Concentrates: what's the Diff?

[Squiby]

My experience with concentrates is limited to hash, shatter, crumble and wax. but what is the difference between these other than physical appearance and texture? For me, crumble or wax is easier to consume than shatter. But what are they? Are some safer or purer than others? Are some of these the same thing with different names?

I see all kinds of concentrate labels; shatter, wax, crumble, cake batter, rosin, sap, live sap, pho, bho/pho.

But in terms of pureness or lack of contaminants what's the difference between them?

Is there a quick and dirty description available somewhere to compare these concentrates that will help a person make an informed purchase?

 

[justcametomind]

Do a search on the leafly website. That's pretty much it. I also see the names as labels, what I'm interested in is the technique of extraction. Solventless tech considered as the the better (CO2 and more). Butane leaves a residue. Leafly is your best friend.

 

[Squiby]

Do a search on the leafly website.

Thanks. I use Leafly all the time for strain info but I didn't think to see if they have a concentrate 101 article.

Off to Leafly it is.....

 

[hippy tribe]

In my experience prime shatter is top of the list, not including distillates with it's terpenes reintroduced.

winterized shatter is the most potent close in line with winterized c02 oil. i think very clean unwinterized shatter and c02 can be slightly less potent but overall a better experienced in regard to taste and high.

 

[Farid]

Shatter, budder, wax, are all just different ways of describing consistency of the product. You can have shatter that has much lower THC % than wax, so I would not assume that one is more potent than the other. The shatter available at Boston's most popular dispensary looks amazing, but it is made from trim, and is not too potent or tasty. I make shatter that doesn't always shatter up as nice as theirs, but it gives much stronger effects.

Rosin is hash that has been extracted using pressure and heat, so it is also solventless.

Sap describes the consistency I believe. Live sap is the same thing as live resin I assume, but with a saplike constancy?

bho is hash extracted with butane.

pho is Vietnamese beef broth vegetable soup. My parents are crazy about it.

 

[Vape Donkey 650]

Them viets are infusing propane hash oil into theirs soups? no wonder its so good

Might explain that thick consistency in the broth too

Good summary, farid.

And for the original question, squiby, look up live resin (also htfsce, live nectar, sap, etc)

Thats the newest, best stuff goin in the world of concentrates today.

 

[Squiby]

pho is Vietnamese beef broth vegetable soup. My parents are crazy about it.

Them viets are infusing propane hash oil into theirs soups? no wonder its so good

Hahaha! I love anything Vietnamese! But I am particularly fond of the roll your own rice paper rolls.

Seriously, thanks for the rundown. Much appreciated.

What does "winterized" mean and how would one know if a product is winterized or not? I won't ever be making my own (I don't think) and purchase from dispensaries online. Do I just need to ask them?

 

[hippy tribe]

winterized is when you filter the oil/wax/shatter utilizing alcohol; this will remove any leftover plant material the extraction may have picked up. winterizing has a tendency to reduce the terpene content in most instances. winterized shatter is also the hardest most stable in my experience. We only vape nug run around my way.. trim oil get decarbed in the oven or used as topicals.

 

[herbivore21]

Shatter, budder, wax, are all just different ways of describing consistency of the product. You can have shatter that has much lower THC % than wax, so I would not assume that one is more potent than the other. The shatter available at Boston's most popular dispensary looks amazing, but it is made from trim, and is not too potent or tasty. I make shatter that doesn't always shatter up as nice as theirs, but it gives much stronger effects.

Rosin is hash that has been extracted using pressure and heat, so it is also solventless.

Sap describes the consistency I believe. Live sap is the same thing as live resin I assume, but with a saplike constancy?

bho is hash extracted with butane.

pho is Vietnamese beef broth vegetable soup. My parents are crazy about it.

This is a good breakdown overall. Most of the terms as Farid says are referring to consistencies and do not necessarily have any descriptive meaning beyond that.

