salter

So I have been working on a tesla coil and I just finished the primary circuit. I decided to run it alone (theoretically the spark gap should jump) but nothing happened. Heres the setup. http://www.physics.gla.ac.uk/~kskeldon/PubSci/images/tesla3.gif 10kv 30mA AC neon transformer. Capacitor that I made (rated at 2911 pF and up to 20kV, by my calculations) inductor (haven't done calculations yet... just wanted to see if it worked. But its coiled outwards and has about 8 turns and 3inches<radius<7 inches) Help plz? I would think that it had to do with either the power supply (both lines are hot not just one, and theres an anti short system) or the capacitor not working or the strengths of the inductor and capacitor are too far off. I tested to see if electricity was getting through by forcing it to arc at various points and found that power was just going strait through the capacitor (obviously).

If your trying to avoid toxic chemicals in all parts of the reaction... you could always use electrolysis of something like [ce]MgSO4[/ce] or [ce]NaCl[/ce] in water. It would probably provide the cleanest gas. it is rather slow, however, unless you use a considerable amount of electricity.

I don't mean the reference frame of the matter going in, I mean from the reference frame of someone outside the hole. To them the matter stops on the event horizon. Merged post follows: Consecutive posts mergedand i'm not talking about earlier matter exerting pressure on the latter matter, I'm talking about the new matter exerting force on the older matter that, to the observer, has stopped on the event horizon. The earlier matter has no potential to move unless an infinite amount of time passes from the observer's perspective, but the matter that lands on top of the earlier matter is in an area of less gravity and thus can move and be pulled in from the observer's perspective. Merged post follows: Consecutive posts mergedThat was badly phrased... what I intended was to portray that the matter that is closer to the event horizon (still from an external frame of reference) is being pulled in with much less force with respect to time than matter that is not in as intense of a gravitational field because it is being held back by the earlier matter. Therefore the latter matter pushes on the earlier matter. Now that I rephrase it, it seems to me that nothing would happen except that the earlier matter approaches the event horizon at a faster rate than it was previously, but regardless of how much matter is piled on and how much force is on the earlier matter, the earlier matter will never reach the event horizon. So it isn't what I first thought, that force was being applied to something that is not moving in time. It is just force being applied to something close to not moving in time (still from an external point of view) Right? Does my logic seem correct? Merged post follows: Consecutive posts mergedPerhaps, If I think about the event horizon as an asymptote... matter going towards it will never reach it typically, like a divergent graph. but if the rate at which it is aproaching increases enough, the "graph" could become convergent... And there could be a point in our time as the observer at which the matter actually reaches the event horizon and then force would be exerted on it.... Come on guys i need someone to answer other than me

Black holes and white holes have no connection. All a black hole is is a very dense source of gravity, say the earth compressed to the size of a golf ball. If you go into a black hole, you get crushed. If you could somehow avoid getting crushed you would eventually find yourself standing on the source of gravity. No magical portals through space and time. Theoretically, if you could go past the event horizon (the point at which light can no longer escape and, to the observer, time stops) and then come back, you would travel backwards in time; however, seeing as light cannot escape and nothing travels faster, you cannot get back out.

Like most people on this forum, I find the relativity of time with gravity and speed very interesting. I've done research and listened to lecture cd's about it... and i have had every question answered save one. If you have objects being shot into a black hole and stopping on the event horizon (to us as people outside of the hole) and matter builds up, would anything happen when enough matter piles up to put pressure on the matter that is stopped on the event horizon?

If you live in the USA, I would reccomend checking out unitednuclear.com. They sell plenty of useful chemicals and explain what each one is used for (including the color it adds to pyrotechnics) and even if you can't actually order them because of parents or whatnot, its educational and you will learn a lot about fun chemical things to do. I am personally a fan of KNO3/S/Al flash powder, 5:3:2. It burns REALLY brightly, about equal to magnesium, and is incredibly hot too. its fun just to see what it will burn through. For added heat and brightness, I add magnesium turnings that i get for $4 USD/50g off of ebay. They also make mean M-80's, but don't tell anyone I said that . The hydrogen idea is really cool I've gotta try that

Yeah we are going to try to do some predictions, but they dont need to actually match the results for us to get credit. I have some other ideas that are more complicated (and would actually tie in calculus) but this is the one piece I didn't remember. I'm feeling stupid about my ratios that I gave because those are by weight, not number of particles.

