How can I make clean hydrogen faster?

[Justonium]

NEVER BREATHE A GAS OTHER THAN AIR! IT DEPLETES YOUR LUNGS OF OXYGEN AND IF YOU DON'T KNOW EXACTLY WHAT YOU ARE DOING, YOU CAN GIVE YOURSELF BRAIN DAMAGE! IN ADDITION TO THIS, HYDROGEN IS HIGHLY FLAMMABLE, AND SHOULD BE HANDLED WITH CARE.

 

OK, that being said, I have been making hydrogen for the purpose of demonstrations showing how it is the lightest gas, in which I inhale some and then talk with a very high voice. I have tried reacting aqueous sodium carbonate with aluminum, and also aqueous calcium hydroxide with aluminum. (Well, actually the aluminum is reacting with water, but it can't happen without these catalysts.) Both of these reactions take several hours to make a sufficient amount of gas, so I was wondering if anybody has a faster method. I don't want to use sodium hydroxide, because, though it is not a gas, I don't want to take any chances, and I dunno, there could be trace amounts of sodium hydroxide vapor in the hydrogen or something. I don't even want to think about hydrochloric acid, that would be a breath of death. So... any ideas?

 

And yes, hydrogen is not any worse for you than helium, and it used to be used by deep divers all the time. You just shouldn't take a puff off a cigarette while you have a lung full of hydrogen. You might not not feel very alive afterward.

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Oh, I forgot to mention: Yes I was using boiling water to make the hydrogen, but it still took forever to make any significant amount. So yea, that's already been tried.

Edited May 23, 2009 by Justonium
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[YT2095]

a neutralising gas bubble scrubber, and activated charcoal filter would go a long way towards cleaning it.

else look into a different production method.

[Justonium]

a neutralising gas bubble scrubber, and activated charcoal filter would go a long way towards cleaning it.

else look into a different production method.

 

I'm not going to try to filter hydrogen made from a process involving harmful chemicals, I don't want to take any chances of leaving any kind of harmful impurities in the gas. I will only use methods of production that leave nothing toxic in the gas. There was another suggestion in one of my other threads to use magnesium and water to make hydrogen, but this process produces a lot of blinding light, and I don't want to risk damaging my eyes. Does anybody know of a good method of eye protection when dealing with bright lights possibly containing high quantities of UV?

Edited May 23, 2009 by Justonium
clarifying information

[YT2095]

HUH???

(a(i)I'm not going to try to filter hydrogen made from a process involving harmful chemicals,(a(ii) I don't want to take any chances of leaving any kind of harmful impurities in the gas. I will only use methods of production that leave nothing toxic in the gas. There was another suggestion in one of my other threads to use (b)magnesium and water to make hydrogen, but this process produces a lot of blinding light, and I don't want to risk damaging my eyes. Does anybody know of a good method of eye protection when dealing with bright lights possibly containing high quantities of UV?

 

(a)i) why?

(a)ii) and NOT filtering will achieve this????

 

(b) who on earth told you that load of garbage???

[insane_alien]

sulphuric acid on metal shavings with the resulting gas bubble through water would provide very pure hydrogen nice and fast.

 

your biggest contaminant will be water vapour and the sulphuric acid concentration would be negligble(you'd get more in your lungs from huffing an onion)

[SH3RL0CK]

why not just buy some hydrogen?

[YT2095]

a big chunk of Galium in the bottom of a gas jar half filled with water and then just feed it empty beer cans, that`s how I make mine for the Fuel Cells.

[Theophrastus]

I go with insane alien, as sodium hydroxide and aluminum, is a viable method, given the fact that the boiling point of ionic compounds, is by nature, incredibly high, and thus you have little worry of attaining sodium hydroxide vapours. If you're really worried, you can use an excess of aluminum, so that all of the hydroxide reacts, or simply bubble it through water, where the hydroxide will dissolve, while the hydrogen (currently in its stable diatomic state) shall pretty much rise (bubble) through.

You could perform a similar reaction with hydrochloric acid, or sulfuric acid and aluminum, of course. These of course have lower boiling points, but will similarly dissolve in water. As for the molten magnesium, in water method, yes, it does seem to glow a tinge, but there's no blinding light, burning out our sockets, or eyes...rather. (mind you, that might be rather fun:D)

 

To Sherlock: Why not simply buy hydrogen? Becoause, generally I find that a lot of people generally only purchase chemicals when necessary. In other words when they cannot be made from scratch with ease. Hydrogen, is generally rather easy to make, so no problems there. Generally its those harder to make chemicals that are bought, like copper sulfate, silver nitrate, etc.

