The agarwood production process to create valuable agarwood essential oil, agarwood incense, or agarwood bracelet products that bring fortune and peace is not as simple as many people think. However, it is the meticulousness and dedication of the artisans throughout the agarwood production process that create the most exquisite and quality agarwood products.
Known as the wood of the Gods, the wood of spirituality, agarwood is a type of wood with a healing scent and brings great spiritual value. In the context of increasing demand for agarwood, not only in Vietnam but around the world, many individuals and organizations wish to successfully grow and launch high-quality products from agarwood.
Discover and learn about the agarwood production process to see the meticulousness and extremely high requirements to create high-class products.
Choosing the source of agarwood raw materials – the most important step in the agarwood production process
Using agarwood grown in which area, whether it is cared for according to standards and harvested at the right time is a prerequisite for creating quality products. When learning about the agarwood production process, most users only know a part from the manufacturing and processing stages into products, but unintentionally ignore the core of the product.
Not all areas are suitable for growing agarwood, the most suitable is at an altitude of 750m above sea level and the soil is rich in nutrients. However, agarwood cannot live independently on its own and needs to be implanted with a microbial solution into a mature Aquilaria tree (10 years or older) – so the agarwood production process is very long and requires patience. Continue to wait for about 3 to 5 years or more, and the agarwood will be “large” enough and of the best quality to be harvested to create essential oils, make incense, or make handmade products from agarwood such as bracelets.
Large and reputable agarwood production facilities can invest from the steps of planting and caring for Aquilaria trees to cultivating agarwood and harvesting, then apply new technologies to take advantage of all the values that agarwood brings. The agarwood tree is sawed close to the root, then the artisans will classify the different parts as suitable for what purpose (there are parts with the highest essential oil content and the highest quality, which are the most valuable parts).
Detailed process of producing 100% standard agarwood essential oil
Agarwood essential oil contains warming and balancing properties, bringing a feeling of relaxation and peace to the soul. In some Middle Eastern states, each precious drop is sprinkled on wedding invitations, and agarwood essential oil is also used in Buddhist cultural events. For health, agarwood essential oil is very useful in neurological diseases, gastrointestinal diseases, rheumatism, diseases during and after childbirth, stomach pain, asthma, and even supports cancer treatment.
Because of its value, agarwood essential oil products are not cheap, but those who choose well and are knowledgeable are still willing to buy the best quality products. They understand that creating a drop of agarwood essential oil requires the most closed and delicate agarwood production process.
The main factor when extracting the oil is to ensure that the agarwood grown from the tree must be 8-12 years old to obtain the oil. The extraction method is done through distillation mainly. In the first stage of the steam distillation process, agarwood is soaked in water for 1 to 3 months. Then, the stained wood is placed in large boilers, the water will evaporate with the resin and accumulate in the condenser, details are as follows:
1. Process of producing agarwood essential oil by filtering water
With this method, agarwood pieces are completely soaked in water, forming a real wood ‘soup’ and boiled in giant boilers. The steam consisting of plant molecules is collected and condensed, and the essential oil floats to the top of the distilled water. When the conductor melts, the oil and hydrosol are separated and finally agarwood essential oil is obtained.
2. Steps to create agarwood essential oil using the water distillation method
This technique protects the extracted oil to a certain extent because the surrounding water functions as a barrier to prevent loss. Filtering water to obtain agarwood essential oil can be done at low pressure or in a vacuum environment to significantly reduce the temperature below 100°C. This method is quite costly and makes the price of agarwood essential oil more expensive, so it is not as popular as the water filtration method above.
3. Steam distillation to get agarwood essential oil (best method)
Steam distillation is said to be the best way to isolate and extract essential oils in general and create agarwood essential oil in particular, but the process of producing this agarwood is quite complicated.
First, the agarwood is put into the steam distillation pot, the heat causes the molecules of the agarwood to open and the aromatic particles rise with the steam. Next, the vapor carrying these molecules moves inside a closed system to the cooling device, where it cools, condenses, and changes to a liquid state.
However, next one must pipe the collected liquid in a container to separate the oil and water – at this point the agarwood essential oil is extremely concentrated. Using this method, it takes about 8,000 – 10,000 kg (8 – 10 tons) of agarwood to produce 1 liter of essential oil. This is also the highest quality, most expensive, and most valuable agarwood essential oil.
Discover 5 steps to make standard, fragrant incense
1. Choose quality agarwood and grind it into very finely powder
There are parts of agarwood that are very suitable for making incense. People will put these pieces of wood into a grinder to grind them into fine powder according to available standards. However, the agarwood production process into incense requires the operator to accurately control the machine temperature and the state of the ground powder to ensure the creation of quality incense and maintain the amount of essential oil with the characteristic aroma of agarwood.
2. Combine agarwood powder with Litsea glue in standard proportions
Using the finely ground agarwood powder above, the incense maker will mix it with a little (insignificant ratio) of Litsea tree glue and pure water to create a certain adhesion. Of course, high-quality agarwood incense will not be mixed with any other plant powders or chemicals, this production process needs to be 100% guaranteed without errors or “overdo” in terms of ratio.
3. Use a compressor to shape the incense stick
Instead of sewing each incense stick, today’s incense products use high-end compressors to create products that are uniform in both size and quality.
4. Dry the incense in a drying room or use sunlight
The quality of agarwood incense depends largely on the raw materials and drying process – temperature and light need to be maintained stable in a clean environment so that the scent does not disappear, there is no mold, the incense is not burned, etc.
Normally, most establishments apply standard agarwood production processes to dry agarwood incense with high-quality drying rooms, maintaining the most stable temperature. If you want to dry incense under natural sunlight, you will need to pay close attention to weather factors and unwanted effects.
5. Dehumidify and package according to standards, completing the agarwood production process
The agarwood incense production process can only be completed after the product has been dried properly, tested for its ability to burn evenly, radiate fragrance in reality, and then dehumidified and packaged according to standards.
The process of producing agarwood into a delicate agarwood bracelet product
Agarwood bracelets are full of aesthetics, used both as jewelry and to help the body and mind be at peace and the wearer achieve much success and luck in life. Compared to the process of producing essential oils or agarwood incense, making agarwood bracelets involves many very different technical operations, requiring the participation of real artisans.
– First, the artist will need to choose suitable agarwood casts and clean them. With the scarcity of high-quality agarwood, choosing embryos to create agarwood bracelet products is not easy.
– Next in the process of making agarwood bracelets, artisans must skillfully use talented hands to create each small blank and punch holes.
– Put the agarwood embryo into a water grinding machine to turn them into small round particles of similar size and basic aesthetics.
– To have beautiful agarwood beads that carry the full feng shui meaning of luck and peace, the artist will select the most beautiful beads, remove all broken, cracked, loose or substandard-sized seeds, and then meticulously beat until smooth.
– Polish each agarwood bead before stringing it into agarwood bracelets of different sizes, lengths, and uses.
The agarwood production process to create natural agarwood bracelets requires a high level of meticulousness, detail, and dedication to each agarwood bead, so the price cannot be low.
Sometimes, each artisan has to spend many days to create a short bracelet, and in many cases, the high-end bracelet reaching the customer must go through an extremely high selection rate – the initial 1,000 to 2,000 beads are only maybe 100 – 200 beads perfect enough to be selected.
Conclusion
In order for quality agarwood products to reach customers, a lot of effort needs to be made with human hands, brains, and the support of high-tech machinery and techniques. The detailed agarwood production process above that https://oudhouse.net/ shares is the most standard process applied at reputable establishments.
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