Experiments gone wrong!

[jdurg]

Let's see. I've had many "incidents". Sodium silicate inhalation, bromine inhalation, fomaldehyde on the face, mild cyanide poisoning, diethyl ether combustion of my eyebrows, sodium metal on my bare hand, concentrated nitric acid on my forearm, concentrated sulfuric acid dissolving my thumbnail, and there's probably a few more. The one thing I can say is "Thank GOD for goggles". Without them, I'd probably be blind.

[Caustic]

i was making an experimental batch of rocket fuel (100+ grams) that contained mostly KNO3 + Sucrose, but i had thrown in some NH4NO3, zinc, carbon, and sulphur just to see how it would affect the burn rate. These were heated over an electric burner to melt the sucrose and i was starting to pack the hot paste into a cardboard tube when the pan suddenly ignited and there was a huge wall of pink/purple fire roaring 6 inches in front of my face! I immediately unplugged the hotplate, cleared the area of combustible clutter (it was in a messy junk packed garage) and reached for my fire extinguisher. When i sprayed the dry chemical extinguisher on the pan of burning chemicals, the pressure from the extinguisher blast blew the pan off the burner plate onto the ground and shot burning balls of fuel all over the garage! The dry chemical did little to inhibit the burning chemicals. Little fires sprung up everywhere and when i ran out of extinguisher pressure i started stomping them out. After about a minute it was all over and there was a huge cloud of toxic smoke pouring out of my garage which took a very long time to dissipate. Afterwards my garage was a mess. Everything was covered with dry chemical dust and ash. My arms had little burns all over them from burning propellent and my shirt was full of little burn holes. I was pretty lucky that I didnt burn the whole apartment complex down. My garage was full of oxidizers, gasoline, oil, a full propane tank, aerosol cans, ammunition, misc chemicals and combustible materials. It was a much needed reality check.

 

not too long later, i was making some bottle rockets with just plain KNO3/Su and to make the bore hole through the grain i came up with the bright idea to melt the hole with a hot screwdriver. The hot screwdriver ignited the tube in my had which was full of about 25g of propellent. Luckily i pointed the tube away from my body and no damages were suffered except for a few minor burns on my hands. Luck was again on my side.

 

Lesson learned: never overheat rocketfuel (DuH!)

[budullewraagh]

Do they use hydrofluoric acid in high school chemistry?

they may. my school is really stupid and we never do anything remotely dangerous. last year, our most "dangerous" chemicals were fuming 14M HCl, minute quantities of 18M sulfuric...we burned some magnesium. thats just about it for "dangerous" chemicals. well, we made some banana oil, which would have enraged bees if there were any in the room but since there weren't, nobody was attacked.

 

at the same time, i know somebody who goes to a school near mine, who supposedly made nitric using the nitrate salt+sulfuric setup. also, a friend of mine made silver acetylide for his final lab last year. so, i bet you could use HF in a lab

[YT2095]

wanna hear "STOOPID"?

 

when I was 14 me and a friend broke into a derilect metalurgy lab in a factory. I saw a plastic tub of picric acid and we took it home (amongst other things) at the end of the day both our hands and arms were all stained bright Yellow from this stuff, and we still never managed to make any of it detonate, so we gave it to a guy that was into Military memorabilia and equipment (a real trainspotter type) and thought nothing of it. I told my mate I`de ask my chen teacher in class next day about picric acid. we parted and then came next day....

 

I asked my teacher, he gave me a lecture, then I showed him the yellow stains. his jaw hit the floor and he nearly hit me! calling me all the stooopid ass wipes under the sun, and did you realise that it`s a carcinogen and directly attacks the liver you`ve probably got 5 to 10 years left to live!!!!!

 

I was then frog marched rather uncermoniously to the head masters office, the police we`re called, we drove to my friends school and picked him up too, went to the lad and showed all the other stuff in there and handed over SOME of what we`de stashed away! as far as I know that picric acid is STILL in that guys Shed! ))

 

oh yeah, and 23 years later I`m still here with no liver cancer

[Tian_07]

My favourite experiment screwup... melting wax to use in some melting point experiment or summat... and my friend dupmed a half beaker of cold distilled water into the wax... needless to say... w were cleaning up splattered wax for a long time... and we couldnt eva get all of the wax off... its like the oil effect i guess -_-''

[Tetrahedrite]

I managed to blow up an extremely expensive screw top teflon beaker containing an extremely rare specimen of the Murchison meteorite! I was doing a freeze-thaw cycle on the specimen using liquid nitrogen. After one of the cycles I screwed the top back on the beaker not realising that there was still a small quantity of liquid N2 left underneath the sample. All I can say is lucky I was wearing safety glasses, or I would've had pieces of meteorite and teflon embedded in my eyes.

[drz]

Well, I've never messed with chemicals to much, most of my mishaps have happened on the 2 wheeler.

 

My friend, however, was trying to hook up a propane tank to his toyota truck, hoping it would produce a NOS like effect. He duct taped a line from the propane tank to the input of the windshield sprayer pump, then, rerouted the sprayer to mist the propane into his intake.

 

Needless to say, he was found passed out in his truck, with the truck running and in gear. Somehow he managed to keep his foot on the clutch, but the fumes from the propane built up inside the cab and damn near killed him.

[jsatan]

Mine was during organic chemistry.

 

"Don't let the reaction over-heat' date='" we got told. Ah ha ha haaa.

 

I wish I could remember the name of that acid because it ate through a boiling flask and the desk.[/quote']

 

 

Was it this?

http://www.powerlabs.org/chemlabs/hydrofluo.htm

this stuff eats glass,

[jsatan]

Mine was during organic chemistry.

 

"Don't let the reaction over-heat' date='" we got told. Ah ha ha haaa.

