipple 5P731
$7.16 1 ½ cap 4WJV2

Side spigot

$0.88 ¼ short nipple JP619
$5.00 ¼ ball valve

The part codes are at the side and are from Grainger

As the lower reservoir will be basically a tube...you will need a carrier solvent like isopropyl alcohol to transfer the finished product out of the unit.

If I have time this week I will make one up to show you the finished unit.

Rusty provided these links in the oil forum to show how a popular extractor works.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vvdedWvpUiU
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lTn5rJ_gBWk
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ajDkBlw_jYs

This will work basically in the same fashion but for us poor folk (me) it will do it for less cash outlay. Maybe not as well but hey, still will work.

oh and if you have never worked with black pipe before...it is very dirty when you first get it. tons of cutting oil etc on it, so it will need lots of cleaning before you should ingest ANYTHING made within it.

Drawing I did up for this. Not to scale but hopefully it clarifies it a bit.

Sadly I cut off the nipple and ball valve at the top of the drawing.

Will work on this a bit next week -BB

nice, I ordered my 1lb tank and bits the other day, I have some plans drawn up pretty similar to yers as well. Instead of the cap assembly at the bottom I was considering using a 2qt stainless paint pressure pot (the sell em online)… however I bet yer pot would be easier to scape… hmm… and I bet u could order all the parts off mcmaster-carr…

Looking foward to seeing the final product BB, I imagine mine is gonna end up pretty similar.

Have you completed your build? Have you tried it yet? Some of those youtube comments made it seem like it doesn't work so well with cannabis.

Do you think just cooling one of the chambers is efficient, perhaps a vacuum thing like in the other DIY would be best?

I've read those comments too, people claiming to get dark oil.

I have a theory on that, I think its because the hot/cold method of moving the butane is more low pressure than blasting, so the butane moves thru the MJ slower giving it more time to soak up chlorophyll.

Over on the oil forum there are some folks that use a ac recovery pump to provide a higher pressure system, they are getting as high quality of oil as a can blast.

I'm wanting to try this non-pump style system tho, I think with a alcohol transfer solovent you could clean it up and make absolute…

Anyways, following this closely BB!

ha, sorry man, I'm just getting your logic behind yer topic split, sorry to be askin questions on the other thread about the stuff on this thread… but anywho, I've gotten started on collecting parts. I ended up getting 2 tanks instead of just the 1 that I paid for :smiley_joint:

I managed to get the tank gutted and the tank assembly on the first tank, just as you described. The ink-pen straw thing didnt work. I ended up using a piece of brass tubing out of this broken torch I had, I dremelled notches in both ends and then used a screw driver to get the stem out. Then I picked up some stuff from harbor freight to make the butane injection part (thats a airbrush adapter, butane tip fits in there PERFECTLY), then the PSI meter… I'm going to wait until I get a larger digital scale before I fill it up with butane tho.

Its going to be a slow process, kinda broke at the moment… but I'll post progress on this thread, if you dont mind.

Hey Rusty, please do post on this thread. Its all about the collective ideas here. Believe me, I do not have the market on ideas and often draw on others for inspiration.

Looking forward to seeing your stuff come together too...

cool cool

quick question for ya, did u d anything to get the clean the propane out of the tank? I'd rather not have any traces, and the tanks still smell like farts. I put some rubbing alcohol in one, now a little is stuck in there… now it just smells like rubbing alcohol and farts…

Nope Rusty I did not clean out the tank for this reason....

first run on ANY extractor, you should do a butane only run...no MJ at all.
This will flush out an oils, additives etc from all your components and deposit them into the evaporation area of the extractor. Then you simply evaporate off the butane and get rid of any impurities left over.

Actually the extractors are a great way to clean your butane when you first start. It really is suprising how much crap is in butane (yes even the 3 and 5x filtered stuff). I know lots of ppl say to spray butane on a glass mirror and look for anything after it is evaporated off..and that sounds good but remember, we are running 500 mls or more through an evaporator, not just a few shots on glass. So clean butane is extremely important.

great advice, thank ya