thermite won't ignite

[akcapr]

thank you

[rthmjohn]

Just out of interest, how did u make your iron oxide?

 

I used a beaker and some bright steel nails for both the anode and cathode. Using thick copper wire, I wired the heads of the nails to an electric train set transformer (approx. 17v and 500 mA... not very efficient) and dipped all but the heads of the nails in the beaker full of high concentration salt water. If you have a more efficient method, please let me know; it takes hours just to corrode one 8D nail using my method.

 

btw... I used a $40 scale accurate to the nearest tenth of a gram to weigh out my German Dark Al. Using the stoichiometric ratios, the mass of iron oxide should be about 2.95 x that of Al. This worked great once I used ACS grade iron oxide. My mixture has never failed to light with a well-placed Mg ribbon.

[akcapr]

to make ur oxide nice and ornage u have to heat it. i encountered the same thing