Tincture Questions

First of all, a big thanks to forums like this, GrassCity & ICMag. I found a ton of useful information, so thanks a bunch to you guys & gals who dedicate your time to keeping us informed. I'm a MMJ patient in Colorado (lucky me). I gave up smoking marijuana a while ago. However, I've found vaping is totally different and is an effective pain killer and far better for my back issues than opiates.
So I got a Magic Butter Machine to make tinctures for e-cigs. I have to say this thing rocks. It's everything it's advertised to be. I made a tincture a few days ago - 1oz of left over top shelf buds + 1 cup PG + 1 cup VG and pushed a couple buttons and checked in on it every so often and 8 hours later it had worked its magic. BTW, the MBM does a great job of containing the smell. As soon as the mixture cooled, I tried out my creation only to be disappointed in its strength. I thought I wasted a ton of good buds, but apparently the tincture gains a whole lot of strength after it sits 3-4 days. It got darker too. Currently the tincture is plenty strong if not too strong.

Is the increase in strength normal? It's already a little on the strong side, can I expect this to continue for much longer or will this taper off?

If it's too strong, can I just add some VG to dilute it? Should I reheat the mixture or just add it at room temp?

Can I just add Vanilla extract to hide the taste of the PG?

I also tried my hand at making VG tinctures with hash oil the old fashioned way. The hash oil was derived from double washing bubble hash with ethanol. Anyway, I mixed the hash oil with ethanol and cooked off a good portion of the alcohol and put that into my heated VG and mixed that up really good. The hash oil keeps separating in small amounts. I assume the separation is because I used too much hash oil.

Does that sound typical of going overboard with the hash oil?

Will the mixture continue to separate?

I plan to just scrape and scoop the the excess hash out of the separating tincture to salvage it for e-cig use. Is there a better way to get the hash oil out? Is there a way to get the hash oil to mix into the tincture by adding VG?

Jimi759 said:

Is the increase in strength normal? It's already a little on the strong side, can I expect this to continue for much longer or will this taper off?

If it's too strong, can I just add some VG to dilute it? Should I reheat the mixture or just add it at room temp?

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Are you asking if your tincture should be as strong as it is? I've little experience with vg/pg tinctures (Mainly use my abv with a 151 tincture or coconut oil) but most of the time, if i recall, people use just VG (Although since its for an ecig, the PG wont hurt it).

And yes, if its too powerful, you can add VG to dilute it- just make sure to shake it a lot and let it mix evenly over a day or two.

Typically, the longer your tincture sits and mixes with the heat in your MBM the better the actives bind to the VG/PG. Once filtered and finalized, i don't think it will gain more potency unless you continue to cook it in your MBM with more plant material.

The reason your hash keeps separating from your mixture is most likely because your mixture was "too loaded" with actives from your previous experiment- I'd scoop those bits out, dry em', and use them in a different tincture. So yes, you probably used too much oil in your tincture

The same thing happens when i over do a 151 tincture- if i add too much abv/qwiso oil/whatever to the tincture, it will have gooey solids appear because they cannot be further dissolved in the tincture.

Hope i was somewhat helpful!

Are you trying to make a tincture or a vape liquid? Two totally different things. The MBM is great for tincs and butter and such but VG tincs make really crappy vapes. Yes it can work but it doesn't work well. It can mix ok at low levels but will split in time. VG tinctures also gum up wicks really bad. Not ideal for vaping weed at all.

StheDubya said:

Are you trying to make a tincture or a vape liquid? Two totally different things. The MBM is great for tincs and butter and such but VG tincs make really crappy vapes. Yes it can work but it doesn't work well. It can mix ok at low levels but will split in time. VG tinctures also gum up wicks really bad. Not ideal for vaping weed at all.

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It's for vaping. PG tastes like arse IMHO. The MBM can do alcohol tincs as well, but can you vape alcohol? Also alcohol may not agree with me, my liver can't process alcohol properly. What should I be vaping with? I'd like to stick with e-cig style vaporizers. I'm looking for something discreet.

FWIW I could do without the big vapor clouds too....

There is a ton of good info around here and on the web about making concentrates with alcohol. If your new to the concept look up QWISO or QWET. You could make it with the MBM too and evap all the alcohol off. For vape liquids I highly recommend Puff Majic. Go to Puffmajicvape.com and look through their site. Its what I use daily. Killer product.

StheDubya said:

There is a ton of good info around here and on the web about making concentrates with alcohol. If your new to the concept look up QWISO or QWET. You could make it with the MBM too and evap all the alcohol off. For vape liquids I highly recommend Puff Majic. Go to Puffmajicvape.com and look through their site. Its what I use daily. Killer product.

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I've made alcohol concentrates, but they're way too thick to go thru an e-cig. I may give Puff Magic a try. Does Puff Magic give you big clouds, does have that PG taste?

I suggest the same...

Make yourself some thick hash oil with ethanol (Kleen Extract or 190 Proof Everclear)

Then mix throughly with the Puff-Magic Solution mentioned by @StheDubya while in the MBM.. This will make the juice and oil mix more uniformly and decarboxylate the solution at the same time.

I personally prefer a 50:50 ratio with PG:VG.

Good luck fellow Colorodan!

I was saying make alcohol concentrates then mix it with Puff Majic. Clouds aren't big or small, reasonable. If you use it out n about you wont be that guy saying "look at me everybody Im vaping". Taste is really good on the flavors I have used. I don't really get the synthetic vape taste like a lot of other stuff I tried in the past. Use a good small tank too like an Aspire K1 or Kanger Aerotank Mini. Some tanks wicks taste nasty but not those. The puff majic kits come with a K1 1.6

Thanks guys. I'm going to have to try some flavors to cover up the vg & pg. I'm not sure how the dispensaries are getting such a clean taste with their e-juices - tastes like bubble hash or a good wax. If I'm going to step up to the eGo size batteries/tanks, then I may just go with QWET and save myself some trouble.