I have a large amount of Ephedra plants. What is the simplest way to extract ephedrine from them?
Question I have a large amount of Ephedra plants. What is the simplest way to extract ephedrine from them?
- Thread starter AKINCI
- Start date
- By AKINCI
I know the article. I tried it in my home garage using isopropanol, but it didn't work. Or do I also need to add gas? I ground dried Ephedra into a powder and used isopropanol directly. I heated it to 30-35°C and let it sit for a day. It turned into a bright green liquid, but I couldn't progress further. Thank you for your response.
I have never made it but i think you have to filtrate your liquid and after that to distill the isopropanol and after that acidify the extract of your plants with HCI .
- By AKINCI
I don't know anything about acidifying with HCl. Can you help me with this? Is hydrochloric acid the same as "tuz ruhu"? How can I acidify with HCl?
You can do a solvent extraction - acid/base. Or you can do a steam distillation, if possible, it will give better results if done properly. Patton made a thread about extracting Ma Huang herb.
bbgate.com
Ephedrine extraction from plants
Introduction Ephedrine was found in the Chinese "Ma-huang" or Ephedra sinica Stapf plant, made from various species of ephedra, by Nagai in 1887. It has two chiral centers so that four configurationally isomeric ephedrines exist. The two naturally occurring ephedrines differ in the configuration...
bbgate.com
I have a similar quest, a decent quantity of premium Ephedra strain, very mature and rich in Ephedrine...
i've made many posts/documents in the past about this one. My recent attempt could be considered a
refined success....so here it is:
EPHEDRA SHRUB X-TRACTION /
CHEAP IN RESOURCES & HI YIELD
I have dried several varieties of Ephedra twigs at different stages of maturity.
I did this by placing them in cardboard boxes with silica gel packs
and allowing them to dry for a year.
During this time, I selected the most promising parts and cut
them with scissors into 1cm pieces. to ferment them further.
After trying out various blenders and coffee grinders,
finally acquired a high-quality multi-purpose kitchen grinder - 200W.
packed multiple loads of 40g at a time and ground them to a fine powder.
transferred the powder to a baking plate coated with Teflon.
After grinding approximately 300g of Ephedra,
placed the powder holding plate
on my laboratory hotplate and heated it to 150°C.
[ This process was similar to roasting coffee beans, but it required careful attention
to avoid burning the material. I constantly stirred the material with a spatula. ]
The result was a dry, yellow powdered substance.
i brought it over in to a 1L Beaker and covered it with WATER and 25% Acetic
Acid ( 500ml H2O + 100ml Acetic-Acid + 20ml EtOH+ 20ml 1-Propanol + 20ml IPA )
this was then stirred with a FAT egg-form Stirbar a few hours, without heating.
I added about 150-200 ml of non-polar hydrocarbons to the top of the mixture,
using a 1:1 mix of mineral turpentine and naphta.
This mixture was stirred for several hours to extract all the plant oil and chlorophyll.
Surprisingly, the non-polar phase separated well without any emulsions.
I separated it using syringes and pipettes.
The remaining mixture was stirred overnight, and at the end,
I let it stand still and took apart about 1/3 of the content, to process it .
Because, I was lucky and found some strainers and sieves
for free in a box on the sidewalk,
i am gifted in separating plants from liquid
with a smart and precise 3 step method....
One of the strainers was a steel net tea sieve, which allowed me to catch the larger particles.
I squeezed them out using a pestle from a mortar- while still in the sieve.
After that, I could use a very fine kitchen sieve with a rubber-like ultra-fine net,
again squeezing the remains. Finally, I forced my opaque, dark brown liquid solution
through a fine coffee filter.
Now I had a red or dark brown but clear solution with a pH of 4-5.
To this, I added 20 grams of fine active carbon and a
large amount of NaOH flakes. I oversaturated it heavily.
Then I used a mix of C8-C26 petroleum lamp oil, C7-C13 barbecue lighter fluid, and xylene,
adding approximately 200 ml in three portions (all this happened in a 1-liter beaker).
I stirred the mixture for a few minutes each time and collected the intense yellow-
coloured non-polar extractions in a 2-liter round-bottom flask (RBF).
To this ephedra alkaloid-base-containing hydrocarbon mix, I added about 120 ml of water.
While stirring, I added 15% HCl until the water layer became acidic (pH=4.5).
The phases separated. I vaped the aqueous layer down in a large pyrex dish,
blowing a fan over the surface area. At the end, there was a fine-quality crystalline mass left,
which I rinsed generously with dry acetone, using a technical grade.
THE YIELD WAS ~3g WHITE CRYSTALS derived from ca.
~100g of the former roasted powder, with water/Acid extraction.
The remaining portion of my acidic plant material solution was stored in a larger
container, which I occasionally shook.
This process is inexpensive and relatively effortless, I must emphasize
that I undertook this task as a side project, without any pressure.
As I write this, I am consuming the crystals,
which I have spiked with a small amount of meth.
I 've got pseudoephedrine for the purpose of synthezising Methamphetamine....
which is why decided to use the plant derived ephedrine as it is...