 

I wish I could remember the name of that acid because it ate through a boiling flask and the desk.[/quote']

 

 

Was it this?

http://www.powerlabs.org/chemlabs/hydrofluo.htm

this stuff eats glass,

[budullewraagh]

it does, but it can't be what he is referring to, as he specified that what he had was more viscous than water.

 

another thought is fluorosulfuric acid...but then again i dunno if that would be used in school...

[budullewraagh]

it does, but it can't be what he is referring to, as he specified that what he had was more viscous than water.

 

another thought is fluorosulfuric acid...but then again i dunno if that would be used in school...

[jsatan]

Well' date=' I've never messed with chemicals to much, most of my mishaps have happened on the 2 wheeler.

 

My friend, however, was trying to hook up a propane tank to his toyota truck, hoping it would produce a NOS like effect. He duct taped a line from the propane tank to the input of the windshield sprayer pump, then, rerouted the sprayer to mist the propane into his intake.

 

Needless to say, he was found passed out in his truck, with the truck running and in gear. Somehow he managed to keep his foot on the clutch, but the fumes from the propane built up inside the cab and damn near killed him.[/quote']

 

What a silly guy, he will never get a nos effect, lol. hope hes ok tho,

 

 

@budullewraagh

Yeah i not a safe thing for kids, lol

[jsatan]

Well' date=' I've never messed with chemicals to much, most of my mishaps have happened on the 2 wheeler.

 

My friend, however, was trying to hook up a propane tank to his toyota truck, hoping it would produce a NOS like effect. He duct taped a line from the propane tank to the input of the windshield sprayer pump, then, rerouted the sprayer to mist the propane into his intake.

 

Needless to say, he was found passed out in his truck, with the truck running and in gear. Somehow he managed to keep his foot on the clutch, but the fumes from the propane built up inside the cab and damn near killed him.[/quote']

 

What a silly guy, he will never get a nos effect, lol. hope hes ok tho,

 

 

@budullewraagh

Yeah i not a safe thing for kids, lol

[Crash]

Ive never had any experiments go wrong for me.....luck or skill (most prob luck) and i do a resonable amount of toying considering.

The worst thing ive seen happen is a chick in my chem class was doing a copper content in brass titration and a guy shoved past her knocking over a flask of conc nitric acid, gave her a few scares and no shoes:p

[Crash]

Ive never had any experiments go wrong for me.....luck or skill (most prob luck) and i do a resonable amount of toying considering.

The worst thing ive seen happen is a chick in my chem class was doing a copper content in brass titration and a guy shoved past her knocking over a flask of conc nitric acid, gave her a few scares and no shoes:p

[jsatan]

@YT I cant remeber the name but isnt there an acid which doesnt burn your skin or anything like that but will attack your bones, ouch.

[jsatan]

@YT I cant remeber the name but isnt there an acid which doesnt burn your skin or anything like that but will attack your bones, ouch.

[slickinfinit]

I mixed potassium per-chloride and sulfuric acid when I was supposed to put the disel in the mix instead of the potassium. I was makin a chemical detonator for one of my self-built model rockets lol. I make them good now all I do is pull a string which drops the potassium per-chloride in the sulfuric acid mixed with disel (only a bit) lol cause they electical ones cost $$ and I like makin things. but I caught part of my clothes on fire which was chemical and only went out after rolling on ground and screaming for a min or so and was left a nasty burn on my arm only 1st degree so no scaring but very painful. I was 20 when that happened now I am ultra careful when doin my rocket hobby.

[slickinfinit]

I mixed potassium per-chloride and sulfuric acid when I was supposed to put the disel in the mix instead of the potassium. I was makin a chemical detonator for one of my self-built model rockets lol. I make them good now all I do is pull a string which drops the potassium per-chloride in the sulfuric acid mixed with disel (only a bit) lol cause they electical ones cost $$ and I like makin things. but I caught part of my clothes on fire which was chemical and only went out after rolling on ground and screaming for a min or so and was left a nasty burn on my arm only 1st degree so no scaring but very painful. I was 20 when that happened now I am ultra careful when doin my rocket hobby.

[YT2095]

@YT I cant remeber the name but isnt there an acid which doesnt burn your skin or anything like that but will attack your bones, ouch.

I can`t really think of any that wouldn`t affect the skin as well, but I maybe be having a blonde moment.

 

dilute HCl will attack the calcium in bones, and the same concentration wouldn`t have a significant effect on the skin for a short period, I don`t know if that`s what your thinking of?

[YT2095]

@YT I cant remeber the name but isnt there an acid which doesnt burn your skin or anything like that but will attack your bones, ouch.

I can`t really think of any that wouldn`t affect the skin as well, but I maybe be having a blonde moment.

 

dilute HCl will attack the calcium in bones, and the same concentration wouldn`t have a significant effect on the skin for a short period, I don`t know if that`s what your thinking of?

[Gilded]

"when I was 14 me and a friend broke into a derilect metalurgy lab in a factory."

 

And now some kids are breaking into/destroying your shed. Ever heard of karma?

[Gilded]

"when I was 14 me and a friend broke into a derilect metalurgy lab in a factory."

 

And now some kids are breaking into/destroying your shed. Ever heard of karma?

[Radical Edward]

best thing I ever did in a lab was heating a pipette. This was in biology and the pipettes were thick glass with a very narrow bore. anyways, you heat up the tube until one end is red hot, and then rapidly dunk that end in water. the water boils around the glass and has only one place to go; up the tube. This has the glorious effect of launching a stream of boiling water across the room and shattering the pipette, much to the chagrin of my teacher, and to our amusement.

[Auk]

My experiment gone wrong would be when I made my own rcket propelant and it blew up. That was scary. I haven't tried it again since.