Vacuum curing/ myth or mystery??

[mephisto]

Hey now, just wanted to absorb some input from like minded members. When our favorite herb reaches the end of its life, we want it to slowly release its moisture and allow the goodness to reach peak psychoactivity.
Sometimes its hard to follow that tried and true curing method of the soft-snap. Sometimes I have problems with excess moisture. My question/statement is the premise of vacuum curing. The extract wizards all employ heavy vac to expel solvents. Will the introduction of a low (water) boiling point allow a faster or more thorough cure .
Simply put, I do not want to wait the next 6 weeks as my new friends say goodbye to mr. h20 and hello to my grinder. I intend to place my goods in a suitable vessel, pull that atmosphere down to 1000-500 microns. By doing this, I expect to boil off a considerable amount of water. As I understand the curing process, its the aging, drying that bring out the best qualities of the breed. The biggest concern is the risk of imploding all the trichs as the atmosphere collapses. Any takers on this vape induced conundrum???

I have had very good success with freeze curing, thanks to OF and the others who shared experience with freeze drying. I intend to open that question up for more info if possible

 

[t-dub]

I only get meds once/year so I use a Food Saver and vacuum pack my stash with O2 absorbers. These meds are already properly cured however. The vacuum seems to create a stasis of sorts. When I'm ready I pop the meds out of vacuum and put into mason jars/cvaults with 62% Boveda packs. This reanimates the medicine to a certain degree making it ready for vaping, however the clock starts ticking again.

Curing and decarbing not only removes water but also carbon dioxide, which is necessary for THCA to convert to THC.

Decarboxylation is a chemical reaction that releases carbon dioxide (CO2). This means a chemical reaction takes place in which carboxylic acids loose a carbon atom from a carbon chain. This process converts THCA to THC, the much loved compound with many medicinal and psychoactive effects. When the cannabis drys, it very very slowly begins to decarboxylate and converts THCA to THC.

The good news is we don’t have to wait years for cannabis to decarboxylate. We can speed things along with a process that is a lot simpler than you might expect. Simply heating dried cannabis to the correct temperature for enough time releases that carbon dioxide and creates THC.

I know this doesn't exactly address your question of flash curing with hardly any atmosphere, but its a start. Not a lot of folks use vacuum on flowers is the feeling I get.

http://www.marijuanagrowershq.com/decarboxylating-cannabis-turning-thca-into-thc/

 

[mephisto]

Thanks for the input t-dub. I could/am be impatient expecting the conversion to happen "on demand" as presented. My thoughts also carry over to vac purging qwet and qwiso runs to quickly rid the extract of residual water. But I digress.....

...perhaps if the initial vac purge does not render the product inert/unusable, the decarb will be covered by the vaporizer. This process may cause the harshness that I associated with freeze drying. I believe the quick freeze locks up the chlorophyll and allows the loud "green" presence when prepared and vaped. Sorry, double digression....

 

[Puffers]

Hey Mephisto.
Great topic, I love canna- ! I wish I had an answer but I have never ever heard of vac-curing flowers. However I don't think imploding the trichomes is really a risk at the vac levels your discussing. Remember trichomes are primarily a waxy shell that holds the psychoactive essential oils. We both know how stable oils and wax hold up under deep vac in sub 500 micron ranges. While a natural part of curing is allowing some decarb to occur its not the primary objective, the flowers even after a proper cure will still contain much more thc-a to thc. This is readily evident if you look at some test results. That said I do get different and less satisfactory results with under cured product then herb that's given a proper cure time.

I would try it on a small batch and see how it works out. You may find that it's something that can rapidly accelerate the final slow part of the curing to help you get rid of all moisture and chlorophyll but is not suitable for the first week or two after the girls get the chop.

Puff

 

[mephisto]

Great points all! thanks for sharing. I am going to give this a try and I will report my findings....