Probably Stolen chemistry: caffeine recipe, purity and failed mixtures

Choose the Chemist scenario to reproduce this equipment path. Its starting inventory supplied the Chemistry Manual, the four chemistry machines, measuring tools, scanner, coffee, Kotton Fabric and containers. Double-click the manual and read its caffeine page before starting. We used the supplied Shabby equipment without installing Chemical Modules.

On day 1, open the shop and call the Cartel Handler. In both research runs, this first visit supplied Common Chemical Supplies along with three Dream Caps. Collect the supplies from the visitor’s counter before dismissing them, then double-click the package in your inventory to unpack it. The Acidic Solution came from this package; the Mini Alcohol Bottle was supplied with the starting kit. We did not buy additional chemistry equipment or verify a supplier route for other starting scenarios.

The starter kit and handler supplies cost no game credits in these runs. We began with 300 credits and paid 5 for the overnight Power Service, leaving 295. That is a record of this test, not a complete commercial costing or a profit claim.

Drag the Composition Spectrometer onto the actual bottle, pitcher or finished pill. A bottle can keep its original name and Gutterflow label throughout the process. After drying, our bottle showed TESTED 0.00% / Unknown Water even though the composition listed 70.62% caffeine. The heading was reporting water quality; the caffeine line was the useful recipe reading.

Compare quantities as well as percentages. Adding solvent diluted the initial caffeine percentage while helping the later extraction. Evaporation increased the percentage by removing water and alcohol, while the absolute caffeine quantity stayed at 26.93 ml. A rising percentage alone does not prove that you created more active ingredient.

Checked on screen · Nov 9, 2026

0:10–0:46 · 36 sScanning coffee beans and loading the Blender (creator chapter at 0:00)

1. Double-click the Blender. Drag an empty Standard Bottle into CONTAINER. The dim canister silhouette is a slot placeholder; it is not an attached container. Check that your bottle contains 0 ml.
2. Drag one Coffee Beans item into INPUT, then click Start. This item is a handful of beans, not a measured millilitre of liquid. Our Shabby Blender displayed 35% content loss and produced 52.00 ml.
3. Scan the bottle before adding anything else. In both runs it contained 29.12 ml Coffee Bean Mush and 5.20 ml caffeine, alongside water, physical contaminant, protein and fat/oil. If your yield or equipment differs, use your own readings rather than assuming this exact batch.

The caffeine page recommends alcohol at roughly three to six times the mush amount. Our measured 105 ml alcohol was about 3.61 times the 29.12 ml mush. The 150 ml bulk solution was not 150 ml of pure alcohol. This distinction matters when copying quantities from a different bottle or run.

1. Fill the 100 ml Graduated Cylinder by dragging the supplied Mini Alcohol Bottle onto it. Drag the filled cylinder onto the coffee bottle to pour it in.
2. Repeat with the 50 ml Graduated Cylinder. The total addition is 150 ml of the supplied solution. Do not add an entire bottle or count the capacity label as the amount actually poured.
3. Scan again. Our batch now totalled 202.00 ml and contained 105.00 ml alcohol, 47.08 ml water and the original 29.12 ml mush. The supplied solution was therefore 70% alcohol, with water making up the rest.

The target display is not the current temperature. Our first attempt stopped at 67°C: the subsequent scan still showed the original 5.20 ml caffeine and 29.12 ml mush. We later heated that separate alcohol-free batch to 90°C, but its caffeine yield was only 7.50 ml. The two full attempts also differed in heating and cleanup, so they do not isolate the effect of alcohol alone.

1. Move the bottle into the Heating Plate’s container slot. Our Shabby plate had no Chemical Modules and displayed a locked 99°C target. The separate actual-temperature column started at 26°C.
2. Switch LOW on and watch the actual temperature. The manual’s caffeine recipe requires at least 80°C. Our recorded run heated for about one minute and reached 92°C before we switched OFF. This is the observed endpoint, not a universal timer or a recommendation for other recipes.
3. Leave the plate OFF and scan the mixture. Our postheat batch had 26.93 ml caffeine and 7.39 ml Plant Matter; Coffee Bean Mush was no longer listed. Alcohol had fallen from 105.00 ml to 40.64 ml during heating.
4. Let the batch cool before the next stage. We performed the measured cleanup with the plate OFF, around 26–28°C.

This is an in-game cleanup step for the measured coffee batch. Six millilitres is our tested addition for 5.20 ml starting protein with that reagent, not a universal dose for arbitrary mixtures. Adding more reagent also adds impurities and can leave excess acid. Kotton Fabric’s tooltip says it strains large chemistry particles and is too coarse for water purification; do not substitute this procedure for the water guide.

