Spectacular experiment with Mn2O7

[woelen]

I did a very nice experiment with Mn2O7. It is easy to repeat this experiment, but it must be done with great care. A description with pictures and animation is given here:

 

http://woelen.scheikunde.net/science/chem/exps/mn2o7/index.html

[RyanJ]

Ah crap and I only just used up my potassium permanganate... there is bad timing if I have ever seen it

 

Looks like an interesting experiment though - will try it as soon as my new supply arrives

 

The material formed in this experiment also is exceedingly corrosive. A drop of this material on your skin will result in instant very hot burning of your skin and possible explosion of part of your skin. NEVER EVER ALLOW ANY DROP OF THIS MATERIAL TO TOUCH YOUR SKIN!!

 

That sounds pretty damn nasty' date=' gloves for me then!

 

Question: Exactly how powerful an oxidant is [ce']Mn2O7[/ce]? Can you compare it with another compound to show its relative power?

 

Cheers,

 

Ryan Jones

[insane_alien]

maybe you should mention not to store it for any legnth of time. just incase.

[woelen]

Insane_alien, that is a good remark. This evening I'll add that to the web page.

[wpenrose]

That sounds pretty damn nasty' date=' gloves for me then!

 

[/quote']

 

Um, gloves are made from organic polymers. They will likely burn just like any other material. At least, you can't assume they won't.

 

Dangerous Bill

[akcapr]

I dont think rubbers will react with that, perhaps thats woelens new experiment?

[RyanJ]

Um' date=' gloves are made from organic polymers. They will likely burn just like any other material. At least, you can't assume they won't.

 

Dangerous Bill[/quote']

 

Don't worry, I am pretty shure the gloves I have will not react.

 

Cheers,

 

Ryan Jones

[YT2095]

Hmmm... it would be interesting to see how this substance would react with pure carbon, pure sulpher or a gas passed over it (propane or methane), Carbon I`de certainly like to know the result of.

[insane_alien]

What mad idea can YT be cooking up now...

[woelen]

YT, your ideas are interesting. I'll repeat the experiment with solid carbon on Mn2O7. I have some activated charcoal lying around and I could try putting a few granules of this in Mn2O7. The same holds for sulphur. I do not expect that passing a flammable gas over this will ignite it, the concentration of reductor in a gas is much lower than in a solid or a liquid.

 

@Ryan: Why do you think that your gloves will not react with this material? What are they made of? It would indeed be interesting to see whether this material reacts with the rubber of the gloves.

[RyanJ]

@Ryan: Why do you think that your gloves will not react with this material? What are they made of? It would indeed be interesting to see whether this material reacts with the rubber of the gloves.

 

The gloves are kevlar... not shure if it will react though.

 

If you do those experiments would you care to take some pictures... may be interesting to see

 

Cheers,

 

Ryan jones

[woelen]

I did the experiment with carbon, sulphur and glycerol.

 

With carbon, a small explosion occurred. This is not very spectacular, when viewed in an AVI file, but the experiment is quite nice. As soon as the piece of carbon falls in the liquid, there is a fairly loud crackling noise and a bright flash. An AVI file of this is presented here anyway, but the result is not as nice as with the acetone or alcohol.

 

http://woelen.scheikunde.net/science/chem/exps/mn2o7/mn2o7-c.avi

 

I also did the reaction with sulphur. Remarkably, with sulphur there was no visible reaction. The material did not set off, no fire could be observed.

 

Finally, I did a test with glycerol. The result with that also is quite nice. An AVI file of this is available here:

 

http://woelen.scheikunde.net/science/chem/exps/mn2o7/mn2o7-glycerol.avi

[YT2095]

Fascinating!

 

the only other time I`ve seen carbon flash off like that as a standalone substance has been under extreme electrical Current in air.

I wonder why the sulpher did very little? perhaps it`s not porous enough or maybe because of its polarity as a molecule?

 

the Glycerol reaction was somewhat predictable, and very reminiscent of the KMnO4 reaction with it, just a little faster

Nice work again!

[RyanJ]

Very interesting, great movies - thanks for sharing!

 

Cheers,

 

Ryan Jones

[aj47]

On a random side note, do you think it would be possible to extract manganese metal by electrolosis of a manganese solution i.e. KMno4/MnSO4?

[jdurg]

Fascinating!

 

the only other time I`ve seen carbon flash off like that as a standalone substance has been under extreme electrical Current in air.

