Just did my first run... nothing but clear 'tane in the pan

Hey guys, I'm feeling like I just threw an ounce of nice herb in the trash because I don't know what I did wrong. I've watched numerous videos and read many guides, and just got a new honeybee extractor. I just put about 3/4 to an ounce of nug in the extractor and ran a can of colibri through it.

What came out, was perfectly clear butane.

I'm thinking I may not have packed it in hard enough, or maybe that more than one can of 'tane is required for a proper extraction... either way, is all of this herb ruined? I'm really hoping one of you oil guys will be able to tell me what I did wrong and that I can still salvage this bud.

Continue with the run...purge, etc...There's probably oil there. A lot of the time, if done right with certain strains, you don't see much color until you scrape.

If you didn't get any oil, or very little, the bud is still fine, and probably has the goodies in it. If that's the case, you probably didn't pack enough/tight enough. I pack as tight as possible, with hold nugs.

Let us know what's up!

Edit* shouldn't need more than a can.

Thanks for the reply, looking at the bud it seems that most of the tricromes are still on the bud and it still looks like decent bud. I'll try again tonight with a tighter pack because I didn't have it very tightly packed in the first place.

I'm sure more factors are involved, but could it be the honeybee to some extend perhaps? I bought one too, but it just didn't look real effective in terms of shape & size (so wide) so I never used it and picked up a STB instead myself.

Good luck anyways, I hope you can still salvage some of your product.

My friend has a honey bee, our runs come out the same...So, I don't think so. I use a SSTB, and get ~20% return.

Also, expect the trichomes to remain on the bud, even after all of the cannabinoids have been extracted. The shiny trichomes themselves aren't the cannabinoids, rather the cannabinoids are within the trichome. If you make your oil right, you will get out all of the good stuff, and leave behind buds that look nearly identical to what you started with.

hey guys im reading this thread and a question came to mind sorry dont mean to change the subject. but hope you dont mind me asking.
if the bud stilll looks relatively the same after doing your run, could it be possible for someone to get ripped off and sold the {used buds} would they be smokeable? would it be easy to tell something wasent right?

ding ding ding. think back to that time you bought (street) weed that looked and smelled good but didn't get you high. at the time you didn't notice that it didn't make your fingers sticky.

i would worry about this stuff getting sprayed with synthetics and resold.

down with black market meds

yes thats why i asked. i once got a nice big bag it looked great but there was something not quite right about it. i still smoked it but it was really week compared to how it looked. would there be any danger to smoking something like this.

I would hypothesize that perhaps an ounce isn't enough for the honeybee you have? arn't there different sized ones? I think that the honeybee is not really the best of designs for running BHO... Agreeing with those above a Stainless Steel Turkey Baster would do you much better...

Purpl3_Haz3, do you know how much your friend typically packs into his honeybee?

OhTheAgony, how much do you pack in your SSTB?

I pack 10 to 15 grams into my SSTB and use around a half a can more or less...(Lucienne ATM) i find that 10 is kinda the magic # for this particular SSTB, but one can assume that not every SSTB may or my not hold about the same amount and that makes it all the more difficult to pinpoint an issue...
The strain can also play a roll as well. 10g of THC Bomb will yield 2 grams 1 run. while this Grapefruit I ran only gave me 1.6 one run... but i ran 14g of that. so was it the pack, or the strain?
I think the answer was both actually... In my case anyway, im referring to an SSTB, but the honeybee is similar so i hope it helped

I don't know how much he packs, but I know he packs until he CANNOT pack anymore. Solid nugs, stuffffffffed.

My yield doubled, maybe slightly less than double, when I went from loose to tight pack. First few runs in my SSTB, I packed a quarter OZ, maybe less. Now, as little as a quarter, with some strains, and up to a half OZ. It makes a difference. Loose pack = butane goes around most of the bud, getting cannabinoids from what it touches/permeates. Tight pack = butane forced to go THROUGH the buds, permeating all of it.

I have no idea to be honest. So far I've only done a couple of ABV-test runs myself, & one with stems & some trim to add some flavour to the ABV oil. I just stuffed it until it was full without weighing anything, sorry.

I'm pretty sure my SSTB can't hold 10 grams of fresh bud though, so those probably come in different sizes. Not to sure about that on the honeybee though, as far as I know there's only one size for those.

there's two honeybee extractors, the new one called queen bee extractor...

I used honeybee extractor several times with good succes. Cannot tell percentage of finished product, i also only use the trims and small buds...

will try the new and bigger queen bee extractor in few weeks, together with my new vacuum chamber

dunno what went wrong with the extraction from centizen though...

Hey cool, I didn't know that. Being the visual person I am:



I think they took a good look at their main competitor; the SSTB

Will the next one be made of SS perhaps?

That thing is not for small runs lmao. What is it like 100g chamber?

im finding the candle warmers uses left and right and i just got it last night. Only 5 bucks.
i intend to use it instead of a pan of water on my next run in a couple weeks. I bet this is gonna rock with my SS banemarie!

Well, I went out and bought a SSTB and that worked a hell of alot better. I also added my ABV which was at about an ounce of well vaped herb and got about .7 - 1 gram of dark oil out of it. I've been purging it and tried a bit and wasen't too impressed by the taste; but it got me very medicated and will work in a pinch. I've become to used to using dabs in the early morning to soothe myself back to sleep from nausea and can't even think about what would happen if I ran out.

Abv dabs taste like swill... Always! IMO

The full nug dabs are the bees knees and now that u got a SSTB ur all set really.

Thaught i would let you guys know I did the first runs with my queen bee and it definately gives me a higher yield. Doing two tube of butane for every queen bee filled.

whereas before I would get about 1/4g for one tube of butane I am now getting 1,2g...same material as before, although it is slighty better selected.

gonna pick up my new vacuum pump now and do some purging this afternoon :-)

ps total yield for now, and still 1/3th of material to go, 36g of nice golden brown sticky stuff

I know that this is a fairly late update; but I'd like to leave some more information for anyone who comes along the same issue that I did and needs help.

I've switched over to using a SSTB like most around here but I don't think that it was my honeybee the first time around that was at fault for my bad run. It probably worked fine; but I was expecting to see at least a little tinge in the liquid like when I was making QWISO. When I didn't I shat bricks and that was the wrong thing to do. Yesterday I did two successful runs and they both were clear in the pan as well. However, once it all evaporates you can tell there is indeed quite a bit of good stuff in there. I am quite pleased with the outcomes; two very tasty and creamy strains of oil with a taffy like consistency for me to dab in the coming weeks.

To those who may have been put off by my bad experience; don't be; this stuff is wonderful.

the taffy is probably water getting in there one way or the other. Does not do anything to potency in my experience, just makes the shelf life a lot shorter. Trick for me to avoid this has been to do smaller runs...

Well; I made it outside while it was snowing so that would explain the texture it took to.

I'm not too worried about shelf life since they are small runs and probably won't even last two weeks; but it's good to know from the future. Although now that taffy consistency has turned more into a hard Macintosh Toffee type thing. Almost like shatter.

Just a note CentiZen (since you mentioned snow), be very careful of spraying in the winter outside... the air dryness can easily lead to an unexpected static spark (clothing) and thats the last thing you want to risk happening (BTDT).