1.When papaver somniferum is dry, take the big head without leaves + 10-15 cm of the stem . ( no leaves! )
2. Crush the big head. try to recover the more seed you can, and throw it on a field! ( so next season you will have more papaver)
3. After separated the more seed you can, then crush all the vegetal material, with anything you can ( scissors etc)
4. For breaking the celular wall, a good trick is to steep the vegetal material on distilled water, and put it on the fridge
5. make a tea with the vegetal material. Low fire! we dont want the water boiling. Proportion is: 1 litre of distiled water for each 100 g of vegetal stuff
6. After 15 minutes-20 minutes, when the water acquire a dark colour, filter the tea. Add 200 ml more of distiled water to the vegetal stuff to finish to push the alkaloids and add it ( without the vegetal stuff) to the "mother solution"
7. Now its time to clean the mother solution ( the tea) of Carboxylic acids and alkaloids we dont want. So, we heat it until it slowly, unit it gets to 80 degrees ( centigrads scale, 80ºC), not boliling! We add slowly some Hydroxide of calcium until the PH gets to, minimun 11, better PH=12.
8. Gotta the PH=12 , its time to turn off the fire. Wait for about 5 minutes and you will see a "precipitated cloud".Then everything is coming good. Let solution out of fire until the solution has an ambient temperature
9. Filter the solution and throw to the rubbish the "precipitated cloud" ( there must be a lot of)
10. because the seeds ( is impossible to recover all), there may be a "cap of fat" on top of the sollution. A good solution to eliminate the "fat cap" of our solution is to mix it with hexane and discard the non polar phase. This step is not a must
11. The solution is already clean and at an ambient temperature. Now its time to add Chloride of ammonium, until the PH lows to 8-9 . ( author says in his experience, optimum PH to precipitate the morphine =9). Let it rest for two hours
12. if morphine is on the bottom of the solution, then the process is going fine. if its not, it could be because the PH is lower than 9, then see step 13.
13. add little amounts of hydroxide of calcium or potassium, until PH=9. The "precipitated cloud· should be seen now. Let rest some hours , until morphine is on the bottom of the solution
14.Filter the solution, clean it with distilled water, and let it dry. When its dry you will see there is a light brown plate, easy to be broken, until it is a thin powder. Problem here, is that pwder is not only norphine but also chloride of calcium and hydroxide of calcium.
15. Dissolve the precipitate in "cloridrich acid". add the acid slowly, drop by drop, very slow, until PH reachs to 2
16. wait two minutes. Disollution should be fast. Not solid remains ahould be, if there are then filter again. Now, after the 2 minutes, add ammonia ( pure ammonia! no add smells, colours etc) until ph reachs 8 or 9
17. Eliminate the "oversimminig" substance ( like, the "thing" wich is on top on the solution. And dry the precipitated substance. There should be a light brown powder. How to know if all the process was right done? Put on alluminium foil and smoke, it should vaporize fast, leaving some black residue on the foil