I will say though that BHO and Rosin are not hashes at all. Hash refers to whole resin glands that have been mechanically removed from the plant (either using water to separate the sinking glands from the floating plant material, or just sifting through screens). Strictly speaking, hash is pressed with some degree of heat (contemporary hashmaking practices use much less heat than traditional methods of course). BHO (and all solvent extracts), Rosin etc only comprise some of the resin content found within the formerly whole resin glands (which have been breached in the extraction process). These products are not the same as whole resin glands at all and do not collect the whole resin fraction in the original form for various reasons depending on the method. In my experience whole resin glands are much more enjoyable than these other kinds of extracts.

 

[zenmasterofzinfandel]

Rosin are not hashes at all. Hash refers to whole resin glands that have been mechanically removed from the plant (either using water to separate the sinking glands from the floating plant material, or just sifting through screens). Strictly speaking, hash is pressed with some degree of heat (contemporary hashmaking practices use much less heat than traditional methods of course). BHO (and all solvent extracts), Rosin etc only comprise some of the resin content found within the formerly whole resin glands (which have been breached in the extraction process).

And so too, in the favored process you use, resin glands have been 'breached' in water hash/bubble hash/ice wax/dry ice hash.

These products are not the same as whole resin glands at all and do not collect the whole resin fraction in the original form for various reasons depending on the method. In my experience whole resin glands are much more enjoyable than these other kinds of extracts.

Do not have enough time to do a nice edit/format job on the quotes:

And so, Frenchy Cannoli's hash rosin you saw in my new thread, it is not a hash according to you, yet the rosin is pressed from hash. Then there is the distinction of rosin pressed from flower, or dry sift (hash).

Can you cite and authority for the proposition that rosin of any form/extraction process lacks what you claim was formerly in the 'whole resin glands'? Whole resin glands get broken/ooze/grease-up/'congeal' less with dry sift, yet you prefer bubble hash, which IIRC, you do micro-planing on<<< i.e. broken glands, no?

Actually, with rosin from flower(or trim) you are getting *more* or what you would get if you had used combustion. bubble hash, unless 'full-spectrum', is getting using various sifting; segregating sizes/maturity of resin glands, you wouldn't be able to get combusting flower. Which is why I have been getting both the sweet spot 70-120u ice waxes, along with 38u & 'full-spectrum' to experiment with. Separate, mixNmatch

In my brief experience vaping concentrates with the Crafty, neither ice wax (full melt 10/10, 6*, or otherwise) nor Cuban Growers dry sift $$$$, gives me a more 'enjoyable' experience compared to *some* rosins I have tried. I actually get more flavor(not saying it tastes better, just more flavor detected) & limited more 'effects' (medicinal or recreational) as compared to either high-end producer full-melt or CG's dry sift. Still experimenting on best way to use them in the Crafty, however. No nails for me, not portable enough.

 

[zenmasterofzinfandel]

Is there a quick and dirty description available somewhere to compare these concentrates that will help a person make an informed purchase?

^should be in the concentrates for noobs thread...the 1st post, but that thread is not setup the way I would like to see it.

Have you tried pfo (google it ;p), you left out the poster child of latest buzz words "terp sauce" ...in the 3.5g baller jars...naturally

 

[herbivore21]

And so too, in the favored process you use, resin glands have been 'breached' in water hash/bubble hash/ice wax/dry ice hash.





Do not have enough time to do a nice edit/format job on the quotes:

And so, Frenchy Cannoli's hash rosin you saw in my new thread, it is not a hash according to you, yet the rosin is pressed from hash. Then there is the distinction of rosin pressed from flower, or dry sift (hash).

Can you cite and authority for the proposition that rosin of any form/extraction process lacks what you claim was formerly in the 'whole resin glands'? Whole resin glands get broken/ooze/grease-up/'congeal' less with dry sift, yet you prefer bubble hash, which IIRC, you do micro-planing on<<< i.e. broken glands, no?