Edited May 23, 2009 by Theophrastus
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[UC]

I go with insane alien, as sodium hydroxide and aluminum, is a viable method, given the fact that the boiling point of ionic compounds, is by nature, incredibly high, and thus you have little worry of attaining sodium hydroxide vapours.

 

Have you ever done this reaction, or even dissolved NaOH in water? Are you aware of the cloud of sodium hydroxide-laden mist that forms and how incredibly hot it can get? A fairly simple distilled water scrubber would probably clean it up just fine though.

 

Magnesium reacts fairly vigorously with vinegar and a dilute solution of sodium carbonate would be effective for scrubbing any acetic acid vapors from it.

 

Best case is to go with YT, but Gallium is expensive, even if it is reusable.

[Theophrastus]

To UC: generally, when one uses water, as a solvent, one would dismiss the mist as water vapour, then again... Would sodium hydroxide remain dissolved in the water, even following evaporation? As for the reaction with hydroxide, that i've only seen done by teachers, as a sort introductory display, to captivate students for science class. I generally add hydrochloric acid to aluminum foil, as hydrochloric acid, costs a fair amount less where I live.

Edited May 23, 2009 by Theophrastus
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[SH3RL0CK]

To Sherlock: Why not simply buy hydrogen? Becoause, generally I find that a lot of people generally only purchase chemicals when necessary. In other words when they cannot be made from scratch with ease. Hydrogen, is generally rather easy to make, so no problems there. Generally its those harder to make chemicals that are bought, like copper sulfate, silver nitrate, etc.

 

Really? Not trying to be argumentative here, in my experience most people will rather purchase almost any chemical (if the price is reasonable) than mess around trying to generate it. Unless of course, the purpose is to demonstrate how to make them. But to each his own; if you enjoy making the chemcials yourself, then have at it

 

In the original post, the purpose of the demonstration was to show how hydrogen is the lightest gas, not how to make hydrogen. But then maybe making it is part of the demonstration?

[UC]

To UC: generally, when one uses water, as a solvent, one would dismiss the mist as water vapour, then again... Would sodium hydroxide remain dissolved in the water, even following evaporation? As for the reaction with hydroxide, that i've only seen done by teachers, as a sort introductory display, to captivate students for science class. I generally add hydrochloric acid to aluminum foil, as hydrochloric acid, costs a fair amount less where I live.

 

It's hard to choke and wheeze from water vapor ;0)

 

"would sodium hydroxide remain dissolved in the water, even following evaporation?"

 

No, but that means that a mist of water vapor is generated that was not vapor at some point. This is even more dramatic with the aluminum added than when just dissolving solid NaOH, but happens in both cases.

[Justonium]

Wow, a lot of people have responded to this one. OK, I think I should mention that I originally tried making some hydrogen with NaOH and aluminum, but the gas had a smell so I didn't consider this method for my demonstrations. (Yes, making the gas is part of the demonstration, which is why I want a faster method.) The hydrogen had a sweet, kind of earthy smell. Could this be the smell of NaOH mist remaining in the gas, or could it be a smell of something used to make the NaOH? All of my NaOH was made by reacting soda ash with calcium hydroxide, which makes calcium carbonate as a byproduct, some of which is still contaminating my NaOH. Does calcium carbonate (chalk) have a smell when it is mixed with water?

 

Another thing: about reacting magnesium with water... I saw a youtube video in which water was poured onto a piece of burning magnesium, and the screen went completely white. You're telling me that this reaction is not blinding? I have looked at gallium on United Nuclear and have decided it is too expensive, so I wont be using it. The sulfuric acid might be a good idea though, as it's boiling point is very high. I still don't want to try it though because, like with sodium hydroxide, the reaction is vigorous and gets hot, and I don't want a mist of sulfuric acid in my gas. I don't want to build an apparatus to bubble my gas through water, as that would involve epoxy and buying plastic tubing. I was hoping somebody would have an idea that is a fast reaction not involving harmful substances, but maybe there just isn't any such reaction (besides expensive gallium) that will work. I may have to just end up building a filtering apparatus and using sulfuric acid/sodium hydroxide.

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HUH???

 

 

(a)i) why?

(a)ii) and NOT filtering will achieve this????

 

(b) who on earth told you that load of garbage???

What I was saying was: I didn't want to use a method that used harmful chemicals because I was worried that filtering might not remove all of the impurities (and because I didn't want to build a filtering apparatus), and I was looking for a reaction that didn't need to be filtered that was faster. For example, you don't need to filter hydrogen made using sodium carbonate or calcium hydroxide.

