Engineers needed in Colorado

And I would expect that Washington State will feel the need as well. From the Associated Press:

Hash oil explosions rise with legalized marijuana

The opening months of Colorado's first-in-the-nation recreational marijuana industry have seen a rise in fiery explosions and injuries as pot users try to make the drug's intoxicating oil in crude home-based laboratories.

Since Jan. 1, when sales began, the state's only certified adult burn center has treated 10 people with serious injuries they suffered while making hash oil, compared with 11 in 2013 and one in 2012.

A bit more:

Hash oil is typically made by packing the castoff leaves and stems of pot plants into a pipe and pouring highly flammable butane through it. The concoction is heated to make the potent oil for far cheaper than it can be purchased in stores.

The golden mixture can be up to 80 percent THC, marijuana's intoxicating chemical, and devotees say one or two drops can produce a more euphoric high than an entire joint. It can also be infused into baked goods or vaporized.

You can also use other solvents but these are a lot nastier than butane. Butane requires very careful handling though - once you load the pipe, you need to maintain constant pressure throughout the entire operation.

Some numbers:

Firefighters in the state have raced to at least 31 butane hash oil explosions this year, compared with 11 last year, according to the Rocky Mountain High Intensity Drug Trafficking Area, an agency that has only recently started tallying cases.

The data represents only reported and confirmed cases, and the actual number of explosions could be higher, said Kevin Wong, an intelligence analyst for the agency. "This is just the tip of the iceberg," Wong said.

I am surprised that no-one has developed an open-source kit for this. They could sell the components but also spec them out so people could scrounge if they wanted. The details on how to build would be open-source and freely available. You could even do a forum where people could submit ideas, upgrades or new sources/vendors for the components...