Making Hydrochloric acid + Halogen Chemistry.

[[w00t]]

Question here, would having like more then 2 electrods be any good?

like have 4, 2 opposite each other which are positve and 2 on the sides which are negative..

[jdurg]

Not unless you have additional sources of power. If you connect your one power source to multiple electrodes, you're just splitting the current amongst the two electrodes and in reality weakening your apparatus.

[woelen]

Jdurg, yes it does, provided the power source is capable of handling this. My experiments have shown that. The overpotential needed for obtaining a certain current is reduced by a small amount (appr. 17 mV) when the surface area is doubled, but when the same overpotential is applied at double the surface area, then twice as much current is flowing. Only the resistive effect in the solution suppresses this somewhat, but still, the effect will be quite noticeable. Look at the effect, described in my webpage. In one of the experiments, the surface area was halved, leaving all other settings the same. This resulted in a drop of current from 1.2A to 0.65A.

 

So, [w00t], try adding additional rods and you'll see that you get more current. You of course also have to double the resistors (you need to connect more in parallel), otherwise the voltage drop over these resistors increases and the effect also is gone.

 

Another approach, which works equally well, is to buy another set of 5 resistors and hook up another totally independent cell. They only share the PSU, but a PC-PSU easily can handle two such cells in parallel.

[[w00t]]

i got it setup like this now

 

http://img57.imageshack.us/img57/8921/ownagecell5ot.jpg

 

yes im using pencil graphite for 2 of them but for me they take arround 2 days to errode away.

 

 

I finish holidays today so back to school tommorrow, ill see if i can 'borrow' some of them fat graphite electrodes

[woelen]

ill see if i can 'borrow' some of them fat graphite electrodes

'Borrow' ??? What do you mean with this ? Ask them kindly and if they don't want to give you a few of those rods, then accept that and try to buy some! Really, honestly obtained materials provide much more fun .

 

They can be found in hardware stores (welding rods), and you could also ask people around whether they have old 1.5 V batteries around (you need the zinc-ones).

[[w00t]]

'Borrow' ??? What do you mean with this ? Ask them kindly and if they don't want to give you a few of those rods' date=' then accept that and try to buy some! Really, honestly obtained materials provide much more fun .

 

They can be found in hardware stores (welding rods), and you could also ask people around whether they have old 1.5 V batteries around (you need the zinc-ones).[/quote']

 

My 80 piece glass set says otherwise

 

i allready though about asking around, i prefer my idea better

[woelen]

i allready though about asking around, i prefer my idea better

Really ???? I cannot stop you, but don't expect any input from me anymore on this subject. Really, honestly obtained materials provide more fun!

 

If you really are interested in science and not a k3wl, then please also take some effort and/or money in obtaining your chemicals and materials. It will make you much more respected and noone has to blame you for anything.

[YT2095]

I have to agree entirely with Woelen, stealing isn`t good no matter what the reasoning or false justification you apply.

besides, these things often have a way of biting you in the ass eventualy!

 

and I must admit that the tiny "Superstitious" side of me would preclude doing that in the 1`st place, I`m not 100% sure I`de trust my results and such (irrational I know).

 

just go and buy some man, or Ask, it`s not going to cost the Earth eitherway

[[w00t]]

If you really are interested in science and not a k3wl' date=' then please also take some effort and/or money in obtaining your chemicals and materials. It will make you much more respected and noone has to blame you for anything.[/quote']

i dont think im on the right page of a book as you, who says im a k3wl, im trying to produce chlorate here, doesnt mean anything

 

ill probably end up buying the stuff(electrodes) i dont really have guts to take shit from the table.

 

your chemicals and materials

i dont steal chemicals or buy them here in australia anyway (because of all the shit they banned.. lucky america), thats why im making it

[woelen]

I'm not saying that you are a k3wl, because you want KClO3. I also want/have that stuff. My problem is the 'borrowing' (stealing) of materials not the material itself. A real scientist does not steal, that person is honest. K3wls do steal if that makes things easier for them.

 

I personally like your attempts to make KClO3/NaClO3 and I really hope you can make some of it succesfully. I am also willing to help you with that (as you may have noticed already), but if you start stealing things, then my part is over.

 

Over here in the Netherlands, chemicals also are hard to obtain, but in due time, you will learn to know your sources.

[[w00t]]

Over here in the Netherlands' date=' chemicals also are hard to obtain, but in due time, you will learn to know your sources.[/quote']

 

oh there are sources i know of but they cost.. VERY HIGH.

if you came and lived here and asked people who do, you will understand.

 

i can easily optain stuff like: carbonate, oxides, metal powders cheaply* no problem but when it comes to (per)chlorates*, especially ammonium perchlorate then looking for a source would be next to impossible.

[YT2095]

basicly you want it all there on a Plate for you.

well we ALL DO!

but instead we`ve learned our Chemistry and MADE our own from such precursors as you listed.

 

the issue here is: are Carbon Rods also banned!?

if the answers NO (and it IS no!) then get back on track, stop moaning and proceed as you planned.