Edited May 24, 2009 by Justonium
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[Theophrastus]

Well, if you don't want to use any strong alkali's/ acids, however are disinterested in using gallium due to its price, I think UC's idea, of magnesium and acetic acid, then using a dilute solution of sodium carbonate to remove any acetic acid vapour is probably what your looking for, in generating hydrogen.

[Justonium]

Vinegar reacts with magnesium too slow, sorry. The pencil sharpeners just don't have good surface area.

[salter]

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.

[Theophrastus]

In terms of electrolysis, yes, it does work, however I find that the yield, unless you are using rather dangerously high voltages, is quite low. Also, while adding salts, will speed up the reaction, these result in impurities, for example sodium chloride will mean the production of chlorine gas. It certainly won't be enough to kill you, given the low voltages generally associated with amateur (non- industrial) electrolysis,though you'll generally be able to smell it, and I doubt breathing in chlorine, however trace the amounts can be good for one's health.

[Justonium]

Lol, electrolysis would be even slower than what I've already been doing, and yes, sodium chloride produces a significant amount of chlorine before concentrations of NaOH build up enough to inhibit farther production of it.

[YT2095]

If your trying to avoid toxic chemicals in all parts of the reaction... you could always use electrolysis of something like [ce]MgSO4[/ce]

 

the problem using that is that it forms a coating of magnesium hydroxide and this slows down the reaction to a near stop quite quickly.

I`ll also point out for the record that using carbon electrodes in H2SO4 although it works nicely for H2, you can forget about using the O2.

[Theophrastus]

I wonder, heat would theoretically accelerate the reaction between magnesium and acetic acid. Couldn't one assume that in heating the magnesium beforehand, the reaction would accelerate? The heat would make even more acetic acid vapour, but at the same time, passing it through a sodium carbonate solution would be adequate to remove these. Unlike hydroxide, magnesium acetate is soluble, and thus, won't inhibit the furthering of the reaction like hydroxide. Anyway, I'll give it a go this afternoon, and if I finally figure out how to post pictures on the web, I'll post the results.

Edited May 24, 2009 by Theophrastus
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[Justonium]

I wonder, heat would theoretically accelerate the reaction between magnesium and acetic acid. Couldn't one assume that in heating the magnesium beforehand, the reaction would accelerate? The heat would make even more acetic acid vapour, but at the same time, passing it through a sodium carbonate solution would be adequate to remove these. Unlike hydroxide, magnesium acetate is soluble, and thus, won't inhibit the furthering of the reaction like hydroxide. Anyway, I'll give it a go this afternoon, and if I finally figure out how to post pictures on the web, I'll post the results.

 

If you heat the magnesium sufficiently first, when you put it in the acid it will "burn" in it, instead of just bubbling normally. This is very hot and generates a lot of steam, not to mention possibly blinding light.

 

I'm also interested in trying these types of experiments with magnesium (if you eat it first it will react very fast even in water) but I'm worried about hurting my eyes, so does anybody know what types of glasses would adequately protect my eyes from strong visible and UV light? That is what magnesium makes when it burns in air, and though I don't know for sure what it releases when in water, I would suspect a similar spectrum. I can't use this method in any kind of demonstration for the sake of others' safety but I still want to try it!

Edited May 24, 2009 by Justonium
adding to my post

[hermanntrude]

any kind of hot metal placed in water (or aqueous solutions), even unreactive ones, can explode. goggles or safety glasses, and/or an explosion screen would be advisable.

[insane_alien]

Justonium, if you intend looking directly at it, welding goggles will do.

 

as for producing hydrogen, see my previos post about sulphuric acid and metal shavings. works a treat.

[Justonium]

insane alien, I agree that sulfuric acid makes hydrogen very fast with most metals, including easy to get iron, but I don't think you breathed yours. The MSDS for sulfuric acid says to use it in a well ventilated area, so I'm not taking any chances with it. I know for a fact that sodium hydroxide only poses a threat as a mist, as it's boiling point is way too high to form vapors, so if I find no other reaction that is safe like sodium carbonate and calcium hydroxide are (with aluminum), I will just use sodium hydroxide with aluminum, and filter the gas through water. Sodium hydroxide is also far easier to make than sulfuric acid.

[hermanntrude]

my apologies. I didn't read the original post. If you intend to breathe the stuff, buy it ready made in lecture bottles and buy the extra-extra-extra pure expensive stuff. or preferably don't do it. Generally, as a rule, chemistry professionals don't breathe, eat, smoke or otherwise consume anything they've made. At the very least, it's a bad example.