Cocaine Few Questions Reguarding Ammonia and Heat

[elyix]

Hi guys! Been using the site for a while, finally decided to sign up!

Now, down to business. From my understanding the role of the ammonia in the process of creating freebase is to neutralize the hydrochloric acid attached to the cocaine effectively separating the two, allowing it to become smoke-able? Does the ammonium chloride just precipitate wherever it can or does it become gaseous and evaporate from the solution? Or does it remain dissolved in the water and only the cocaine precipitates allowing you to just filter out the solution and leave the freebase behind.

Also, what is the purpose of the heat? Is it just to boil out all of the water or does it act as some sort of catalyst? Or maybe dissolve any undesirables to be filtered out?

I've never cooked but from my understanding when it comes to using baking soda the sodium bicarbonate's purpose is to pull the hcl off to make sodium chloride which dissolves in the solution and and allows the freebase to separate and be filtered out. But I still don't understand the use of heat other than possibly acting as the catalyst the first time and to boil out the water the second time.

I'm by far no chemist. Any knowledge I possess on chemical reactions is self-taught so bare with me.

 

[sekio]

Or does it remain dissolved in the water and only the cocaine precipitates allowing you to just filter out the solution and leave the freebase behind.

This.

Also, what is the purpose of the heat?

Encourages the cocaine HCl to react rapidly, at low temperatures it may not convert to freebase as rapidly.

Bicarbonate and ammonia do the exact same thing, both act as bases (accept protons) to convert the HCl salt of cocaine to its freebase (which is insoluble in water) plus water soluble chloride salts. There's no reason to use ammonia in comparison to bicarbonate; it stinks.

 

[Limpet_Chicken]

Depends, sekio. Some people cook up crack by making a paste of bicarb and cocaine HCl don't they? If someone is making it via extraction into ether or other suitably volatile nonpolar and evaporation then I'd consider it superior, as if just making a paste then there is going to be a lot of salt left behind, possibly excess bicarb diluting the product.

At least excess NH3 can be evaporated off more easily and cleanly. Plus less tendency towards ester hydrolysis, given that cocaine is fairly sensitive to base, although not sure if bicarb or carbonate would be strong enough to hydrolyze either of the two ester linkages in cocaine, heating with the weakest base that will do the job does seem desirable.

 

[Scrofula]

I'd rather my Bluelighting neighbor cooked up his crack with baking soda AOT ammonia. The cat lady on the other side would be bad enough (volatile and flammable, just like ammonia).

 

[RedRum OG]

Haven't smoked crack in over 5 years and hopefully never will again, but in the name of science, is ammonia better than the traditional "trap" method of coke+ baking soda + heat? The few people I knew who cooked themselves preferred the ammonia method.

Part of the reason, as explained to me, was that you never even know a ballpark purity % of coke, and with baking soda you will get more leftover garbage if using improper ratios, which doesn't matter as much with ammonia. True?