Hey all,

I have been researching opium and morphine/heroin manufacture, and there is but one thing that I wasn't sure about.

So when you want to get morphinhine out o ya opium, can you use just regular cooked (smoking) opium, or do y ou have to do the "slaked lime" thing?

Thanks guys

Hey all,

I have been researching opium and morphine/heroin manufacture, and there is but one thing that I wasn't sure about.

So when you want to get morphinhine out o ya opium, can you use just regular cooked (smoking) opium, or do y ou have to do the "slaked lime" thing?

Thanks guys

There ya go, i did the work for you. Be advised to do a little searching next time.

http://tinyurl.com/7esean

So when you want to get morphinhine out o ya opium, can you use just regular cooked (smoking) opium, or do y ou have to do the "slaked lime" thing?

The question doesn't quite make sense, to me at least, sorry. Do you mean, 'can you extract morphine from opium' or do you mean 'can you use a method by which one can get to cooked opium from pod latex to get to morphine' or do you mean 'does the opium have to be 'cooked' in order to extract morphine from it'?

The three questions I wrote out above would be answered by me as;

a) yes
b) no
c) no

The 'slaked lime thing' is a method by which people extract morphine from opium for the conversion to heroin. It is one method of various to extract morphine from opium.

You can extract morphine, funnily enough, from most things which contain morphine. E.g. pills, opium, pods, seeds, poppy straw, morphine tincture etc etc, its just going to take a little bit of a different approach each time.

I have absolutely no idea what you're trying to do to be honest, so I can't really be more helpful than that.

morphinhine

lol que?

If I may give some advice, not even knowing quite what you're trying to do, might I propose that you try to either get to opium and be happy if you end up there, or stick with poppy pod tea? No offence, but unless english isn't your first language, it sortof looks to me like you might make a mistake trying to extract morphine, and end up swallowing NaOH, salt, plant matter...

Aiight, I was gonna make a thread on this exact topic, but looks like leroche beat me to it, and fucked it up. So, given the resaerch I've done, I've devised a modified A/B (rather than relying on the basified morphinate salts that may/maynot be BS). My hope is that someone (one of y'all upper tier LT'ers) can approve/comment on/adjust the process. It starts from plant matter and attempts to produce ~pure morphine.

1. An extraction fluid is prepared by diluting muriatic acid with triple its volume of dH2O.
2. Two volumes of extraction fluid are mixed with 1 volume of plant material.
3. Mixture is shaken, not stirred, (<lol @ my Bond joke) for a minute or two (less time if plant material is finely ground).
4. Plant material is then strained off using a ~fine cloth or other straining device. Filter paper might take too long, but it would be advantageous to have as little plant matter as possible.
5. Gaseous ammonia is prepared from alkali hydroxide and ammonium compound and bubbled into solution. The amount of ammonia gassed into solution should be about double the moles of HCl originally present in the extraction.
6. After gassing, a quarter volume of the overall solution of nonpolar solvent (hexane, xylene, toluene, ether, etc) is added to solution.
7. Solution is thoroughly shaken for a few minutes.
8. Polar layer is drained and discarded, nonpolar is saved.
9. Nonpolar is added to half its volume of extraction fluid.
10. Mixture is shaken again for a few minutes.
11. Now, nonpolar layer is discarded.
12. Ammonia is gassed into the polar layer, prepared as before, and in a molar quantity double that of the HCl in the extraction mix.
13. And finally, hopefully, a white, crystalline precipitate should have formed which can be filtered out with a coffee filter or some such.

The final product might be a mix of alkaloids, but it should be mostly the good stuff. Also, the reason I say ammonia gas is because the liquid's never concentrated enough. There'd be too much fluid and the goods wouldn't precipitate out at the end. Also, the reason I say ammonia in general is that supposedly alkali/alkaline earth metals form water soluble base salts with the goods, which would be bad.

Also, the reason I say ammonia in general is that supposedly alkali/alkaline earth metals form water soluble base salts with the goods, which would be bad.

Good thinking man, looks like a solid plan overall. I'm pretty sure you're right about the water soluble product formed when basifying with hydroxides, those two OHs are going to form an O-Na I'd think.

I reckon it looks OK, though I'm not entirely sure that gassing with ammonia will be easier than using a aqueous basic solution. Though I don't know much about the particulars in this system, it may be that using a basic solution that is not strong enough to deprotonate the phenol and alcohol would be less hassle...

Also, the extraction steps should be given longer, with more repetition - extracting from plant matter can be a pain the the ass - the intitial soak in HCl should probably given a long soak at first, followed by a couple of shorter periods; the back extraction should also be given more repetitions (maybe 3 or so in each case).

I reckon it looks OK, though I'm not entirely sure that gassing with ammonia will be easier than using a aqueous basic solution. Though I don't know much about the particulars in this system, it may be that using a basic solution that is not strong enough to deprotonate the phenol and alcohol would be less hassle...

