If you have chemistry questions....

[azmmjadvocates]

got my hands on a RO filter and my issues from a few pages back have cleared up...turns out my well water has a shit ton of calcium in it and adding more (through CalNit) wasn't really working...

Cool Beans, do you have A RO system yet, or just juggen it? I still do both, I'm hoping to get another one here pretty soon that uses up most of the water going down the drain in the RO process.. My suggestion is to go to multiple water stations so people don't put 2 and 2 together that you have a grow.

 

[Old Peanut]

hey cool thread! ive a question for you.

What is the best way of preventing oxidation when storing buds? read a few methods and while some of them sound great theyre not practicle for small scale growers with limited bux to do. but still interested to hear your thoughts on it!!

 

[squiggly]

hey cool thread! ive a question for you.

What is the best way of preventing oxidation when storing buds? read a few methods and while some of them sound great theyre not practicle for small scale growers with limited bux to do. but still interested to hear your thoughts on it!!

Vacuum sealing would do the trick to some extent--but storing under nitrogen atmosphere would be the "chemists" standard.


If I was going to do it I'd build an apparatus as follows:


Glass jar (mason jar) lid modified with self-sealing injector ports (2 ports per lid, 1 in, 1 out):

http://www.mycopath.com/injector-port-strip-of-25-autoclavable-p-69.html


Rig a nitrogen delivery apparatus from a tank that leads from an air line to an appropriate needle. Insert needle into closed jar. Insert needle/tube to exit line to prevent pressure buildup and to allow the expulsion of oxygen.

Pump nitrogen through the jar and allow a minute for the levels to equilibrate. Flame dry the jar (bunsen burner).

Allow to cool. (still pumping nitrogen--only a very light flow is required).

Once cool open the cap (with nitrogen still flowing) and QUICKLY drop material to be stored into the jar). Close the jar tightly and allow nitrogen to flow for another minute.

Remove the exhaust line briefly before cutting the flow (to build slight positive pressure in the jar).

Voila--no oxidation (except that which will occur due to bound water).

Poor Man's Solution:
Get a nitrogen source--shit a bunch into a jar filled with material. Try to use the jet of the nitrogen initially to displace oxygen from the container--and use slower flow near the end of delivery to make sure to fill the container.

Think of filling a glass of water under high pressure vs low pressure--under higher pressure, some of the water will always be knocked off the top--such that there is space left in the glass. If you go slow and steady you can fill the glass to the rim. We want no space in the jar here because it will contain oxygen.

There are also oxygen absorber packets that work fairly well.

 

[azmmjadvocates]

hey cool thread! ive a question for you.

What is the best way of preventing oxidation when storing buds? read a few methods and while some of them sound great theyre not practicle for small scale growers with limited bux to do. but still interested to hear your thoughts on it!!

I vacume seal them in my canning jars, you can get a canning jar lid adapter through Cabellas in the vacume sealing section. get both sizes, you will use them both believe me.. Vaccume sealing is a good thing to do in curring as well, get a small thin Digital hydorometer from a cigar shop or online, you can insert it right in with the buds and get a precise reading one when to air them...

There is another thing I do that is controversial, I freeze my buds vaccumed still green after 2 days drying,,, write "curring, NOT Curred on the top of container and date.. Then after it's frozen, handle it gently open it and place 2 ice cubes on top of wax pater then reseal, quickly place back in freezer..

Now you don't have to hand out all your overages.. When you need to finish curing, take out the ice, place jar upside down on a paper towel allow to thaw without knocking off any tricombs.. Take out , air, then re jar, air , rejar ect until curred..

Now ask youself if you happened to get raided if any of that curing bud could possibly be stated it was "usable and dry" NOPE it will be moldy, moldy, moldy by the time court comes and you get to examine it...

BTW,, I guarantee you this is the first board or book that has said that. : )

 

[azmmjadvocates]

LOL oh dammm you Squiggly lol I forgot to mention as well the vacume aparatus I use on those mayson jar sealer lids from cabellas, I get at wally world, it's in the vaccume bag section and it just fits over the hole on the canning lid adapter and you push a button and it sucks all the oxygen out and pops the canning seal.. That way you don't have to buy a real expensive vacuum packaging system,, BTW I wouldn't recommend the bags or they will crush your buds..

