How to Make Essential Oils | Steam Distilling Geranium

Geranium essential oil is a commonly used natural aromatic substance used in beauty and medicine. The extraction method mainly uses steam distillation. The following is the detailed process flow for extracting essential oil from geranium.

1. Raw material preparation: First, choose fresh geranium leaves. Since the content of aromatic substances varies before and after flowering, fresh geranium leaves before flowering are generally selected as raw materials. Cut and pluck the geraniums and clean them to remove impurities and residual soil.

2. Crushing: Put the cleaned geranium into a special crusher and crush it. The purpose is to increase the contact surface area between raw materials and water vapor, which is beneficial to the release of extracted substances.

3. Distillation: Place the crushed geranium into a steam distiller. The distiller is usually divided into three parts, the bottom is the heating part for distilled water, the middle is the part where aromatic raw materials come into contact with distilled water, and the top is the part where aromatic substances are collected. Add an appropriate amount of water to the bottom and heat it to boil the water to produce steam. The water vapor passes through the aromatic raw materials from the bottom, taking away the aromatic substances, and then enters the top collection part.

4. Separation: The water vapor collected from distilled water contains the extracted geranium essential oil and a trace amount of water. Through cooling and condensation, water vapor is converted into liquid. Because essential oils are lighter in density, they usually sit in the upper part of the liquid. Use a separatory funnel to separate the distillate into two layers, the upper layer is Geranium essential oil and the lower layer is water. Collect the upper layer of essential oil.

5. Storage: The collected geranium essential oil can be stored in glass bottles after preliminary treatment. Processing typically involves filtering and removing impurities and ensuring the purity and quality of the essential oil.

In summary, the process for extracting essential oil from Geranium geranium mainly includes raw material preparation, crushing, distillation, separation and storage. This process can effectively extract the essential oil from Geranium and ensure the quality and purity of the essential oil. It is worth mentioning that in actual applications, some adjustments and improvements may be made according to different products and needs to obtain better extraction results.