Hi, people, I'm new to this forum but not to GD,

Having read this ENTIRE discussion of GD and having one or two failed attempt and three or four VERY successful attempts, I thought I'd share my experiences.

Like Melodious Fellow above, I really thought long and hard about decarboxylation. 325 just seems WAY too high--you can see stuff boiling off, and, I'm sure, you end up losing a lot of good volatiles. On the other hand, 200 is just too low--somewhere I read (FWIW) that decarboxylation starts at 214 F. So, the issue is, make the temp high enough and the time long enough to ensure full decarboxylation. I've found the 250 F for 20 to 30 minutes seems to do just fine.

Then, I tend to use about twice as much alcohol as most people use. I reason (rightly or wrongly) that I want to use enough alcohol to guarantee that the solution doesn't saturate before it has disolved all of the THC and other goodies. Sure, the final product may be weaker than optimal, but I just use a little more of it. I really want to ensure that I've disolved ALL of the goodies, and haven't left any in the dregs.

Then, after "cooking" the alcohol/marijuana mixture in a water bath for about 30 minutes, I leave the marijuana dregs in the alcohol at room temp for a week or two. What can it hurt, and it helps guarantee I've disolved as much THC as possible. Then, when I do strain off the dregs, I cook them a touch longer in some fresh alcohol to extract the last bit.

All I can say is that the product of this process is quite stong. It's not quite the same as a smoking high (not quite as buzzy), but it lasts for 6 to 8 hours, and is really mellow. I have to test each batch, as the potency is a bit different from batch to batch, so I start low and work up over a few days. I once made the mistake of not doing this, and knocked myself crazy. I woke up the next day with a THC hangover (not nice) with headache, nausia, and general weekness. Don't go there if you can avoid it.

Anyway, that's what I've learned, and I'd like to hear other opionions on this approach.

Cheers,
ED