NOTE: This is not meant to be a complete set of instructions or a recipe to be followed. These are simply the words written out, presented for clarity and discussion.
* -What kind of music do you like to listen to while you're cooking?
- Umm... Rachmininoff .......ahah. *
1) North American Sassifras Albidum oil is distilled under vacuum to isolate safrole from other phenylpropenes and terpenoids.
"Potassium hydroxide, that's the catalyst".
2) Potassium hydroxide is added to 6.3 molar equivalents of safrole and heated under vacuum to drive off water.
"This is when the magic starts to happen. It will suddenly turn blue then brown then black."
3) Hydroxide ions abstract the benzylic proton by isomerizing the safrole to the thermodynamically favorable internal alkene isosafrole
"It foams up alot."
4) The crude isosafrole is distilled under vacuum.
"Here's your gorgeous schedule I precursor."
5) Formic acid is dissolved in 3 molar equivalents of %35 hydrogen peroxide and stirred in an ice bath for an hour to produce performic acid.
6) The distilled isosafrole is dissolved in sodium bicarbonate buffer with DCM and placed in a salted ice bath.
7) An approximate 4.5 molar excess of crude performic acid is poured down a liebig condenser over a period of 15 minutes with vigorous magnetic stirring resulting in the evolution of carbon dioxide gas and a yellow color change.
8) A crude mixture of aqueous acids and oxidation products primarily consisting of the isosafrole epoxide, the isosafrole glycol, and the glycols monoformate ester, is transferred into a sep funnel and an emulsion is broken using a vibrating dilding apparatus.
"Gotta find just the right spot ... 8====D bzzzzzzzzz!"
9) The mixed isosafrole oxidation products are dissolved in methanol, heated to 70c and treated with an approximate 3.8 molar excess of %15 hydrochloric acid, which hydrolyzes the isosafrole glycol monoformate ester, opens the isosafrole epoxide and initiates a pinnacle rearrangement on the resulting isosafrole glycol. After 2 minutes, brown droplets of MDP2p oil begin to rise and fall from the surface of the reaction mixture in a convection current. The crude MDP2p is purified by vacuum distillation.
10) Sheets of aluminum foil are shredded, followed by grinding in a food processor.
"The finer it is, the faster it reacts with the mercury forming the amalgam."
11) The finely ground aluminum is placed in a 5 gallon HDPE bucket and suspended in methanol with stirring from an improvised overhead stirrer made from a power drill.
12) Mercuric II Chloride is dissolved in methanol and introduced to the suspension to amalgamate the aluminum.
13) Nitromethane is added to the stirring amalgam followed by MDP2p. The nitromethane is reduced, producing methylamine in situ, which condenses with the ketone, forming an imine, which is reduced again.
* Very exothermic *
14) The reduction mixture is treated with aqueous sodium hydroxide to liberate the MDMA freebase.
15) The freebase product is extracted THREE times with xylene.
" That is going to have to sit for just a few minutes while it seperates. You have to extract it 3 times. Wash it 3 times with hydroxide. Wash it 3 times with distilled water. Each time you repeat this it gets cleaner and cleaner."
" When we're done washing and extracting, this [Mg2SO4] is what we use to make sure that we don't lose product and everything precipitates out with no trouble whatsoever.
16) The cooled organic layers are dried with anhydrous magnesium sulfate.
17) Hydrogen chloride gas is generated by dripping hydrochloric acid over sulfuric acid. The hydrogen chloride gas is bubbled into the xylene solution of MDMA freebase and crystals of the hydrochloride precipitate out of solution.
18) The MDMA hydrochloride slurry is poured into an improvised buchner funnel and dried under vacuum then washed with chilled anhydrous acetone from a spray bottle.
19) The hydrochloride salt is dissolved in heated isopropanol to form a saturated solution then allowed to crystallize overnight.
20) Finally, residual isopropanol is stripped under vacuum and VOILA!
Sometimes, things are mentioned and fall between the cracks. They are written between the lines and go unnoticed and forgotten. There are many ways to get to the same conclusion. Perhaps there is some knowledge or information contained here that can help connect some of the pieces that might be missing for you. Again, this is not meant to be a complete set of instructions or a recipe to be followed, rather a rough outline of the procedure to be studied and discussed. There might be alternate or better ways to do something, however, I want to focus on using easily obtained materials and ingredients that can be bought at stores locally, or on ebay/amazon. Preferrably we will focus on what can be had with cash in person. The yield, quality, expenses etc. are made to be an after thought - the main priority is accessibility/stealth and not leaving any footprints, so to speak.
I am planning to be attempting this, as best I can to whatever extent, strictly using materials obtained easily/locally. As always, anybody with any ideas, suggestions, corrections etc. to add/discuss, please share!
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