And boy, it is a truly satisfying substance on its own...
i've made many posts/documents in the past about this one. My recent attempt could be considered a
refined success....so here it is:
EPHEDRA SHRUB X-TRACTION /
CHEAP IN RESOURCES & HI YIELD
I have dried several varieties of Ephedra twigs at different stages of maturity.
I did this by placing them in cardboard boxes with silica gel packs
and allowing them to dry for a year.
During this time, I selected the most promising parts and cut
them with scissors into 1cm pieces. to ferment them further.
After trying out various blenders and coffee grinders,
finally acquired a high-quality multi-purpose kitchen grinder - 200W.
packed multiple loads of 40g at a time and ground them to a fine powder.
transferred the powder to a baking plate coated with Teflon.
After grinding approximately 300g of Ephedra,
placed the powder holding plate
on my laboratory hotplate and heated it to 150°C.
[ This process was similar to roasting coffee beans, but it required careful attention
to avoid burning the material. I constantly stirred the material with a spatula. ]
The result was a dry, yellow powdered substance.
i brought it over in to a 1L Beaker and covered it with WATER and 25% Acetic
Acid ( 500ml H2O + 100ml Acetic-Acid + 20ml EtOH+ 20ml 1-Propanol + 20ml IPA )
this was then stirred with a FAT egg-form Stirbar a few hours, without heating.
I added about 150-200 ml of non-polar hydrocarbons to the top of the mixture,
using a 1:1 mix of mineral turpentine and naphta.
This mixture was stirred for several hours to extract all the plant oil and chlorophyll.
Surprisingly, the non-polar phase separated well without any emulsions.
I separated it using syringes and pipettes.
The remaining mixture was stirred overnight, and at the end,
I let it stand still and took apart about 1/3 of the content, to process it .
Because, I was lucky and found some strainers and sieves
for free in a box on the sidewalk,
i am gifted in separating plants from liquid
with a smart and precise 3 step method....
One of the strainers was a steel net tea sieve, which allowed me to catch the larger particles.
I squeezed them out using a pestle from a mortar- while still in the sieve.
After that, I could use a very fine kitchen sieve with a rubber-like ultra-fine net,
again squeezing the remains. Finally, I forced my opaque, dark brown liquid solution
through a fine coffee filter.
Now I had a red or dark brown but clear solution with a pH of 4-5.
To this, I added 20 grams of fine active carbon and a
large amount of NaOH flakes. I oversaturated it heavily.
Then I used a mix of C8-C26 petroleum lamp oil, C7-C13 barbecue lighter fluid, and xylene,
adding approximately 200 ml in three portions (all this happened in a 1-liter beaker).
I stirred the mixture for a few minutes each time and collected the intense yellow-
coloured non-polar extractions in a 2-liter round-bottom flask (RBF).
To this ephedra alkaloid-base-containing hydrocarbon mix, I added about 120 ml of water.
While stirring, I added 15% HCl until the water layer became acidic (pH=4.5).
The phases separated. I vaped the aqueous layer down in a large pyrex dish,
blowing a fan over the surface area. At the end, there was a fine-quality crystalline mass left,
which I rinsed generously with dry acetone, using a technical grade.
THE YIELD WAS ~3g WHITE CRYSTALS derived from ca.
~100g of the former roasted powder, with water/Acid extraction.
The remaining portion of my acidic plant material solution was stored in a larger
container, which I occasionally shook.
This process is inexpensive and relatively effortless, I must emphasize
that I undertook this task as a side project, without any pressure.
As I write this, I am consuming the crystals,
which I have spiked with a small amount of meth.
I 've got pseudoephedrine for the purpose of synthezising Methamphetamine....
which is why decided to use the plant derived ephedrine as it is...
And boy, it is a truly satisfying substance on its own...
- By AKINCI
"Thank you very much for your attention and response."
Very welcome....
*EDIT:
i again repeated the Water / Acetic-Acid
extraction . this time i additionally
processed the solution with the suspended plant matter
with a common kitchen hand-blender (for soups etc.)
to further break down the plant-tissue....(after the non-polar clorophyll /oil removal )
filtered -> gave NaOH flakes DIRECTLY in to filtrate-solution (the exothermic release of heat aids the transfer of the freebase alkaloids...)<- OVERSATURATE
and extracted as mentioned before with a clever combined mixture of petroleum destillates.
the outcome was phenomenal
( i can now estimate my ephedra strain
is about 40mg /g )
*EDIT:
i again repeated the Water / Acetic-Acid
extraction . this time i additionally
processed the solution with the suspended plant matter
with a common kitchen hand-blender (for soups etc.)
to further break down the plant-tissue....(after the non-polar clorophyll /oil removal )
filtered -> gave NaOH flakes DIRECTLY in to filtrate-solution (the exothermic release of heat aids the transfer of the freebase alkaloids...)<- OVERSATURATE
and extracted as mentioned before with a clever combined mixture of petroleum destillates.
the outcome was phenomenal
( i can now estimate my ephedra strain
is about 40mg /g )