Easy COOl experiments

[akcapr]

I would like to know some cool easy experiments i could do. I have a large assortment of chemicals and lab equipent. Stuff id like to do is synthesis (of simple stuff even) precip. reactions, things like making gases, making color chagimg reactions, etc. Pretty much any hobby-chemiust should kno wat i mean. Thx for the infoooo

[akcapr]

by large assortment i mean 55 or so chems and some beakers, flasks, tubes, etc.

[budullewraagh]

what sort of chemicals do you have?

[The Thing]

Depends on the chemicals you have. If you just want to do some lab procedures of, say, extracting not-very-dangerous gases, get a book from the library, since they are all over the places now. If you want to, say, extract fluorine, you'll need better stuff like platinum. So I'd say get a book.

[akcapr]

ill try to write em alll out, all though i dont wanna. here they are: HCL 50% 0f max conc., conc. sulfuric acid, 3% and 30% Hydrogen peroxide, Ammonium chloride, potassium permanaganate, sulfur, sodium carbonate, calcium chloride, sodium bicarbonate, Mg, Zn, oxalic acid, Boric acid, cobalt chloride, sodium silicate, iron filings, copper sulphate, manganese dioxide, manganese sulphate, iron sulphate, copper, calcium hydroxide, sodium thiosulphate, ethanol, phenolphatalein, glucose, sucrose, sodium chloride, magnesium sulphate, calcium sulphate, potassium hydroxide, ammonium hydroxide, ammonium nitrate, citric acid, magnesium chloride solution, calcium sulfate, lithium chloride, acetic acid COncentrate (almost glacial), phenol red, calcium acetate, zinc powder, ammonium dichromate, sodium sulfite, polyvinyl alcohol, barium hydroxide, glycerin, aluminum sulfate, potassium chlorate (very little cuz used it up), magnesium ribbion, iron powder, dilute H2SO4, bromythyl blue, sodium sulfate solution, iron oxide, calcium carbonate, aluminum powder, carbon (charcoal.

 

pheeeeeeeeeeeeew... thats about it... i might have a bit more

 

some of those i have synthesised my self like iron oxide and 30% H2O2

[akcapr]

by the way i have been at library and internet and pretyt much already did all the cool things that those sources had. Im running out of stuff to do. See the problem with books and internet demos and such is that they all demosntrate principles and laws of chemistry. I just wanna do some cool stuff that isnt necesarily supposed to show how a "base can nutralize acid" or to demonstrate "boyles law". I just wanna do some cool reactions.

[Nevermore]

ill try to write em alll out' date=' all though i dont wanna. here they are: HCL 50% 0f max conc., conc. sulfuric acid, 3% and 30% Hydrogen peroxide, Ammonium chloride, potassium permanaganate, sulfur, sodium carbonate, calcium chloride, sodium bicarbonate, Mg, Zn, oxalic acid, Boric acid, cobalt chloride, sodium silicate, iron filings, copper sulphate, manganese dioxide, manganese sulphate, iron sulphate, copper, calcium hydroxide, sodium thiosulphate, ethanol, phenolphatalein, glucose, sucrose, sodium chloride, magnesium sulphate, calcium sulphate, potassium hydroxide, ammonium hydroxide, ammonium nitrate, citric acid, magnesium chloride solution, calcium sulfate, lithium chloride, acetic acid COncentrate (almost glacial), phenol red, calcium acetate, zinc powder, ammonium dichromate, sodium sulfite, polyvinyl alcohol, barium hydroxide, glycerin, aluminum sulfate, potassium chlorate (very little cuz used it up), magnesium ribbion, iron powder, dilute H2SO4, bromythyl blue, sodium sulfate solution, iron oxide, calcium carbonate, aluminum powder, carbon (charcoal.

 

pheeeeeeeeeeeeew... thats about it... i might have a bit more

 

some of those i have synthesised my self like iron oxide and 30% H2O2[/quote']

 

Might I ask how you acquired such an impressive arry of rare, deadly, and expensive chemicals?