I thought about those iron packets but that would give a taste transfer I think, not to mention heavy metal. It's not an issue with eating food but smoking it, don't think I'd take the chance.. what do you think squiggly?

 

[azmmjadvocates]

LMAO,, Sqiggly wrote: "shit a bunch into a jar filled with material" Tommy chong doggy pooper scooper bud/shit extraction process, "dog ate my stash, little fucker LMFAO You meant shoot? Awww crap you know what I mean lol..

Sorry, meds are kicking in.. : )

 

[Prince Blanc]

There must be an easier way than with nitrogen? Where does one even get nitrogen gas from? Vacuum sealing seems like the logical solution to me, though TBH I simply store in jars with their lids sealed tightly. I must admit that after some time the buds do begin to lose color and become brittle...

 

[squiggly]

Most "at home" vacuum sealers do not pull a strong enough vacuum to prevent all oxidation--they are not intended for this purpose generally.

 

[pork]

Was this the problem with precipitation of salts?

I knew that calcium was to blame--its one of the most likely culprits any time you're getting precipitation (as not many calcium salts are soluble).

yup this was it. i figured it had something to do with crappy well water, as just about every other variable in my system is controllable...

 

[Seamaiden]

Then your intuition is off. I bit off WAAAAAAY more than I can chew this semester. Learned a lesson though.

My son does that on a regular basis. It can get expensive. ;)

 

[pork]

ok, so here's a good chemistry question:

when determining ppm of P and K in P2O5 and K2O we have to take into consideration the respective molar masses of the elements and thus have conversion factors of .4364 and .83 (close enough) to get out actual ppm of P and K in solution.

for CaNO3 it seems that the calculations people are using don't have a similar factor taken into consideration. this also extends to microelement sources, which leads to my question.

something like Jack's MOST that has 7.5% listed Fe, but in the form of Iron Sulfate. Is 1 g/L still going to be 75 ppm Fe? Or would it be 36.7% of that due to Iron only contributing that much to Iron Sulfate? (I'm not using 75 ppm Fe btw, just easier on the math for the purpose of my point)

By extension, would that mean my N, Ca, and micro numbers are all different that what I thought?


Any thoughts on Jacks Pro Chelated Trace Elements? I'm not sure if I really like the MOST..

 

[cctt]

When I pour some tap water and watch its pH, over time it becomes more alkaline. Is it due to gasses evaporating or dissolving to or from the nearby air? This happens even after using a carbon filter to remove chlorine.

 

[squiggly]

ok, so here's a good chemistry question:

when determining ppm of P and K in P2O5 and K2O we have to take into consideration the respective molar masses of the elements and thus have conversion factors of .4364 and .83 (close enough) to get out actual ppm of P and K in solution.

for CaNO3 it seems that the calculations people are using don't have a similar factor taken into consideration. this also extends to microelement sources, which leads to my question.

something like Jack's MOST that has 7.5% listed Fe, but in the form of Iron Sulfate. Is 1 g/L still going to be 75 ppm Fe? Or would it be 36.7% of that due to Iron only contributing that much to Iron Sulfate? (I'm not using 75 ppm Fe btw, just easier on the math for the purpose of my point)

By extension, would that mean my N, Ca, and micro numbers are all different that what I thought?


Any thoughts on Jacks Pro Chelated Trace Elements? I'm not sure if I really like the MOST..

K so, first an foremost--I hate ppms, I'm not an environmental chemist and I grow in organic soil--so I never have to use them, I can help here though. The calculations go as follows:

1ppm = 1 gram per liter

So taking iron sulfate as an example

The formula weight (mol. wt) of iron sulfate is 151.908 g/mol (if its annhydrous, it probably isn't--you should find out which form is in the stuff for a better answer--monohydrate/heptahydrate.

Moving on, we then find the atomic mass of iron is 55.845.

So the formula is 1g of Iron in relation to the compound = FW/AM

151.908/55.845 so 2.72g per ppm iron.


So then we can come back to your percentage.

7.5% of 1 gram is 0.075g.

