Rotary Evaporator

Today at the Outlaw lab we are using our Rotary Evaporator machine. This machine allows us to do a variety of processes that are essential to producing high quality wax products. To get here, we mixed ethanol with our cannabis concentrate to do a process called winterization (which we will highlight in the future).  In this picture we are boiling the ethanol out of the cannabis concentrate (Fig. 2). We then have the condenser coils (Fig. 1) that catch the gas ethanol and convert it into a liquid where we can collect it for future use.

The way this machine works, without getting too deep into the science, is we manipulate the temperatures and the pressures inside the machine to change the boiling points of compounds such as ethanol. This allows us to use minimal heat to boil off the ethanol without compromising or damaging the terpenes or other cannabinoids in the cannabis concentrate. This uses the same type of physics that makes it so boiling water at a higher elevation requires less heat than at a lower elevation.

Fun fact: Even though Mars has such a thin atmosphere and can barely hold onto compounds on its surface, it actually has points on its surface that are so low in its elevation that the pressures on it allow liquid water to be located at the lower parts of the planet, such as The Hellas basin. If you would like to look more into this topic click here.