When reacting butyrolactone gamma and sodium hydroxide, can they be mixed cold and then cooked, or does the sodium/water mixture have to be added slowly as the butyrolactone simmers on the heat? 

If anyone has bulk GHB synthesis suggestions or helpful tips, I would love to hear them.  I have experience making smaller batches and am going to apply the same process to larger batches, I'm just interested in making sure I am doing things the most efficient way.

Here's a tip, quit making date-rape drugs, but seriously i was under the impression this reaction was exothermic, but that stuff is about as good of a trip as a bottle of  dramamine - or so i heard. If your thinking about handing this out as X or acid you have bigger problems.

Sure, just add the aqueous base slowly to the lactone, stop occassionally to stir. No heat is necessary for this reaction, but it will heat up on its own and as it does the pace of the reaction will accelerate, so go slow.

The only things NOT to do are to either add all the aqueous base to the lactone wholesale or to add the NaOH pellets to the butyrolactone then add water.

This reaction is about as difficult as adding baking soda to vinegar and not having the thing foam up and make a mess (in other words, quite easy, just go slow).