[[w00t]]

we're doing experiments with electrolysis today (some crap with copper sulfate solution) anyway i asked and she gave me 3 graphite and 1 copper electrodes.

 

shown here in my new setup, now its bubbling 4x more http://img115.imageshack.us/img115/5909/dsc005407vq.jpg

(30g)

 

its getting close to 3 days, ill try to see if ican get it down to powder tommarow and see how it goes, im betting it wouldnt work but anyway

[woelen]

Don't use a copper electrode when electrolysing for chlorate production. Even if it is a cathode, there will always be traces of copper ions in solution. Copper ions, however, form a VERY dangerous mix with chlorate ions. Copper ion is a good catalyst for decomposition of chlorate. Any composition made of the chlorate becomes a suicide bomb, when the chlorate is contaminated with copper.

 

If you value your fingers (or even more), then consider using another electrode for that copper place. A stainless steel cathode is much safer.

[[w00t]]

Couldnt it be filtered away?

[woelen]

Nope, filtering is not an option, the copper is inside the crystals. Recrystallizing might be a better option, but that requires quite some skills and a lot of patience and it introduces quite some losses.

 

Throw away the batch and make a new one. That is my advice. I hope you think your fingers are worth more than 3 days of lost time .

 

Yes, [w00t], real science is not easy and sometimes it is frustrating. I've been working as a researcher in university for almost 5 years and I once had to redo work, on which I spent three months instead of 3 days. Whoooaaa..., but it's all part of the game.

[YT2095]

no, that would be like trying to filter out the Sodium from Chloride in salt water

[jdurg]

no, that would be like trying to filter out the Sodium from Chloride in salt water

 

Well add some Uranyl Acetate and you can quite easily do that. Albeit by changing what you actually have and making it a bit radioactive.

[YT2095]

Ah.. but can you make a good Chlorate out of it!????

 

actualy when I posted that it was in direct response to #115 but I got distracted before hitting and never realised Woelen had already beat me to it

[[w00t]]

Hmm 3 days over anyway with the big electrodes it got the 150ml down to 30-40ml overnight, and there wernt any soild parts other the carbon deposit so im assuming its mostly chlorate (hopefully) ill get it dry to crystals in the oven and see how it goes

[[w00t]]

i put a match in to a small pile and it melted and ate the match, very much like KNO3

[YT2095]

with a nice bright yellow flame, Congrats, you`ve finaly made it! (literaly)

[woelen]

Indeed, [w00t], good work .

 

One word of caution though. Did you use the batch with the copper contamination? You cannot see that contamination, it is very pale blue, in low concentrations just white, but it is lurking there, ready to set things off when you don't expect it. The copper is not there as solid brown/red particles, but as ionic impurity, incorporated in the crystal lattice of the NaClO3. So, be careful when you experiment with this. You have to be careful anyway, chlorates are sensitive, too sensitive to my opinion.

 

If you want a really good product, you can dissolve KCl in water (make a concentrated warm solution) and you dissolve your impure NaClO3 in an as little as possible volume of warm water. Next, you mix the two solutions and you let things cool down slowly. Take approximately equal volumes of the two concentrated hot solutions. The KClO3 will settle at the bottom, the NaCl and possibly excess KCl will remain in solution. The crystalline stuff has to be separated from the liquid and needs to be rinsed briefly with some ice cold water (not too much and not too long, otherwise you loose KClO3 again). That gives you a nice product, which also remains nice on storage (KClO3 is not hygroscopic and remains good, also over extended periods of time, while NaClO3 is prone to deterioration).

 

Now, your product is like KNO3, but if it is purified, it is much more energetic. A glowing match, put in a heap of pure KClO3 will cause a very violent reaction with flames and smoke, and not just eating away of the wood. KClO3 is very energetic, much more so than KNO3.

 

Try the following thing to assess the purity of your NaClO3. If you have access to concentrated hydrochloric acid, then do the following experiment:

 

http://woelen.scheikunde.net/science/chem/exps/clo2/index.html

 

If you also get the bright and intensely colored yellow gas, then you have NaClO3 at quite high purity. Beware, do this experiment outside, but not in bright sunlight. ClO2 is a very sensitive gas and may explode, when hit by sunlight, so be careful and use small quantities.

 

If you do not have conc. HCl, but you have H2SO4 of 30% or better, then use that (dilute to 30% if more concentrated), combined with a lot of table salt to make in-situ HCl and then add your NaClO3 to that. That gives the same results if your NaClO3 is sufficiently pure.

[[w00t]]

Whatever i got now wont burn with Alpowder (400mesh), instead it melts over burns with charcoal though, not fast mabye because it wasnt mixed properly.

 

also with the match, it was burning really fast, it had the sound of a blowtorch when it was eating the match with a nice flame.

 

i've been to supermarket but theres no KCl salt subsitute, only ones with 50/50 sodium and potassium chloride, ill look more tommorow

[woelen]

Pure KClO3 burns really fast with charcoal, even if not mixed very well. If you light such a mix, then there is a 'whoosh'-like sound and it is gone.

 

Btw, did you do the test with HCl?