1. Inspect the Acidic Solution tooltip and scan a measured portion. Our supplied reagent clumped protein into filterable debris. Its measured composition was 97.86% acid, with small contaminant amounts. Another research run’s supplied reagent was only 93.9%, so do not assume identical purity.
2. For this batch, fill the 5 ml Dropper from Acidic Solution and pour it into the cooled coffee bottle. Repeat using the 1 ml Dropper: 6 ml of supplied solution in total.
3. Allow the reaction to settle and re-scan. Our protein line fell while Insoluble Debris appeared. Do not filter immediately and assume that the reaction has finished. The final filtered scan below had no protein or debris listed.
4. Double-click the empty Water Pitcher and drag Kotton Fabric into its filter slot. Close that small filter panel. Drag the coffee bottle onto the pitcher to pour the mixture through the installed fabric.
5. Scan the pitcher, then pour its contents back into the now-empty original bottle. We obtained 125.85 ml containing 26.93 ml caffeine, with no listed Plant Matter, Protein or Insoluble Debris. Physical contaminant, fat/oil, residual acid and trace contaminants remained.

Use the dry CONTAINER bottle for the next step. Do not infer dryness from the label or volume alone; check the composition. The Finisher’s Caffeine Pill option explicitly says it cannot include wet ingredients.

1. Open the Evaporator and put the filtered bottle in CONTAINER. We also attached an empty 750 ml Standard Bottle in DISTILLATE; that bottle remained empty in our test, so this guide makes no solvent-recovery claim.
2. Check the machine’s installed Energy Cell. Our Shabby Evaporator displayed Required Energy 6/day and began at 40/100 kJ, with no modules.
3. Close the shop after the important visitors, open the end-of-day screen and sleep. We selected Power Service for 5 credits and the free Cartel Protection; cleaning was off. This run did not isolate whether shop power is necessary for this battery-powered device.
4. The next morning, scan the CONTAINER bottle. Ours had fallen from 125.85 ml to 38.13 ml; water and alcohol were no longer listed. Caffeine remained 26.93 ml, now 70.62% of the dry mixture. The cell was 34/100 kJ.

The starter Finisher did not preserve the bottle’s 70.62% concentration: the finished pill was 62.14%, with physical contaminant at 24.10% and fat/oil at 12.00%. The manual says Chemical Modules can reduce impurities introduced during finishing, but we did not test an upgraded configuration or establish a universal loss percentage. Packaging a weak batch does not purify it.

1. Double-click the Chem Finisher, click Configure and select Caffeine Pill. The menu specifies 5.00 ml required volume and no wet ingredient. Close the selection window after choosing it.
2. Move the dried bottle into CONTAINER. Wait for Status: Ready, leave output space and click Output once. Our click produced one pill and used 5 ml of the mixture.
3. Drag the Composition Spectrometer onto the finished pill. Our 5.00 ml Caffeine Pill tested 62.14% Street Standard, and its label matched. Its estimated/base value was 10 game credits; we did not sell it.

Scanner numbers are rounded. Values describe the actual test and may differ with source ingredients, condition, modules or processing time. We produced and scanned one pill from the successful batch; this is not a verified total-pill-yield or income projection.

The earlier baseline still produced a pill, so it was a quality failure rather than a completely nonfunctional machine. Its dry batch was 32.47% caffeine before finishing. A later reagent cleanup did not turn it into a high-grade product. Avoid promising a rescue until you scan the actual finished output.

The retail Chemistry Manual describes these bands and value adjustments. They are handbook reference, separate from our measured outcomes. Our runs independently reached Starch Grade, Junk Grade and Street Standard; the higher grades below were not produced. Treat the displayed grade as the authority at a boundary, since the scanner rounds percentages.

Checked on screen · Nov 9, 2026

1:54–3:00 · 66 sThe Chemistry Purity Rating page and scanning a reagent (creator chapter at 1:54)

The main demonstration and troubleshooting short are silent, with explanatory text burned into the picture. Original gameplay runs at normal speed; waiting and repeated inspection are cut. The complete text alternative and source timestamps are available below. The VTT contains the same explanatory text, not speech subtitles; avoid displaying it as a second overlay on the burned-in export.

Read the complete video text

Download timed explanatory text

Inspect measurements, source footage and limits

Tested October 29, 2026, in the purchased Windows / Steam game, installed build 26284217, visible version 100-REV3. Two separate Chemist / Mark Up (Normal) / Skip Intro research runs, no perks, days 1–2. Existing user saves were backed up and were not edited. All chemistry names, volumes and temperatures on this page describe the fictional game’s UI and mechanics.

The demonstrated recipe starts with the Chemist kit and first handler package. We verified one completed Street Standard caffeine pill, an alcohol-free low-grade baseline, an under-temperature failure, reaction/filtering and overnight evaporation. We did not verify any additional recipe, higher purity, upgraded chemistry module, ingredient supplier outside this start, sales or profitability.

The two full attempts changed solvent, heating and cleanup together; they support the improved procedure, not an isolated causal percentage for each change. Handbook-only statements are identified in their sections. Community questions informed the research, while the published recipe quantities and outcomes come from the original recordings.