I'm currently doing a project for my calculus class involving doing calculations with flash powder. It has been a while since my last and only chemistry course and my teacher was anything but competent... I can't recall how to find out how much energy is released from an exothermic reaction or how to find the activation energy or anything of the sort. Any help would be appreciated. I'm using [ce]5KNO3 + 3S + 2Al[/ce] flash powder.

Thanks a lot, that was a big help

Ah, I wasn't sure about that. Merged post follows: Consecutive posts mergedYou should still check out the site tho its fun XD

if you haven't checked out http://www.unitednuclear.com you should.

You can always buy it off of unitednuclear.com XD Would it work to put some metal like Mg in NaOH solution? Granted, if it did work it would react with the water but I'm just curious.

Well I'm going to be using different shapes of copper to try to encourage different growth and if the copper reacts with the acid and changes form before the silver starts to precipitate out then it could mess up the shape and growth of the crystal. So then the one last thing I need is a confirmation that the copper would rather react with the nitric acid than with the silver nitrate. Or you could say the opposite was true and that would make me much happier.

rewording what i was asking at the beginning... So do I need to use up all of the nitric acid before adding the copper? If both silver nitrate and nitric acid are left, wouldn't the copper rather react with the nitric acid than the silver nitrate?

So i decided to grow some silver crystals. The conventional way is dissolve [ce]AgNO3[/ce] in water and put in copper, then the copper dissolves to make copper nitrate and the silver precipitates out. I figured that i would just dissolve silver in nitric acid myself... So my question is this: do I need to separate the [ce]AgNO3[/ce] from the nitric acid or could i saturate the acid with silver then just put in the copper?

Hmm... sometimes I collect copper sulfate crystals in mines... and if you get it on your bare skin it reacts with your sweat to make sulfuric acid... I know this for sure because it itches and burns really badly and its a pain in the ass. What could be in the sweat that is causing the reaction? Maybe this could be utilized.

[ce]2Mg[/ce] + [ce]2NaOH[/ce] = [ce]2MgO[/ce] + [ce]2Na[/ce] + [ce]H2[/ce] http://wiki.answers.com/Q/What_happens_when_magnesium_reacts_with_sodium_hydroxide

If you do electrolysis of NaCl in solution it is going to be hard to find something that doesn't react... if you want [ce]H2[/ce] and [ce]O2[/ce] do yourself a favor and use NaOH. I've tried pretty much everything save platinum and carbon... i've heard carbon works. And to theo: your problem is the current. You need to use a car battery... i was able to get 34 cc of hydrogen in 15 minutes. If you use copper you will get copper (II) chlorides like [ce]CuCl4^2^-[/ce] as well as NaOH and [ce]H2[/ce]... As for the Cl your gonna need something tough.

I looked it up and Mg and NaOH do react. wiki.answers.com/Q/What_happens_when_magnesium_reacts_with_sodium_hydroxide and http://www.jtbaker.com/msds/englishhtml/s4034.htm This would create Magnesium Oxide... the idea that it comes from a reaction between the NaOH and the Mg makes more sense to me because then there isn't any problem because of the - charge repelling the OH-. And the Ph would be much lower because much of the NaOH would have reacted with the Mg. If i recall correctly... I think I did do a Ph test on my version with only copper probes and it came out to a 9 or 10. You could test this because it releases additional [ce]H2[/ce] gas.

problem: Mg and Acetic acid react. Merged post follows: Consecutive posts mergedHmm... I suppose that what you found must be MgOH... considering that NaOH and Mg react . That rules out the NaOH idea... but the MgOH is likely from a reaction with the NaOH rather than the electrolysis itself.

If the salt water solution was concentrated it is possible that the white is salt (but that should be easy to identify) or what would make more sense to me would be just NaOH on it. Or a combination... the more I think about the MgOH idea the less likely i think it is. If you do find that it is basic, it just means it isn't salt not that it's MgOH since it could be NaOH as well. thinking about it a little more... i think the OH-'s would be more likely to just create [ce]H2O[/ce] and [ce]O2[/ce] than bond with the Mg; however, Na+ ions should be left over from the Cl-'s usage and want to bond. Then an H+ would be floating around and create additional hydrogen gas with little additional use of just 2e... The simplest way to solve this would be just see if the Mg has eroded at all. Maybe run the experiment longer to see. That coupled with the Ph would be pretty strong evidence one way or another. If i was you I would go crazy with this and build an apparatus that gathered gasses seperately (this is what I did when I used both copper probes) using clear tubing and hot glue, then take the amounts of gasses produced at each end and figure out exactly how much of each thing is being produced with respect to each other and time. Could be a pain but... fun to attempt . and after that you could even figure out how battery power affects the rates and amounts of different compounds produced relative to each other and amounts of different copper (II) chlorides etc. Also... there is a guy i know who goes by the name of Theo and speaks in the same style that you do. Do you live in Flagstaff, AZ by chance?

