Greetings,
I'm doing my first demething and trying to identify the point at which I have no more meth in the BD. Just for reference, I heated a sample of freshly reacted BD(glycering drained) and saw the meth bubbles almost rolling out from the center. I chose to bubble my BD to demeth it (slow, I know, but safe for now) and will filter later. I've pulled a sample, heated it and now I don't get that same obvious bubbling but rather the bubbles seem to stick to the bottom and are much smaller. I touch these with my temperature probe and the bubbles release to the top. But again, it's not the same rapid bubbling I got with the first sample. Does this still indicate the presence of methanol or is possible the KOH soap acting this way? I haven't filtered the soap out, yet.

Subzilla,
I've never done a comparison like that so I'm not sure if the bubbles are meth or soap or who knows. I do know however, that methanol is very easy to detect because of its odor. If your not sure if what you’re smelling is methanol, just step outside and take a couple of deep breaths then go back in and sniff a little. I say a little because it's rather unhealthy. The other choice might be to simply do a quantitative water test such as the one Troy has outlined. You can easily tell if there is any methanol that way. Chances are, if you have heat the sample fairly warm (160F or so) if there is methanol in there it will come out and you will smell it.

You can just try to light a small sample but be careful. It's very difficult to see the flame of methanol burning.

Of course I have to state the standard -Be careful bubbling the methanol out, it really does make a very flammable vapor. If you can collect the methanol vapors you'd be way ahead of the game. If you have an Appleseed processor then you’re just a simple condenser away.


-mcguyver

Water test