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Opioids Laudanum Storage?

B

Bruvvamoff

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Joined
Nov 6, 2014
Messages
11
Anyone who is not familiar with laudanum it's basically opium in pure alcohol.
I'm having trouble finding out what the shelf life would be of laudanum stored properly in a glass jar.
Pure alcohol will pretty much last indefinitely but what would happen to the opium after 1, 2, 5 years?
 
The alcohol should also act as a preservative for the opium, giving this a pretty long shelf-life if kept in a cool-dark place. I don't want to make an actual guess on a year amount, but I don't see why this wouldn't last literally a couple of decades as a result of the alcohol if it was stored properly. Someone please correct me if I'm wrong!! I would think the potency of the opium is likely to decrease at least some over time, but overall should keep better than just a bottle of pills (for example).

To be clear, all of that is a well-educated guess. Have you come across a bottle of ancient Laudanum or are you asking how long it will keep if some is produced?
 
cuivre said:
Have you come across a bottle of ancient Laudanum or are you asking how long it will keep if some is produced?
Click to expand...

The latter. A friend of a friend gets poppy heads and I was thinking of storing the good stuff for a rainy day.
 
I’ve come across some ancient laudanum, it’s very old, I’d guess around 100 years.
 
I don't know the actual answer but with alcohol killing any bacteria or fungus and morphine/codeine being known a stable compounds i'd say you could store it for decades. Like others have said, store in a cool, dark, and dry place, the cooler, darker, and dryer the better
 
It keeps indefinitely.
There's some storage place in London that keeps both legal and controlled Victorian and Edwardian drugs (Cocaine, Heroin, morphine, laudanum, opium, Aspirin etc) and the BBC did some documentary around 2010 and featured it and they tested the tablets, which at most had lost about 2% potency.

Proper pharmaceutical grade Laudanum (More than 40% alcohol!) will last forever if kept in a cool dark place.
 
If I remember correctly, laudanum is supposed to be opium dissolved in 40% ABV brandy. When I was with my ex, I made some from poppy heads (boiled poppy straw extract in oven at 110°C, until it was a black sticky mess. A couple of days exposed to the atmosphere and it turned into what would be recognized as opium.
Dissolved that in 62% alcohol, white rum. That seemed exactly the same strength two years later, being stored in an airtight jar.
To be honest, it tasted fucking horrible, so only got used as a painkiller, no recreational use.
Would have gone out, processed poppy straw and made more, but the memory of it's taste and the mess I made in the kitchen, mean I only ever think about it, then decide NOOO!
Besides, my wife gets oramorph (10mg morphine/5ml soln) prescribed, but even that has a stomach turning taste, IMO.
 
How do they standardize laudanum, so that it contains the same amount of alkaloids each time it's made? Something sold in a pharmacy should always have the same consistency.
 
Survival0200 said:
How do they standardize laudanum, so that it contains the same amount of alkaloids each time it's made? Something sold in a pharmacy should always have the same consistency.
Click to expand...
There must be some ratio like 1/25 or 1/50 for example./like other tinctures(means volume of alcohol and volume of substance.The stuff i had used long time ago was hold in big dark old-styled pharma glasses with label Tinctura opii simplex.contain 1% morphine in pure ethanol.One ml of that stuff felt like 20 mg morphine parentheral.If stored properly could retain its potency very very long
 
fastandbulbous said:
If I remember correctly, laudanum is supposed to be opium dissolved in 40% ABV brandy. When I was with my ex, I made some from poppy heads (boiled poppy straw extract in oven at 110°C, until it was a black sticky mess. A couple of days exposed to the atmosphere and it turned into what would be recognized as opium.
Dissolved that in 62% alcohol, white rum. That seemed exactly the same strength two years later, being stored in an airtight jar.
To be honest, it tasted fucking horrible, so only got used as a painkiller, no recreational use.
Would have gone out, processed poppy straw and made more, but the memory of it's taste and the mess I made in the kitchen, mean I only ever think about it, then decide NOOO!
Besides, my wife gets oramorph (10mg morphine/5ml soln) prescribed, but even that has a stomach turning taste, IMO.
Click to expand...
I'm using Oramorph right now to get me by (trying to avoid using heroin as much as possible) and it tastes of alcohol mostly. I've had it many times before as I get it at least once a month and I've had other stuff as a syrup and Oramorph tastes pretty fine to me.
It's not even bitter as there's sugar in it. If you think that's bad try codeine linctus. Now, that's rank instead. At least IMO.
 
The NHS supply ketamine, as a linctus, flavoured with artificial lemon. So fucking horrible, when I did the interview with Hamilton Morris, he seemed to find it hilarious that I virtually glued my arse cheeks together, plugging the stuff...

BTW, which country do you live in, as UK/NHS oramorph doesn't have any alcohol in there (as far as my tastebuds can tell!)?
 
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