All things considered, i think the most likely answer is that both copper (II) oxide and copper chlorides are coming off of the cathode, accounting for both colors. I would assume that the Mg doesn't actually react with anything so you just get [ce]H2[/ce] from the anode and the Na+ makes NaOH with an OH-. hmm... I would still say that the white powder is magnesium hydroxide... perhaps you could do a Ph test or something.

to UC: did i seriously say diode? wow. I meant anode and cathode. to Theo: you should tell us which one was positive and which was negative and what ends gave what. If the copper was positive then Cl- and OH- gather around it, and that with the copper limits your possibilities. Assuming that the yellow is [ce]CuCl4^2^-[/ce] and the black comes from the magnisium end (since when i used both copper probes i only got the yellow/orange), the only possibilities of what the black one could be are combinations of H+, Na+, and whatever is in the magnesium. if the copper was negative and the magnesium was positive there is a whole range of other possibilities... you should try reversing the charges and tell us what you get then. Since I did the experement with both copper probes and got no black... i would assume that somehow the black has to be related to the magnesium or addatives in salt or impurities in your magnesium. but I could be wrong so lets go with it... if the black was copper (II) oxide (again assuming that the copper was + since thats the only way you might get copper (II) oxide), then the Cl- goes unused and would make [ce]Cl2[/ce], correct? and you would have 2OH- + 2Cu - 2e = 2CuO + [ce]H2[/ce] in addition to the chlorine gas. So if you feel sick when you do this experiment... lol. in theory you would then get chlorine gas, hydrogen gas, and copper (II) oxide off of the +... leaving the yellow to the other side. you have Na+, H+ and Mg (assuming the magnesium is pure) on the - side and I don't see any possibilites... correct me if i'm wrong, but this rules out the copper (II) oxide idea... unless both the black and the yellow come off of the copper and I missed that somehow when I did it... you should perform the experiment again and take note of where they come off of. If you can't within the next three days or so i'll experiment a little to try to figure this out since i'll be home from vacation. Merged post follows: Consecutive posts mergedalso the white powder... I suppose it's possible that it was created before you applied the charges and is magnesium hydroxide. Once you apply a negative charge to the Mg you repel the OH-. Merged post follows: Consecutive posts mergedHmm... looking at the possibilities if you reversed the charges... hmm you could get chlorine gas and MgOH if the Mg was +, or you could get [ce]MgCl2(H2O)x[/ce] http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Magnesium_chloride and oxygen gas (4 OH- - 4e = 2[ce]H2O[/ce] + [ce]O2[/ce]). On the - (copper) you have Na+, H+ and Cu... hydrogen gas. doesn't seem to fit.

the yellow is CuCl4 2- obviously the 4 is supposed to be a subscript and the 2- a superscript but i can't figure out how to do that in this... NaCl dissasociates into Na+ Cl-. So at your + end you get OH- and Cl-. the OH- - 4e = 2H20 and 2 O2. Theoretically you would get CuCl2 (or Cl2) from the copper from the probe and Cl-; however, the abundance of electrons and additional Cl-'s can create CuCl3 - and CuCl4 2- as well. CuCl4 2- has a yellow color. CuCl3 - has a redish color, and CuCl2 has a bluish color. The ratio for yellow:red:blue should be dependant upon current and voltage (number of electrons in the area... or perhaps surface area and concentration of salt water). when i did this with a car battery, i got a deep orange that looked like mango juice. here is a link to a wiki about copper chlorides http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Copper(II)_chloride also, The black is not copper oxide since, if you do the experement with both the anode and the diode as copper, all you get is the yellow/orange. i have done this myself and if you allow the experiment to run longer using solid copper rods, you will see that the copper erodes; therefore the orange/yellow must be a copper chloride. i would guess magnisium oxide for the black.

one more thing. The fact that no wierd colors appeared in the solution when NaOH was used instead of NaCl suggests that the colors that appeared in the NaCl solution must include Cl (or Na), as they are the only real difference. Either way it isn't copper oxide as suggested above, it is cupric chloride or whatever else.