[YT2095]

probably the same way I did, what you can`t buy dirrectly, you Make with your existing resources. I have all of those chems and then some, only difference is that my Lithium is in the form of a nitrate or Metal.

 

as for the question, there`s not really too much you can`t do with such an assortment, the question`s too open ended to answer really

 

I agree with the Thing, getting a good advanced level Chem text book is the place to start, have a quick skim through it, see what takes your interest then do it, then learn about what you just did and why/how it works.

 

you`re only limited by your imagination

[raivo]

I do not see anything especially dangerous there.

 

Amount of great chemistry demos is not very big . You have to think what in chemistry is most interesting for you and go to that direction with your own experiments and problems. For example you may want to explore extraction of dyes from plants or something with pyrotechnics or making your own elements, but i think you do not find too much ready-made demos any more.

[akcapr]

my parent are chemist. Actually my dads a biochemist, moms a genetisist- they both have chems at work. I got about half of all my stuff from them. the rest i bought online

[The Thing]

Go explore the world of organic chemistry. So many different chemicals it will make your head spin.

[akcapr]

how i go about "exploring"?

[Dave]

Buy a book, look on the net, go to the library...?

[akcapr]

look for wat. im not quite sure

[Dave]

Well, you tell us What kind of things would you be interested in? As YT said, it's a bit of an open-ended question.

[akcapr]

well im intersted in chemistry.

[akcapr]

,ore specifically synthesis, gases, oxidation, and just plain cool reactions.

[akcapr]

not sure if thats specific enough

[H2SO4]

dude, thats the same thing i do, i have a lab, bought chemicals online and from those chemicals ive made tons more. I have bought alot of lab equipment also, and made some of it too (bunsen burner, burner stands,any thing that is found in a lab and is constructed of metal). When your in your lab, its not that your trying to make some new incredible thing, but your just doing it for the hell of it, just to experiance chemistry. I feel i am right where you are in chemistry, we have alot of the same chemicals.

 

As with the original question. I have done alot, but the one that always sticks in my mind was when i created ammonia solution. Among all the expirement, this one sticks. So the ideal is to heat an ammonium salt (use ammonium chloride, it works good) with an alkali (preferably calcium hydroxide). I used calcium carbonate. You can do this in an erlenmeyer flask, and have a stopper with a hole. Run a rubber tube to another erlenmeyer flask thats half filled with water. Dont let the hose hit the water when this is going, because ammonia gas is extremely soluble in water and the hydrogen oxide will suck back into your flask thats being heated and then convert quickly to steam, and blow out the stopper realesing the ammonia, then you gotta bail. If when this is happening and your tube is just right above the water in the second flask, the ammonia will immedietly dissolve, and there will be no danger of the gas. This is cool, and i did this because i wanted ammonia for no reason (actualy, to add to my chem collection.)

 

 

 

You can also try bubbling sulfur dioxide through H2O2 to get H2SO4. Theres tons of them, and seriosly, if you want to share idea, because were at probaly around the same place in chemistry, just email me and i will tell you everything ive got.

 

You can email me at djeglinski@gmail.com

 

Oh, and how did you get your H2O2, you said you synthesized it yourself. I make MY 50% by boiling antiseptic three percent (EXTREMELY DANGEROUS) down. Its a bad idea but i dont know where to buy H2O2!

 

 

Here is a small website i made probaly a year ago, and have progressed alot in chemistry from then, this is alittle more basic in chemistry then i am now. It has a bunch of neat reactions that realy are pretty cool.