I wonder why the sulpher did very little? perhaps it`s not porous enough or maybe because of its polarity as a molecule?

 

the Glycerol reaction was somewhat predictable' date=' and very reminiscent of the KMnO4 reaction with it, just a little faster

Nice work again! [/quote']

Could have to do with the ring structure of sulpher. A good test would be to use graphite as your carbon source and see if the same type of reaction takes place as with normal, amorphous carbon. (If you are REALLY daring, you could take a small piece of diamond and see if that reacts as rapidly. It may just be a structure thing with sulpher).

[woelen]

Jdurg I did the experiment you suggested. I have some reagent grade powdered graphite and it does NOT react. The charcoal I used for the first experiment probably is much more reactive, due to unterminated carbon atoms, while the graphite has a much better defined structure, with all carbon atoms (except at the edges of the 2D sheets) being fully incorporated into a stable structure.

 

I first need to rob a jewellery shop before I can do the last experiment . Lately I just was running out of diamonds .

[RyanJ]

Jdurg I did the experiment you suggested. I have some reagent grade powdered graphite and it does NOT react. The charcoal I used for the first experiment probably is much more reactive, due to unterminated carbon atoms, while the graphite has a much better defined structure, with all carbon atoms (except at the edges of the 2D sheets) being fully incorporated into a stable structure.

 

If thats the case then I'm guessing you would not see any reaction from a diamond either then? Afterall diamonds are pretty unreactive. On a side note, I once saw an experiment with a diamond - heated up with one of those mini-blow torches and dropped into liquid oxygen. It was neat

 

Cheers,

 

Ryan Jones

[YT2095]

if you have an old/broken record player, take the fang out the tone arm, there`s usualy 2 diamonds in that

[jdurg]

Jdurg I did the experiment you suggested. I have some reagent grade powdered graphite and it does NOT react. The charcoal I used for the first experiment probably is much more reactive' date=' due to unterminated carbon atoms, while the graphite has a much better defined structure, with all carbon atoms (except at the edges of the 2D sheets) being fully incorporated into a stable structure.

 

I first need to rob a jewellery shop before I can do the last experiment . Lately I just was running out of diamonds .[/quote']

Fantastic! It's always nice when a hypothesis is proven true. So I guess the ring-like structure of sulpher is probably the main reason why it did not react. The ordered arrangement of carbon atoms in the graphite also explains why that did not react as well.

[YT2095]

agreed, it`s Molecular structure/ polarity was a thought, although as a Porus substance Atomised even, I wonder if it would react then? I think it Might.

 

thnx to the Toluene thread I made a while back I now have near as, 100% pure sulpher, so I may just try this myself also when I get a quiet 5 mins

 

I`ll try some red Phos also, that too may prove interesting

[woelen]

This evening I had a small explosion, while demonstrating this reaction to some friends. I performed the reaction with a drop of after shave. I did this with the idea to use something they all know as a common substance. As soon as the drop of after shave fell on the Mn2O7 it exploded with a loud and high pitch and a violent bright purple flash and a lot of very small droplets of Mn2O7/H2SO4 were sprayed around, unfortunately also some on my hand and clothes . Lateron I repeated the same experiment with acetone, that again gives more like a flame as shown in the small animation. So, the nature of the reductor has a strong influence on the outcome. Please be careful!

It is surprising to see that 50 mg can do so much harm and creates such a loud and scary explosion (one of the persons was not amused at all ).

[RyanJ]

It is surprising to see that 50 mg can do so much harm and creates such a loud and scary explosion (one of the persons was not amused at all ).

 

It is nasty stuff... as long as you did not burn yourself too badly

 

How does this stuff react with acids? Or does it react at all?

 

Cheers,

 

Ryan Jones

[budullewraagh]

it doesnt react with acids- it reacts with reducing agents which are inclusive of some acids, namely hydrohalic acids. it could probably oxidize hypohalous, halous and even halic acids. actually, it should be noted that the "it" i refer to is permanganic acid, formed when Mn2O7 is exposed to water, which it would be exposed to if placed even in a saturated solution of any of the aforementioned acids.

[YT2095]

it would be interesting if you could safely isolate this heptoxide, convert it to the permanganic acid, and then react it with Other metals, I`de like to see Sodium or Lithium permanganate as a solid, I imagine the Lithium salt would have the most interesting properties.