Also, the extraction steps should be given longer, with more repetition - extracting from plant matter can be a pain the the ass - the intitial soak in HCl should probably given a long soak at first, followed by a couple of shorter periods; the back extraction should also be given more repetitions (maybe 3 or so in each case).

I agree with doing more a more comprehensive initial extraction; on the wiki for morphine, it mentions a method used where poppy straw is soaked for 5 or 6 times to get the most alkaloid product.

It also notes that either NH3 or Na2CO3 can be used for attempting to gently basify. :)

Sauce is wikipedia;
A Hungarian chemist, János Kabay, found and internationally patented a method to extract morphine from "poppy straw": dried poppy pods and stem, and other parts of the dry plant, except for seeds and root. In natural form, in poppy plant, the alkaloids are bound to meconic acid. The method is to extract from the crushed plant with diluted sulfuric acid, which is a stronger acid than meconic acid, but not so strong to react with alkaloid molecules. The extraction is performed in many steps (one amount of crushed plant is at least six to ten times extracted, so practically every alkaloid goes into the solution). From the solution obtained at the last extraction step, the alkaloids are precipitated by either ammonium hydroxide or sodium carbonate.

There ya go, i did the work for you. Be advised to do a little searching next time.

http://tinyurl.com/7esean

That's fucking hilarious.

I agree with doing more a more comprehensive initial extraction; on the wiki for morphine, it mentions a method used where poppy straw is soaked for 5 or 6 times to get the most alkaloid product.
My only worry there is that the extra volume of fluid will mean more alkaloids will stay in the polar layer rather than transfered into the nonpolar. Ideally, the the solution could be boiled down to minimize this loss, but IIRC, there will be some alkaloids taken up into the steam and will be lost that way. Given that the alkaloids will be their HCl salts, this steam loss may be minimal, but I don't know. I thought I also remembered hearing that poppy alkaloids undergo partial decomp as low as 100C. I was hoping that if the original round of extraction fluid is shaken with the plant material long enough, there will be a near-complete transfer. What is comes down to, then, is how much is lost with each of these methods. I have little experience/knowledge when it comes to these processes, so I haven't the foggiest idea.
It also notes that either NH3 or Na2CO3 can be used for attempting to gently basify. :)
The idea being that the CO3 will keep the Na occupied? This would save a lot of effort/money/safety.
Sauce is wikipedia;
mmm... Wikisauce...

The idea being that the CO3 will keep the Na occupied? This would save a lot of effort/money/safety.


My friend plans on giving this a go, he lives on an offshore drug boat in international waters, so its legal you see. He'll be using Na2CO3, just adding it gram by gram to the solution, stirring with a pH meter to get the stuff dissolved in there, I imagine that sodium carbonate wouldn't pose the same problems as NaOH would cause due to it being so strong. I'll report back on how well it goes its done soon.

keep the pH as close to neutral as possible and heat under 60 celsius, i wouldnt go over 45 personally. If extracting from opium, codeine morphine and possibly also thebaine/more alkaloids will all be pulled. if you're fine with an alkaloid mix, you're good to go. However if you wish to go to heroin or pure morphine, you must form calcium morphinate or a similar salt and take advantage of their (in)solubility. Don't quote me, but codeine may form dangerous byproducts when acetylated. Plus, if separated, it can be methylated to morphine!

I've done ether syntheses where the phenol had to be deprotonated in order to work with it. Carbonate was used as the base. :/ Just keep the pH close to neutral.

Von Bass, any word yet from your friend? I have a similar friend (on a boat on international waters) and his work is slow going. He's been astounded about just how much liquid dried plant material can soak up (200ml added, 50ml recovered). He's using bicarb to null the majority of the acid and hopes to use ammonia to base the rest, so to minimize Na+ ions in soln. I will post any results from my friend, but he is slow and not very bright (he lives on a boat, what can you expect?).

Von Bass, any word yet from your friend? I have a similar friend (on a boat on international waters) and his work is slow going. He's been astounded about just how much liquid dried plant material can soak up (200ml added, 50ml recovered). He's using bicarb to null the majority of the acid and hopes to use ammonia to base the rest, so to minimize Na+ ions in soln. I will post any results from my friend, but he is slow and not very bright (he lives on a boat, what can you expect?).

Oh very much the same, he's still doing initial soaks on his material, had to add about a litre of acidified water to get anything other than a mush. Hopefully in about a day or three, he'll filter off what he's got and set to with some Na2CO3, although by the moles of acid he added, he'll probably do as you do, push it nearly all the way with a cheaper base and then finish it off with ammonia or a carbonate :)

Now my seabound friend is learning first hand about emulsions. After basing with carbonate, and adding xylene, he says there are three layers: polar, nonpolar, and a shit-ton of random cloudy organic goop sitting between the two. He doesn't know what to make of it. Isn't chemistry fun?

