Got plenty beer here myself. But alas, I may not drink so much as a swig.
The prope comes from, well its explained above. From what I understand of its pedigree, ..someone...acylated morphine. That is the basic reaction in the case of heroin manufacture too, what the producers of H do, is to obtain, by whatever means, typically in their case, isolation from poppy pods and straw, farming it etc and 'acylate' it, this is a chemistry term meaning to form a carboxylic acid (acyl group) ester, also called esterification, not all esterifications are acylations, however. And acylation can also mean to add an alkanoyl moiety to an amine, forming an amide.
The reaction of an acid with an alcohol, including a phenolic hydroxyl group, such as in the case of morphine results in the formation of the carboxylic acid ester of the phenolic -OH, in this case, two of them where morphine is concerned, at the '3 carbon and the '6 carbon. The -6 position is pretty much where the action is, and seems like selective monoesterification of the '3 position results in some possibly nasty things, but its easier to selectively monoacylate the '6 -OH if thats what someone wants to do, or to just go ahead and acylate both.
The process by which, and I will use heroin as the example since it is well known chemistry and quite simple. Either one of two routes is typically used. One-the esterification of both -3 and -6 position hydroxyl groups, taking morphine as the starting point. Two reagents are typically used although it is possible to do it other ways. The most well known is acetic anhydride, and heating. The second is esterification using an acyl halide, such as acetyl chloride, or acetyl bromide. this is essentially an activated, more reactive form of the parent acid, and it does not require heat, it can howeve result if not controlled, also in amide formation as a byproduct, I'd expect that use of morphine as a salt rather than as morphine base would help act as a protecting group, it does for a similar amidation reaction, not of morphine, but of piperazine. This is a symmetrical diamine, two amine groups bridged on each side by a two-carbon chain forming a cyclic ring with the two amine groups para- to each other. Formation, selectively, of mono-acylated piperazines has of late been of interest to me. And whilst if piperazine freebase is used and the acyl halide added, one will get di-acylpiperazine, the acyl group corresponding to the acyl halide one would choose to react. However if piperazine MONO-hydrochloride, and I expect, the mono-monohydrogen phosphate salt (that is, one amine group being salted by monohydrogen phosphate as the counterion, the other being the free amine) is reacted with an acyl halide, the mono-amide is the product almost exclusively. This is of interest due to a nootropic, of the AMPAkine type, called DM-235, or sunifiram being a pet project of mine, just cleaning up the piperazine from a bit of dye actually. Starting from pripsen de-worming powder. Which is just piperazine dyed with erythrosine (a red dye) and containing, per 8g sachet of piperazine monohydrogen phosphate about 12.5mg of sennoside, a laxative of the irritant/cathartic type. This is of no consequence however, seeing as DM-235 is of very very high weight potency. Active dose range in humans is between 5-15mg so there would be an infintesimal, utterly inactive level of the laxative in the finished AMPAkine.
The synthetic route that will be used is simply taking the mono-phosphate salt as is, recrystallization to remove the dye, then reaction with first propionyl chloride, to form 1-propionylpiperazine, and subsequently forming the freebase by the usual means, washing it clean with water, as the freebase dissolved in the nonpolar solvent of choice, either chloroform or methylene chloride, then the washed clean base, remaining in chloroform or dichlor dried over anhydrous calcium chloride, separated and then the 1-propionylpiperazine freebase in CHCl3 or CH2Cl2 treated with benzoyl chloride to give the finished product, DM-235, 1-propionyl-4-benzoylpiperazine.
This is the same reaction, using acetyl chloride in the case of heroin, that would give that drug if morphine sulfate or HCl was reacted with a base (to scrub the HCl produced in the hydrolysis of the acyl halide, an amine is often used, pyridine is common, but I'd avoid that if a beginner certainly, using carbonate or bicarbonate is less elegant, but on the other hand its not toxic and the workup is simple enough for someone new to chem to get cracking with some selfeducation online if they were to wish it. Pyridine or other amines would need more workup and scrupulous cleaning to get it ready for consumption. And if you've never had the dubious turd sandwich of a pleasure that is encountering pyridine, its somewhat toxic, not extremely so but nasty enough, and it STINKS. In fact, come to think of it you probably have encountered pyridine before, as its used in very small quantities to add the disgusting reek that attends the opening of a bottle of methylated spirits, so as to warn the potential fucked up far-gone desperate alcoholic that might otherwise attempt to ingest the ethanol that is intended to poison, blind and possibly murder people for tax purposes should they drink it. The pyridine gives it that unbearable stink of whitish-grey-to pale cyan-greenish colored-smelling acrid, rotting fishyness (might get lost in translation, I admit, but thats how I perceive it, I'm a synaesthete
)
But either propionic anhydride, and heating, or propionyl halide (chloride, bromide etc.) plus base at room temperature would do it.
And yes, whilst I am most certainly not about to confess to doing a home synth of prope, the reaction itself is pretty much identical in principle to my project, the AMPAkine nootropic (cognitive/mnemonic enhancer and booster of LTP), although in this case its formation of an amide rather than an ester.
Me? I just dig science, and it isn't like the principles in operation with this type of reaction are particularly complex or difficult to understand. Anyone could pick it up, or for that matter evne the recipe cooks could manage it. Hell, if someone can pull off a reduction of pseudo/ephedrine then they are more than capable of it.
Thought I'd be in W/D this weekend, but by a bit of a prescription quirk and surgery opening times quirk I ended up getting an entire extra week's worth of morphine 30s too, that I can just 'spend' on lasting the rest of tonight lol. Lying back on the sofa, feet up, watching family guy on the cretin-canister, rolled a smoke, with a shot of mixed morphine and prope dope, clonidine, oral tizanidine and gabapentin, a bit of chlormethiazole amd some pramipexole, plus the pipe or two of meth. Meth all gone now though
Feeling pretty good all the same. No comedown in sight, not going to be either, only a low dose on the meth, but nevertheless, I'm feeling fuckin' golden
