Using Nitrogen Gas to Cure/Store Buds in...

MacGuyver4.2.0

MacGuyver4.2.0

Well-Known Member
Not sure if this has been asked here yet, so as the title says- anyone here cured or stored thier buds long term using nitrogen gas? I know that oxygen and light are bad, so logic suggests that Nitrogen (or another inert gas) would be best to store long term.

Should also serve as a barrier to mold or bacteria as well, since they need oxygen. Just vaped my meds awhile ago and got to thinking about this. :weed:
 
C

Creek

Active Member
You want the tricomes to oxidize. They cannot with out oxygen nitrogen forms nitrites and nitrates that form salts. Part of the curing process is oxydization and off gassing of nitrogen and other solouble gases.

Its the same reason they dont age wine or scotch in inert environments.
 
MacGuyver4.2.0

MacGuyver4.2.0

Well-Known Member
Creek said:
You want the tricomes to oxidize. They cannot with out oxygen nitrogen forms nitrites and nitrates that form salts. Part of the curing process is oxydization and off gassing of nitrogen and other solouble gases.

Its the same reason they dont age wine or scotch in inert environments.
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Um actually they do...

Since I have vinted my own wines for years I know that oxygen is death to wines! Many wine experts actually prefer inert gas bottle filling now compared to the traditional vacu-vin bottle stopper.

As to Cannabis, oxygen exposure creates CBN (Cannabinol) and is produced as THC ages and breaks down, this process is known as oxidization. This is basically THC reacting to the presence of Oxygen.
Inert gases DO NOT change THC to CBN. Light breaks down THC as well, but you can still have a dark container that is not air tight (or with lots of trapped air in it), and still have oxidation occur. In short, once your bud has CURED you want to stop the oxidation process, or greatly slow it down.

By the way, alot of foods are shipped in nitrogen filled bags or containers for the same reasons...bacteria and molds need oxygen to survive.
 
C

Creek

Active Member
You seem to know all the answers already. Go ahead and cure your weed in nitrogen. You can age your personally vintaged wine in nitrogen purged casks too.

Many expert wine makers use liquid oak in there wines too doesnt make it right. They nitrogen fill blended and mass produced wine were they dont want anything different from one lot to the next or one vintage from the next.
 
V

vinny27

Member
I've heard that both Nitrogen and CO2 help preserve marijuana, and keep it from getting "old." I've also heard that N hurts the aroma and taste of buds stored in it. Is that true for N? For CO2?
 
mellokitty

mellokitty

Moderatrix of Journals
we (hubby and i ) have been curious about this; they *pouf* nitrogen gas into 'vacuum packed' items too, right?
to promote "fresh" ness? it's NO2 they use for that right? or pure N vapour? idk a lot about the process.

one would think that you would want to dry and cure your buds to whatever state you want them put into suspended animation in, right? and you'd want to make sure that in the pursuit of the perfect balance of "fresh" and "dry" you manage to make it dry enough....
 
T

thedude27

Well-Known Member
Hrm, thats actually rather interesting idea (as far as for storage, not sure about the cure). I have a bunch of CO2 laying around. (dont have temps for it in my grow, but I'm a homebrewer and use it for my kegs).
 
anymouse

anymouse

Active Member
You might be on to something MacGuyver. If you were to just pump inert gas into a jar or bag it will mix with the air and you'll have to pump a lot of gas into and out of the container until the level is lowered, wasteful. You could try buying a couple of the hermetic wire hinged jars with a silicone gasket and acrylic lid. Drill a hole in the lid and install a barb or inverted shrader valve. Then if you get one of those vacuum hand pumps you can evacuate the air inside to around 600mm Hg (the model I have can go to 700 but it's slow for the last 100 or so) in about 5 minutes tops for a 1 liter vessel. If you evacuate it all the way to 700mm Hg you will have a pressure of -13.536psi, normal atmospheric pressure at sea level is usually 14.65psi IIR so 92.396% of all gases have been removed. Fun fact: your bud is now in an atmospheric pressure comparable to the lower mesosphere according to Wikipedia. Pump inert gas into there back up to atmospheric pressure and you will have an oxygen content of 0.227% (someone please verify this as I am uneducated). If you want to further lower that you can do another evacuation cycle cutting it to .0025 or you can remove the remainder through chemical reaction though anything lower than a third of a percent is just splitting hairs.
You might even just evacuate the jar and leave it in a vacuum to see what happens.
 
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theTinker

Member
anymouse said:
You might be on to something MacGuyver. If you were to just pump inert gas into a jar or bag it will mix with the air and you'll have to pump a lot of gas into and out of the container until the level is lowered, wasteful. You could try buying a couple of the hermetic wire hinged jars with a silicone gasket and acrylic lid. Drill a hole in the lid and install a barb or inverted shrader valve. Then if you get one of those vacuum hand pumps you can evacuate the air inside to around 600mm Hg (the model I have can go to 700 but it's slow for the last 100 or so) in about 5 minutes tops for a 1 liter vessel. If you evacuate it all the way to 700mm Hg you will have a pressure of -13.536psi, normal atmospheric pressure at sea level is usually 14.65psi IIR so 92.396% of all gases have been removed. Fun fact: your bud is now in an atmospheric pressure comparable to the lower mesosphere according to Wikipedia. Pump inert gas into there back up to atmospheric pressure and you will have an oxygen content of 0.227% (someone please verify this as I am uneducated). If you want to further lower that you can do another evacuation cycle cutting it to .0025 or you can remove the remainder through chemical reaction though anything lower than a third of a percent is just splitting hairs.
You might even just evacuate the jar and leave it in a vacuum to see what happens.
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Evac, replace with CO2, Evac again. You sir, just gave great advice.
This would really help the situation, It would also let people compensate for shitty vaccum sealers.
 
