Question pseudo hypo method issues

[life110atatime]

recently got my hands on some pseudo raw. alot of things were off with the cook. 1st during reduction via hypo method. 400g raw pseudo mixed with 440ml hypo in vessel. adding 390g iodine reaction was very slow during first few drops of iodine had to stir to react. anyway eventually reacted and proceeded to burn off but it held fine powder on the bottom of vessel thew whole reaction and wouldnt dissolve. when complete i went to steam distill but when adding caustic it was hitting the liqued and completely evaporating. i had to throw that much caustic in to get the oil up and steam. anyway i steamed over and got a 45% yield. ive used these chems before and know they are good. im sure someone with more knowledge can inform me on this