Metal Nitrates / Oxidising Potential

[YT2095]

I`m sure most folks are aware that KNO3 is used as the most common oxidiser in Pyrotechnics (gunpower, lifting charges, fuses etc...).

has anyone here explored the possibility of using Other metal Nitrates instead?

 

I`ve recently made a small batch of Iron Nitrate Fe(NO3)3

I already have Copper Nitrate Cu(NO3)2

and plan on making Aluminium Nitrate Al(NO3)3

 

since it`s the NO3 part that creates the desired effect, I`m wondering if having 3 x (NO3) ions in a single molecule might be more effective than the single (NO3) in KNO3?

 

anyone here ever experimented with these before?

 

and does it procuce "more bang for your buck"?

 

edit, the method I`ll use is Filter paper burn rate.

[jdurg]

I'm not actually sure about this, but I believe that some of the nitrates you mentioned above will have a pretty high content of water in it. As a result, the water will hinder the oxidizer's ability to 'oxidize', therefore making it not as suitable. (Since the water of hydration won't allow as intimate a mixing). Plus, you would figure that the higher charge on the cation would create a stronger attraction to the nitrate ion itself. (Therefore making it harder to pull the (NO3)- ion away from the metal ion, thus making it less effective). Now i'm not expert on this and experimentation is always the best method, but I don't think it will be any more effective, and may be a little less effective.

[YT2095]

well preliminary results with the Iron Nitrate where a little disapointing, I used the paper I filtered with to purify the liquid for crystalisation.

 

notable effects were, a slow but self sustaining burn rate.

upon drying of the filter paper there was a noticable discoloration (a dark browning) of the paper over the heater, perhaps decomp reaction?

 

and the low burn rate could be down to the fact that the soln molarity if quite low at the moment.

 

there was also a distinct "Nitric Acid" smell in the air as it burned/smouldered.

 

 

it was only a test on a filter paper scrap, I`ll conduct a more serious test a little later when all are to basic crystal form and then weigh out the correct molarity to water vol and then do the burn race

[ed84c]

I Will give links to the results of my experiments, in .mov format.

 

Any body know how to give a link to something like this, where can i upload it?

[YT2095]

UL to your own web space then add the URL in the post

[Silencer]

no one likes .mov's either. Go for mpg if you want to be more versatile.

 

http://www.1asphost.com should give you some space for the movies.

[ed84c]

my digitazl camera only does .mov

[Silencer]

conversion programs are your friend.

[budullewraagh]

i think i can answer this.

 

we must think of this in terms of moles.

 

disregarding density, if one has 10 grams of LiNO3, they will have much more NO3- than 10 grams of CsNO3.

molecular mass of LiNO3=68.9459 daltons

molecular mass of CsNO3=194.91035 daltons

thus in any given sample, the NO3- anion accounts for 89.93268635% of the mass of LiNO3 while it only accounts for only 31.81200998% of the mass of CsNO3

 

in the case of Al(NO3)3, the NO3- anion accounts for 87.33238753% of the mass

 

however, one must consider the forces of attraction between the cation and anion.

in terms of number of molecules, CsNO3 has more oxidizing potential than Cu(NO3)2 despite the fact that Cu(NO3)2 has more NO3- per molecule and per mass for that matter.

 

ferric nitrate should be a reasonably strong oxidizer

cupric nitrate should be a poor oxidizer comparatively speaking

aluminum nitrate should be the strongest of the bunch

[raivo]

I think that most common problem with other nitrates is that they tend to contain water. Its remarkable how fast KNO3 will dry. No many salts do as well.

 

There may also be other problems. Once i tryed to make calcium nitrate crystals ( by mixing Ca(OH)2 and NH4NO3 in water ) It appeared quite hard task because of solubilty properties that calcium nitrate has. At first i got some kind of syrop and ended up with glass.

 

You may also test decomposition properties of nitrates by heating some small amount ( like 1g ) with torch and exploring what exactly happens. For example NH4NO3 and KNO3 will behave completely different way.

 

It would be interesting to see your results.

[Gilded]

"I think that most common problem with other nitrates is that they tend to contain water."

 

Amen to that. Almost every one of them are even sold as nonahydrates (one molecule of the compound and nine molecules of water).