SimonD

SimonD

Well-Known Member
MacGuyver4.2.0 said:
In short, once your bud has CURED you want to stop the oxidation process, or greatly slow it down.
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Agreed. Filling the container with nitrogen will effectively stop the curing process and preserve the product as is. There are a few folks on IC who invested in vacuum sealers with nitrogen-fill functions for that reason. Personally, when I want to stop the cure at a certain point - mostly with commercial product - the air is removed from the container and it's refrigerated. This obviously isn't the same, but it does maintain a given level of cure for many months. For personal, I cure forever. Heh, well, not really. My oldest is ~7 years old.

Simon
 
anymouse

anymouse

Active Member
I was dabbling around with basic chemistry and learned something that reminded me of this thread.
For those of you that are into this sort of thing and happen to have the equipment and know how (I suspect some people here are at least interested in science if not actual college students) you don't need to buy an expensive N2 tank. Ammonium dichromate (NH4)2CrO7 when decomposed in a flask releases N2 and H2O in addition to the suspected carcinogenic chromium oxide ash volcano(youtube it, cool). It's cheaper than buying a cylinder of N2 if you only need a little and already have a few flasks and silica gel. Just scrub off the H2O and stray Cr2O3 crystals in an apparatus for a supply of pure N2. I'll give a small sample a long term storage trial once I eventually buy some ammonium dichromate. Heh, check back in 5 years.
 
dannyboy602

dannyboy602

Well-Known Member
OMG. i can't imagine seven year old weed. it is either really bad or really good. in any event who has the patience to wait seven years. i can't even remember that far back. i have a hard enough time telling ppl they have to wait a month or two.
 
SimonD

SimonD

Well-Known Member
dannyboy602 said:
OMG. i can't imagine seven year old weed. it is either really bad or really good. in any event who has the patience to wait seven years. i can't even remember that far back. i have a hard enough time telling ppl they have to wait a month or two.
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Heh, it's not really waiting for 7 years; it's more like trying to see what happens. Then comes a point where it's been curing for so long, might as well keep it going. IME, the product becomes extraordinarily smooth. It's the only way I can put it lacking a better term. At the same time, the (optimal) smell is mostly gone as is the the taste. It's still there, kinda, but more much more subdued. The stone isn't as intense; its scope is more relaxing than peaky if that makes sense. For personal smoke, I like to cure for 12-18 months. 6 months at the very least. It's personal preference more than anything; I hate to smoke weed that isn't stupid-smooth. It doesn't mean, of course, that I won't sample other product. :)

Simon
 
OKLP

OKLP

Well-Known Member
How about curing in glass the typical way for 3-6 months, THEN vacuum and add Nitrogen to preserve it at that point?

Oh shoot, old thread, oh well...
 
F

fromanoc

New Member
This is a valid Idea. I work in a research lab (I'm a molecular biologist), and Nitrogen gas is used to store sensitive chemicals that get oxidized by air oxygen.

The Nitrogen gas is N2, the same in the air (most of the air is N2). It does not react with anything, is pretty inert, Is not N03 as someone asked earlier on.

The way you do it, with a chemical on a glass bottle with a screw cap, you hold the jar slightly open with one hand, while with the other hand you blow N2 into the bottle/jar, for a few seconds, this replaces the air with N2. Then while blowing N2 gas into the opening you screw on the bottle cap. And you are all set, the gas in the jar/bottle is almost if not completely N2. N2 is dirty cheap by the way.

Co2 is also pretty inert and won't react with anything, Oxygen in the air is the bad thing. You could probably drop a little piece of dry ice into the jar with weed (make sure it doesn't touch the weed so it doesn't freeze it. Then wait some time for it to evaporate, Co2 is denser than regular air, it will expand and push out the air out of the jar (there has to be zero breeze for this), then screw the cover on and you are all set, you've gotten rid of oxygen in your jar. I might try this.
 
S

SomeoneWhoIsn'tMe1115

New Member
I'm happy to resurrect this thread as it is purely about the test of time. The last post (and some others high up) really nailed it in my opinion. Cure, then evacuate with nitrogen/co2 the lazy way knowing they are denser than air. This is cheap, and effective, and I look forward to trying it one day. Hopefully it will allow us to go multiple years without losing aroma/taste/effects. This is how a lot of self-sufficient people store food off the grid. They take their food for the day/week and replenish the n2 because it is dirt cheap as mentioned. That's my addition... Pick a nug, replenish, never worry about your supply going stale on you. Happy toking.
 
Jaybodankly

Jaybodankly

Well-Known Member
Put some dry ice in a large mason. Wait till it has sublimated to gas. It will spill over the top of the jar. The jar is now full of CO2. Add the weed and seal the jar. CO2 packin. Seeds store this way also.
 
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