Rosin Press on Amazon (and ebay) Thoughts?

[Aksarben]

I am looking at a Rosin Press on Amazon and what appears to be the "same" design/model as well on ebay, but cheaper. I include a link to the one on Amazon. Nice thing about Amazon, even though it costs a bit more, I can specify that they donate to NORML if I use the link.

What are yout thoughts? I don't need or want to press a lot of rosin, as 2" x 3" obviously will be limited to small amounts. It is heated top and bottom and can adjust the pressure to about 1000 pounds. Lot more pressure than I can do using just a 2" flat iron hair straighner, but a lot more pricey.

How much rosin can you get form most buds? More specifiallyl, how much rosin would one get from each gram oof flower?

My PAX 3 has a special oven attachment for concentrate. Use high heat and a piece about the size of a grain of rice. Would like to try this sometime.

Has anyone here used this one, or know someone who has? What kind of feedback is ther for this rosin press?
LINK: https://tinyurl.com/wq46mq2

Looks like a nice little unit. Around $141 on ebay.

 

[Aksarben]

Bottom line, has anyone had first hand knowledge and use of this press I am looking at? It appears to be small 2-3 inch. with decent heat on both plates, but sometimes the proof of the pudding is in the eating. I'd like to hear opinions about this little 10 lb press.

 

[The Hemp Goddess]

I want to start by saying that I have never used this press, but here are my thoughts. Not enough pressure. Saying something is capable of x amount of pressure doesn't in itself mean anything---it is how much area that pressure spread over that actually tells you how much pressure you have. While I even question how this press is capable of 1000# manually (770 recommended), it still is not enough. If you take the 770 lbs and divide it by the size of the platen, it is only exerting 128 lbs per sq inch....which is the only pressure measurement that means anything. You may well be getting that much pressure from your flat iron hair straightener.

We had a member on here a while ago called Hackerman who did a lot of research and work on a DIY rosin press using a bench or stand press. I made one with a 6 ton press and 3 x 4 plates, so 1000 lb/sq in. Of course, it doesn't weigh 10 lbs, but it is still portable. I'll see if I can find his work.

 

[Aksarben]

@The Hemp Goddess do you or others make a "puck" first before pressing? I have seen that done on a video.

Also, if I make a puck that is 1 inch diameter, then that puck is the only thing getting the force applied to it. I would have to have a marijuana puck 2" x 3" to take up the entire plate surface to reduce to what you were saying.

 

[Aksarben]

Doing a little web search I did find something worth sharing, regarding pressure and plates. I'll provide the link, as it contains very nice graphs and very good explanations on pressing. What they have found at this link is that 1000 lbs pressure is optimal for flower, and anything more than that and you risk getting plant materials IE chlorophyll etc. into the rosin. Also it appears that plate size is not as important as bag size or glower size. A 2" x 3" plate system at 770 pounds of force will exert the same force on a bag whether the plates are 2 x 3 or 8" x 12" Plate size is not important. Bag size is. When you press you are concentrating pressure on a smaller area o- the bag or flower - rather than the whole dimensions of the plates. A quote from their website:

"On a pneumatic press pressure is generated by compressed air which enters the machine and is distributed over the area of a piston. Pressure = Force / Area so Force = Pressure x Area. The cylinder on the Pikes Peak Press is 82.3 in^2. With 120 psi of air entering the machine we calculate 82.3 in^2 x 120 psi = 9,876 LBF. Since 2,000 LBFs equals 1 ton we can see that the Pikes Peak pneumatic press generates approximately 5 tons of force. This is the force at the plates. However, what we really care about is the force at the bag.


We will now calculate the pressure at the bag using the equation Pressure = Force / Area, where area is the size of the bag. For example, the area of a 2” x 9” bag is 1.8” x 9” = 16.2 in^2. (1.8” is the true measurement inside the seam). If we plug that number in we get 10,000 / 16.2 = 617 psi at the bag. Now let’s run this calculation for our 2” x 3” bags. 1.8” x 3” = 5.4 in^2. 10,000 / 5.4 = 1,851 psi at the bag. As you can see the smaller the bag, the more pressure you will get. Think of a nail. A nail tip exerts a large amount of pressure on whatever it is traveling into because it has a tiny area. If you hit a hammer with the same force but drive the head of the nail into the wood rather than the tip it will barely dent the surface. This is because it has a larger surface area. When creating recipes for a specific batch of material, you will want to know the pressure at the bag that produces the highest quality and yield. You will be able to scale your recipe up or down in size with replicable results by maintaining a constant bag pressure. For example if we create a recipe that works well in a 2” x 3” bag and we want to scale up to a 2” x 9” bag we will increase the air pressure entering the machine, compensating for the larger bag area and maintaining a constant bag pressure."

Ergo, if your flower bag is only 1" x 1" you have 1 square inch and are pressing plates together at that spot. So 770 pounds is 770 PSI or 1000 pounds is 1000 PSI. 2 inches and it drops by half. What I would garner from that is small pressure heat plates and smaller pounds of pressure will hamper your overall size of "puck" " bag " or flower in-between the parchment. I intend to make 1 inch pucks to give uniformity to the pressing.

And, here is the link to the above copy-paste for further reading: https://gopurepressure.com/blogs/rosin-education/the-physics-behind-rosin-heat-pressure

 

[Aksarben]

Got the press for Christmas. Presses pretty well, but one must remember that it is a small press 2" x 3" So it has limitation on grams/press. Pressed and had some nice rosin beads. I pressed at 212 F at about 4 minutes. Rosin on the parchment paper is kind of gooey. I have a steel pick up tool but the rosin soon begins to smear after I have removed it from the freezer.

