What is a rosin press and a DIY guide to create your own at home

Access to most marijuana concentrates is a new feature for most people. With the flood of concentrates came the various tools used in different methods of creating them. A marijuana press requires only two components, pressure and heat, where other extracts like oil and wax need tools like solvents and take quite a bit of time to make.

Where to buy?

Professional level rosin presses come at a high cost and aren’t very widely available though they can be purchased online. You can buy a mini rosin press for around $450 through www.sztuopuke.com.

Though a larger one goes for as high as $1050 for a 20 Ton hydraulic rosin press, these are generally purchased by those looking to produce high volumes of rosin because of the cost involved.

What is a rosin press?

A rosin press (aka a weed wax machine) utilizes heat and pressure to extract the rosin from dried cannabis. It applies even amounts of both over short periods. The heat must be controlled to maintain and preserve the cannabinoids and terpenes as too high of temperatures can disintegrate those components which will affect the taste, and overall high a user will experience when smoking it. Since a rosin press utilizes a safe reduced heat, it also requires pressure to effectively extract the rosin from dried marijuana.

DIY rosin press

As crazy as it may sound, using a few basic tools you likely already have lying around like a hair straightener you can create your very own rosin press at home. For every 3.5 grams of dried herb, this method should produce somewhere around 0.5 grams of rosin.

You will need:

• 1 hair straightener
• Parchment paper
• 1 blade
• 1 small glass vial or jar.
• 3.5 grams of dried bud (or more)

Instructions

• Take a large piece of parchment paper and cut it down to be just a little wider than your hair straightener when it’s folded in half.
• Heat the hair straightener to 350 degrees Fahrenheit.
• Line the bottom plate of the straightener with parchment paper.
• Place 1 bud of your dried herb onto the parchment paper. Then fold the parchment paper to cover the top of your bud before pressing the two plates together.
• Press as hard as you can for 5-6 seconds then release.
• Press once more for 5-6 seconds and then remove the paper from the straightener to cool. At this point, you should see the rosin collecting on the parchment paper.
• Put the bud to the side, most of its contents have now been extracted and continue this process each time using a new sheet of paper.
• Once all the bud has been pressed, it is time to take your blade and collect all the rosins from the paper. This can be done by gently scraping and then placing the resin into a vial or glass container.
• That’s it. Time to enjoy that rosin!

What to do with rosin?

The marijuana rosin produced this way is 100% pure and free of chemicals. It can be used as a base to create THC infused oil or butter and can be smoked using a dab rig, hash pipe, vape. Rosin can also be made into a tincture using solvents for oral or topical use and can also be encapsulated for oral ingestion.

The effects of rosin

Because rosin is so pure and contains an average of 50% or higher THC the effects will be amplified by several times over if comparing the buzz to that of the initial plant is was extracted from. Rosin, when smoked, can affect the user for up to six hours before the effects start to wear off. When taken orally the buzz will be even more intense and have a time released result that can take upwards of four hours to begin to kick in. Since oral ingestion takes the body longer to process, the high can be felt for upwards of 12 hours before the feeling will start to die down.