Brine and centrifuge, perhaps?

Now my seabound friend is learning first hand about emulsions. After basing with carbonate, and adding xylene, he says there are three layers: polar, nonpolar, and a shit-ton of random cloudy organic goop sitting between the two. He doesn't know what to make of it. Isn't chemistry fun?

Oh dear. This implies it may be necessary to attempt a defat first.

As FMJ sayeth, brine and centrifuge if you can manage, also sitting in warmish water for 24 hours appears to help.

Good luck sir!

Though my buddy has not finished with the process, he reports after brine and sitting, it has mostly separated. His current fear, though, is that there is only a minimal amount of alkaloids present in the vast quantity of solvent, and as such, basing from acid solution at the end will not precip the goods. A way to remedy this, he thought, was to use Et2O as the NP. Once the initial extraction mix is based and transfered to the Et2O, because of the really low BP, the it could be boiled away to a tenth of the initial volume without any loss of goods either to decomp or the vapors. Thoughts?

Depends on what state you want to end up with..... I would personally get it all nice and clean, then put it in the sulfate or hydrochloride salt, in water, and evaporate to dryness. If you want crystals, slow crystallization of the sulfate from ethanol is the way to go, but I'd prefer powder. In fact, I'd prefer to just smoke the opium, hahahahaha. Call me a lazy fuck...

Depends on what state you want to end up with..... I would personally get it all nice and clean, then put it in the sulfate or hydrochloride salt, in water, and evaporate to dryness. If you want crystals, slow crystallization of the sulfate from ethanol is the way to go, but I'd prefer powder. In fact, I'd prefer to just smoke the opium, hahahahaha. Call me a lazy fuck...

Boil away aqueous Sulfate solution, dissolve in anhydrous EtOH at high temps, cool, collect precip?

Dont boil. Just put a fan blowing over it, and it should evaporate from a shallow dish over night.

Slight thread necrophilia, but hydro, did your friends smell strangely like... ketchup... when doing the initial polar extraction? I have this strange feeling I've bred a super bacteria capable of growing in pH 1...

Slight thread necrophilia, but hydro, did your friends smell strangely like... ketchup... when doing the initial polar extraction? I have this strange feeling I've bred a super bacteria capable of growing in pH 1...

Its the T-Virus! Fuck we are doomed

*starts eating brains*:cool:

Slight thread necrophilia, but hydro, did your friends smell strangely like... ketchup... when doing the initial polar extraction? I have this strange feeling I've bred a super bacteria capable of growing in pH 1...

A asked my buddy and he told be he overdid it with the HCl on the initial polar pull (and continues to on following runs). He uses hw-store muriatic of ~30% conc. (mol fraction? mass percent? % by vol? He doesn't know. Why couldn't they just use molar?) diluted with 3 volumes H2O per volume HCl. He said he wouldn't know if it smelled like ketchup because the HCl fuming from it would overpower the smell. Yikes.

Though, I imagine that between the basing and multiple phase transitions, you could be growing super anthrax w/ AIDS and probably not have a problem with consumability of the final product. As for my friend's status, he's yet to set up a working ammonia gas rig (not for lack of trying though, more for lack of having labware :( ). So, instead he cooked up some carbonate (bicarb + ~350c) and is currently making crude extracts by extracting w/ HCl, basing, and collecting impure-as-shit precipitate. He'll probably wind up going with at least another b/a pull and going from there, but whatever, all in good fun.

Alrighty cheers. I think the first solution will be filtered off today, and we'll see what can be done. :) Coincidently, I used 30% HCl in my case, but made a weak attempt at converting roughly to moles and making a weaker solution.

Now, I figured one should titrate his acid, but in my friend's case, it's so oversaturated, it's green and fuming. So even an accurate titration number would mean less over time. But that's what he'll probably do anyway.

As for other stuff, he tried: Ground pods +10%HCl, shaken thoroughly, soaked for few days, filtered off plant material, let sit for a few more days, nothing else settled out of solution, based with carbonate, noticed shit-tons of precip (if filtered and dried, precip was brownish-white powder, on this run, though, he did not remove it) but then added xylene, shook thoroughly, obsereved four layers (down-up: precip on bottom, H2O, precip in middle, xylene) filtered to remove both precip layers (left with H2O and xylene), separated, discarded H2O, added xylene to 10% HCl, shook thoroughly, separated, discarded xylene, again based with carbonate, no precip was observed, he then sighed and went to bed. Right now, he's envisioning another type of extraction utilizing liquid butane.

Sounds good, I think my cat will be retrieving what can be retrieved after basing with carbonates, and then trying to work from there, hopefully meaning smaller volumes to work with and easier crystallisations :)

I still fear the primordial soup that is the extraction thus far, but we'll see what happens after it is filtered.