Any tips or ideas on collecting rosin off parchment paper? Is the temp about right? One local guy suggested getting some Dry Ice and putting parchment paper (with rosin) between 2 pieces of Dry Ice. I can get it locally, but perhaps I am missing something....

Does this need to go in it's own tread?

 

[hollowpoint]

You can play with your temps and make a product that is wax like and a tad easier to handle. Freeze ...scrape...place in silicone container. I use a piece of dense bud to wipe the scraper clean...this is how I smoke my rosin as well....wipe it on bud material and drop in the bong bowl. Happy pressing with that new toy !

 

[Caw]

Aksarben, how much rosin are you getting per gram? Do you feel it's worth the price of the machine? I've investigated myself and they can get pricey.

I plan on making my own press at some point. My initial thoughts are to get a small hydraulic Jack, an adjustable temp flat iron (one that goes as low as 175), and some aluminum plates. I would simply cut an opening for the flat iron plates to go into the aluminum and use a infrared thermometer to dial in temps. I cant imagine it would be THAT hard to make - I'm somewhat handy and love diy. Thoughts?

As far as your procedure...4 mins seems long from all I've read. As stated, play around timing and temps. I would think a shorter time would get a less thin extraction. Although, it could all be based on the flower. I say this because a few days ago I went to a friend's house who had just pressed 3 pucks of different bud on a machine. All three had different results in terms of thickness, color, yield, etc. I guess you have to figure out what works best for the flower being used...

Have fun getting to where you want to be. I'm a bit jealous but excited to try my hand at making my own...

 

[Aksarben]

You can play with your temps and make a product that is wax like and a tad easier to handle.

I am pressing at 212, so you think that going down 12 degrees to 200 might make it easier, more wax like, to deal with?

Thoughts on plates... DIY I would think plates would need to have some sort of ability to heat and turn off to better control temp. Once it gets hot it will start to cool down as soon as you don't heat it anymore and you begin pressing.

Perhaps 4 minutes is too long. Might try about 180 seconds, which is 3 minutes. 3 minutes at 200F. I notices on this one I got from Ebay (was $138.00) cycles the temp off and on during the pressing. Has a self timer and works very well. Really squashes out the flower that is for sure.

 

[hollowpoint]

I started at 195* with 90 second press..I am using a 20 ton shop press with heated plates. It will vary on the moisture/variety of the flower.

 

[Aksarben]

Thank you so much @hollowpoint !! I reduced to 192* F and 120 seconds. Put the puck in the press and pressed, but relaxed it to get it started. Then kept incrementally increasing the pressure with the adjustment nut until it was difficult to "cam" over and lock. Set the timer button and when done, pulled out the rosin, dumped the left over puck into a bag, and then put the parchment paper in the chest deep freezer. Did this with several pressing. I included a picture of the rosin I got from doing a press. Weight of paper was 0.701 g after pressing and with rosin on it, the weight was 0.782 g or a net of 0.081 grams. On a 2 grams of bud (weight before pressing) , my auto flowers "High Density" that I grew this last summer it would appear I would be getting about 24.69% rosin on the press. Seem right in the math? Very small shelf type press and easy to set up.

 

[oldfogey8]

~4%

 

[Aksarben]

At this youtube video the "demonstrator" shows collecting and then removing rosin from his tool.
I am curious why someone would wipe the rosin back onto parchment paper, after you just got done collecting it off the parchment paper??

 

[Aksarben]

One more thing.... bag pressure, or flower puck pressure at the press appears to be best between 600 psi ( 1" x 1" ) to 1000 psi (same 1" x 1") Anything above 1000 psi gives little more return, but increases the plant material that is "squished" out. For a small pressing of a single gram of flower that is 1"X1" my press at 700-1000 should work just fine. I am limited though by how much flower I can press by 1. plate size (which is only 2" x 3" and pressure @1000 max. 20 tons of press would be way over kill for 1x1 pressing. You could press flower material 4" X 10" or 6.3245" square and end up with 1000 PSI at the flower (pressing) with a 20 ton press, and that would be for higher production runs.
Quality of flower, is prime. Poor flower will result in poor returns. Then to throw in another variable, it appears that each strain has certain "likes" of heat and time.

I have seen Youtube video of an experiment using 2 different strains, both pressed at the same heat- time - pressure but the only difference was the humidity level, or RH of the flower. 62% RH seems to be an ideal spot. What was interesting in the video is the results of the 2 strains and their % of collection, as there was clearly a difference in % of output.

Graph courtesy of "Pure Pressure" Their link: https://gopurepressure.com/blogs/rosin-education/the-physics-behind-rosin-heat-pressure and the graph:

 

[Aksarben]

I started at 195* with 90 second press..I am using a 20 ton shop press with heated plates. It will vary on the moisture/variety of the flower

@hollowpoint When you are pressing, do you have any issues with bleed through of the rosin on the parchment paper? I went ahead and bought a second press, one that has a turn wheel at the top and produces over 2000+ pounds of force... probably enough for what I'm doing. It seem to make quite a difference. A friend gave me some Alien OG and a 1 gram pressing netted 0.176 g of rosin. Weighed the paper before and after to get that figure. However, I notice that there is bleed through on the parchment paper, and it did get on the press plates. 195 Proof alcohol and paper towel cleaned that right up, but I was able to collect rosin off both sides of the raw parchment paper. Found it, pre-cut on Amazon

Is there a grade or "Brand" of parchment paper that is a bit thicker, that has silicone on both sides?

 

[hollowpoint]

I have never had bleed through...might try 2 sheets of paper.