Actually, with rosin from flower(or trim) you are getting *more* or what you would get if you had used combustion. bubble hash, unless 'full-spectrum', is getting using various sifting; segregating sizes/maturity of resin glands, you wouldn't be able to get combusting flower. Which is why I have been getting both the sweet spot 70-120u ice waxes, along with 38u & 'full-spectrum' to experiment with. Separate, mixNmatch

In my brief experience vaping concentrates with the Crafty, neither ice wax (full melt 10/10, 6*, or otherwise) nor Cuban Growers dry sift $$$$, gives me a more 'enjoyable' experience compared to *some* rosins I have tried. I actually get more flavor(not saying it tastes better, just more flavor detected) & limited more 'effects' (medicinal or recreational) as compared to either high-end producer full-melt or CG's dry sift. Still experimenting on best way to use them in the Crafty, however. No nails for me, not portable enough.

I do not microplane or otherwise interfere with resin glands in processing or drying man. The only exception was actually my avatar pic, which was the first time I ever made full melt bubble and before I'd developed my own techniques in the ensuing years. The last time I microplaned bubble hash was long, long before you'd ever appeared on FC and I am curious where you got the idea that I microplane given that I have long argued for the opposite!!! Upon examination under a digital microscope, my extracts comprise whole resin glands with intact membranes (not breached, ie: torn/broken etc). The ultra-high magnification (closer up than macro!) images do not lie my friend! That is the most compelling evidence I can possibly have that the glands are unbreached!

I must highlight that I do not process my bubble like anybody else that I know of. I have gone to great lengths over the last few years to develop my own techniques for drying and storage which prevent the glands from necessarily changing over time and which reliably keeps them intact. I do also heat press a some of my hash (not too differently from how Frenchy Cannoli does actually - I have great respect for his work and much of my early advances in bubble processing came from his methods - techniques like abandoning the work bag in the machine) which may lead to some incidental breaching (but actually a lot of my ultra macro images recently have had nothing but whole glands). As indicated above though, The rest of my material is dried and stored in ways AFAIK unique and unfamiliar to anybody here.

I also love full spectrum full melts as well and like you, tend to prefer this to individual bag collections. Whole glands means intact membranes though, I enjoy individual screen collections sometimes too

Generally even my 25u is 5-6 star full melt btw (my last year's worth of runs have yielded nothing but full melt from 25-120u for every agitation!). Mixing all of the full melt collections together makes for a very enjoyable experience - although care must be taken to know what sized resin glands are on your material and which collections are going to be contaminant - for example, if you are dealing with narrow-leaf varieties sometimes the best full melt heads are much smaller than what we usually see in full melt

As to rosin made from hash, yes it is different from flower rosin but no, it is not hash. The heat and filtration used making rosin means that the bulk of the non-melting components (the secretory cells etc, I am not sure how familiar you are with the anatomy of a trichome gland but am happy to point you to some good sources on this?) of the gland are filtered out of the final product, the heat is in the rosin process will cause very minor changes to some of the more volatile content of course as well.

I encourage you to read the literature regarding changes of volatile cannabis compounds under various conditions. Some terpenes for example become other terps when they are exposed to relatively low heat and oxygen - for example, alpha pinene can be used in this way to synthesise the monoterpene 'verbenone' (a profoundly different compound in taste!) in this way for example. The extent to which this takes place is going to vary of course, depending on the temps used in pressing and the pressure, the length of the press, the chemotype of the material you are pressing in the first place etc.

Hopefully this answers some of your questions and responds to some of your comments there man.

I also am curious, do you process extracts or do you buy them?

 

[throwawaytre3s]

The vast majority of my experience with concentrates has been with like a pull and snap taffy consistency kind of concentrate. I've had a few times where I've gotten some very glass like shatter, and a few times where it was total 'tane poop soup, you know? I've also had some crumbles, distillate, and budder/soft consistency as well. There are variations in each one in thc percentage and terps just like regular shatter, you can have great crumble or crap, you can have glassy shatter or unstable black crap. With the exception of distillate, which is pretty much always going to be 93%+ depending if terps are re-added as well. It mostly comes down to preference I think, in terms of which one you use. Or for most people I"d argue it's availability, rather than preference.

Distillate is definitely going to be your preferred choice for purity. Due to how it's processed, it's incredibly pure, super potent, but also usually flavorless. In my experience it was almost completely clear, and tasted vaguely of pine terps. Some labs re-add terpenes and can make distillate taste amazing from what I've heard, but the only distillate I've had has been raw.