How to make your own vape cartridges with cannabis extract

If you are wondering how to make your own vape cartridges with cannabis extract then lets start by understanding what an extract actually is. There is a huge range of wonderful extracts on the market.

In this case we are discussing concentrated plant material, made using the cannabis plant and extracted from it, a more condensed or pure version, much stronger than the original flower itself. This means you have a strong and concentrated material, great for dabbing, but how do we get this into a vape cart?

Obtaining Extracts
Please ensure to follow all laws in your area when obtaining your extracts. CBD extracts can be easily obtained online.

Generally there are 3 different ways of doing it, and depending on your extract you may use one, or more of these steps:

-Melt down your extract and syringe right into your carts
-Decarboxylate your extract
-Blend with distillate

Extracts that are ready to go into vape cartridges as they are:

-Distillate

-CO2 oil, HTFSE oil

If your starting materials is distillate or any cannabis oil which is a liquid consistency when heated to around 60-80c, then it can often be the best experience to use it pure in your cartridges, simply providing enough warmth in a jar to liquify the material and syringe right into cartridges as-is. So long as your material is pure, this is the best, no-cuts experience. However as easy as this is to do with distillate on its own, most users prefer to add terpenes for flavour due to distillate having an unusual flavour by itself.

With the advancements in HTFSE extraction, some “sauce” style extracts can now been found which have preserved almost all of the original terpenes from the plant. In contrast to distillate, using heat with this type of extract would waste away a lot of the terpenes even above around 50c, but it can go right into cartridges as-is for a premium vape cart experience.

Other than these above few examples, most other types of extract require some processing to work well in cartridges:

Extracts that require processing to work well in cartridges:

-Shatter

-BHO

-Rosin

-Crumble

-Live Resin

-Wax, Sugar Wax

When these types of extracts are made, they manage to capture varying levels of cannabinoids from the plant during extraction. The better the extraction is, the more percentage of the original cannabinoids and terpenes are kept. However if we consider the cannabis plant in its raw form will actually contain THC-a instead of THC.
This is why if we eat raw cannabis flowers it doesn’t have too much effect.
If you have lots of THC-a together concentrated, you end up with crystals, So the secret here is: THC-a is a solid polycrystal that doesn’t work in carts but it decarbs into THC when heated, which is a thick oil that does work in carts.

So to solve this problem we can either:

Decarb – add heat to convert THC-a into THC, but boil away a lot of terpenes in the process
or
Blend – Mix with a pure oil such as distillate

Decarboxylation:

Some are familiar with the idea of decarboxylation when it comes to making edibles out of cannabis flower. When it comes to decarboxylation of extracts and making carts: The theory is the same but the reason to do it is different

When making edibles, flower is heated to convert THC-a into THC so that it can take effect once eaten.
However when making cartridges, extracts are decarboxylated to change the state of the THC-a from crystals into a liquid THC oil which will run through a ceramic coil. In other words, to make it more liquid, even once it has cooled down the material will remain liquid assuming most of the THC-a has been successfully decarboxylated

How do I decarb my extract?

There are different ideas and methods around for this, but generally it’s something like:
-Put your extract into a sealed jar, sealing helps prevent evaporation loss, however *caution* with pressure build up in your container.
-apply heat at around 120c
-Many bubbles will appear indicating the process in effect, often takes a few hours
-Once bubbles slow right down to only a few then the decarboxylation process is completed
-cool material down after decarb to around 50-60c for further processing

So after this process you will have an oil which is runny and will pass through a vape coil, however the downside to running this process is it will evaporate almost all of the terpenes that were in the extract, leaving you with a less flavourful oil than the original starting material, and a loss of the full spectrum effects it once had.

A vacuum oven can be used here to prevent as much loss but they are quite an expensive investment.

Crystallisation and cloudy oil:

A common problem when working with strong extracts especially CBD extract, is that at certain high percentages the material will form crystals which will prevent it from running through a vape cartridge. Or in the case of THC extracts can be caused if there is either too much THC-a in the materials still, or if it has too much fats/lipids in the original material.
Some styles of extract maintain a lot of the lipids from the plant, this is bad news as can cause clogging in vape cartridges.

How to solve the above problems:

-Consider modifying the blend/recipe. For CBD, adding other cannabinoids or terpenes can help prevent crystallisation by reducing the total CBD percentage, also look out for “flowform” distillate which is confirmed not to crystallise in cartridges.
-If working with extracts that have lots of lipids, consider blending with a high purity oil such as distillate. In this case the lipids dissolve into the distillate and can be carried through the vape coils.

Blending Extracts with Distillate

If wanting to attempt to preserve original terpenes in extract, it should be melted down at low temperatures ideally below around 60c, considering the boiling points of the terpenes in the material, then adding distillate into the mix and allowing to mix well. A ceramic hotplate with magnetic stirrer is recommended since handling viscous liquids can be very difficult by hand. If working with a thin/runny extract then a ratio of 2:1 extract to distillate can work well. For harder extracts like Wax, Rosin, Live Resin, then a 1:1 ratio can work well, running a decarb of the extract first may even be required before blending if there are lots of crystals or chunks that won’t easily dissolve.

So you can consider the idea that using distillate almost as a carrier oil, can carry the extract through a vape cart, even if its got a fair amount of lipids and some THC-a left.

My material is still too thick

After running a decarboxylation and/or blending with distillate, sometimes the material is extremely viscous/thick, and would be unable to be syringed into carts or even pour into a filling gun. At this point you would need to apply heat enough to warm that material, in the range 60-80c. If the material is still too thick even at this temperature then thinning is needed.

-Dissolving with terpenes. Drop temps down to below 60c, then adding terpenes to your mix helps to thin and add flavour, aim for around 5% and not more than 10%
-Adding MCT oil. Sometimes only a few drops of MTC oil is all that’s needed to thin the material. Not recommended to go over 10% else the taste is noticeable
-Adding distillate, or more distillate to your blend. This will help with the viscosity, but too much distillate will take away the full spectrum effects of the extract and lessen the flavour.
-Using Thinners such as Liquidizers (NOT RECCOMENDED) Some thinners have been proven unsafe in the past so extra cation is required, its not often clear what is in them. You could consider using terpenes with low flavour instead such as The Juice

Tips and further info

Some experiments could be easily suggested, for example adding different types of distillate, either CBD, D8, D9. Varying the amount of terpenes or MCT in the blend. Varying the ratio of distillate to extract, or considering a decarb only. Testing a few samples carts on a small batch first is always a good idea.
Aiming to use the minimal amount of additives where possible for the best results. The quality of the end cartridge is dependant on the quality of the extract.
Some blends will work better with certain carts than others, standard V4 coils are popular for distillate. Full Ceramic carts bring out the colour of your oil visually due to the white ceramic centre post. Full glass options allow for a premium look and feel and have great increased airflow, also allowing for better overall flavour.
Also consider the intake hole diameter into the coil. Around 2mm is common, larger intakes or more of them will allow for better absorption of thicker oils.
Thinner oils will work better with smaller inlet hole sizes to help prevent leaks.