2.72g/1ppm = 0.075g/x (i always think of this as a ratio comparison "2.72g is to 1 ppm as 0.075 is to x ppm" and just solve for x).

x=0.075/2.72

x= 0.0275g ~ 28ppm.

All of this math makes it plain why chemists generally use molarity instead. It's much quicker. Find how many moles (1mole = 6.022x10^23 molecules) you've got--and divide it by how many liters of solvent you've got. For species that ionize and dissolve, you will create a mixture that is the same molarity (or at least a predictable molarity) in each ion--because they connect to each other in a well-defined fashion (1:1, 2:1, etc).

So if you make up 1M NaCl you really have 1M Na+ and 1M Cl- because you're relying on the number of molecules versus an arbitrary assignment of 0.001g as "1 part per million".

You do as much work to find the ppm as we do to calculate the number of molecules--and then some. The conversion factor is given to us in the formula (55.8 grams/mol), and looking it up is the hardest part. From there we know to make a 3M solution we just take 55.8g x 3 and bring the volume to 1L.

It's just laziness ultimately that makes me hate ppms--but its also that I've got zero personal use for them, they are certainly a useful measure (especially in biology--that's just not my side of things).

 

[squiggly]

When I pour some tap water and watch its pH, over time it becomes more alkaline. Is it due to gasses evaporating or dissolving to or from the nearby air? This happens even after using a carbon filter to remove chlorine.

There is likely a small effect from the dissolution/evaporation of various gases yes. What kind of a change are you noticing?

Did you equilibrate the pH probe before taking your initial reading?


What you're seeing here is that pH is dependent on a SLEW of factors--because really what it's talking about is not only how many hydrogen ions there are, but how active they are.

pH is known as "hydrogen potential" for this reason.

Any change whatsoever not only can, but will, affect pH. Temperature, solutes, etc. Anything that is in the water, or is a physical property of the water itself (temp, pressure) will affect pH.

 

[Do Be]

1ppm = 1 MILLIgram per liter

fixed that for ya.

But you got it right here.

So if you make up 1M NaCl you really have 1M Na+ and 1M Cl- because you're relying on the number of molecules versus an arbitrary assignment of 0.001g as "1 part per million".

:D

 

[squiggly]

fixed that for ya.

But you got it right here.



:D

Yup, exactly--again this is my chemistry training betraying itself. I'm accustomed to writing "g" after everything and just using scientific notation. So to me a mL is just 1x10-3 L. I only really get into calling something a milligram or milliliter in the write-up, not during calcs.

 

[pork]

so basically, yes..

so dankworth, me, and i imagine many others thinking that we are hitting 120 ppm w/ .774 g/L of CalNit (15.5-0-0-19) are really only achieving the small percentage of Nitrate in the double salt form of calcium nitrate (can't seem to find/too lazy to calculate molar mass of that huge molecule)?

 

[squiggly]

so basically, yes..

so dankworth, me, and i imagine many others thinking that we are hitting 120 ppm w/ .774 g/L of CalNit (15.5-0-0-19) are really only achieving the small percentage of Nitrate in the double salt form of calcium nitrate (can't seem to find/too lazy to calculate molar mass of that huge molecule)?

N = 14
O = 16

2 (1N + 3O )
2 (12 + 3(16) )
2 (12+48)
2 (60)

~120 g/mol

Annhydrous cal-nit is 164.88 g/mol or 235.15 for tetrahydrate--again it is important to find out from the company whether these salts are hydrated and HOW they are hydrated (i.e. get your molecular weights for the minerals FROM THE SUPPLIER).



Have at it.

 

[pork]

i thought the double salt version of calcium nitrate was: 5Ca(NO3)2.NH4NO3.10H2O

 

[pork]

i think i might be overthinking all of this with regards to N and Ca in CalciNit...could it be that the 15.5 % on the label refers to how much nitrate is going to be available in regards to the whole solution (taking into consideration the big molecule)? and im getting confused because the P-K ratios on bags are for P2O5 and K2O, and we convert those because the plant just eats the P and K out of there? where as it eats the whole NO3?

i hope that isn't too confusing...and i really appreciate you coming in here during finals week..i know what the stresses of a science education can be like (bs physics)...