 

http://www.freewebs.com/chemicalrecreations/

[Gilded]

"Actually my dads a biochemist, moms a genetisist"

 

My mom is a geneticist too. (Although I can't remember the exact title, must've been special doctor of genetics or something like that)

 

OK, some things you could do with the stuff you have (but of course, I also recommend getting a book about chemistry experiments, even though they are usually rather lame ) ):

- Some major hydrogen generation with Mg (or Zn) and HCl (and you could extract the MgCl2 afterwards, if you need it for something )

- You could boil that H2SO4 to a higher conc. and then pour a few drops on sucrose. At least YT keeps telling me it's quite awesome

- An Al-Fe2O3 thermite, although you have probably tried that one already

- http://www.chem.uiuc.edu/clcwebsite/ammvol.html with your ammonium dichromate, rather awesome looking little experiment

- Here's an interesting endothermic reaction including ammonium chloride and barium hydroxide (be careful with the BaOH though, it's rather madly poisonous, as you probably know)

 

"Go explore the world of organic chemistry."

 

Bah, stick to inorganic as long as you can.

[Lance]

Thermite is rather fun because you can use so many different chemicals for so many different results.

[jdurg]

One of the more interesting, and relatively simple to do, experiments is the genreation of the halogens. Making chlorine gas is somewhat dangerous, but really neat to do and you can have a LOT of fun with the product.

 

The first way to make chlorine gas is just pour some concentrated hydrochloric acid on some potassium permanganate. That will quickly and easily generate the gas, but it uses up the KMnO4 which can probably be used for better things than chlorine generation.

 

The better way is to make your chlorine via the reaction between calcium hypochlorite and concentrated hydrochloric acid. Both of those chemicals are found at any pool supply or hardware store and are known as 'super shock' and 'muriatic acid'. Mixing those two will result in the generation of copious amounts of chlorine gas, and the reaction can be quenched by throwing some sodium or potassium hydroxide on there.

 

All of this just requires a simple setup where you generate the gas in one vessel and force it to move into another vessel filled with water to remove any soluble impurities in there. After the water vessel, the gas is forced to move into a vessel filled with completely anhydrous sodium bicarbonate. This will remove any water from the gas. Finally, the gas is then forced into a collection vessel where you either collect the chlorine or direct it into another reaction chamber. Knowing that chlorine is denser than air you can set all this up with a few erlenmeyers, some two holed stoppers, and some glass tubing.

 

With your chlorine, you can react it with sodium metal and make table salt; you can burn some steel wool in the chlorine gas and make iron chloride; you can bubble the gas underwater near some calcium carbide that you've thrown in there and where the two gasses meet there will be flashes of light; you can make 'excited' oxygen gas which will glow red in the dark; you can mix it with a little bit of hydrogen and when light hits the reaction vessel you'll have hydrogen chloride gas; you can direct it over a solution of sodium hydroxide and make sodium hypochlorite a.k.a. bleach; you can direct it into a solution of a bromide or iodide salt and make bromine or iodine; you can store it in a vessel and have a sample of a pure element that you've made yourself.

 

If you make some bromine with it, you can also use the bromine to test organic compounds for complete saturation; you can react bromine with aluminum to see a really nifty and somewhat violent reaction; you can use bromine to generate iodine from a solution of iodide ions; you can freeze bromine and then watch it slowly melt and vaporize; etc. etc.

 

With the halogens you can do a lot of really neat and fun experiments if you just do a quick search on the web for the specifics. One thing that does need to be mentioned, however, is that the halogens are very dangerous to work with due to their reactivity and toxicity. It doesn't take much of them to make a really powerful reaction get out of hand or to make you very ill. So whenever doing any of this, make certain that there is plenty of ventillation and a way to quench any of the reactions. Having some sodium hydroxide around is a very good thing because it can cause just about all of the halogens to form hypohalites which aren't as dangerous as the pure halogen. The best 'neutralization' compound is sodium thiosulphate. It will neutralize the halogen completely and help avoid any complications.

[Gilded]

Mmm, halogens. Got myself iodine and bromine so far. Hey by the way jdurg, is it ok to put a bromine ampoule (most likely borosilicate) to -8 or so and then warm it in room temp without too much risk of it breaking? I thought about doing so but wasn't quite sure how safe it was.

[jdurg]

That's fine. I've done it many times. Borosilicate glass is very forgiving in terms of temperature changes. I believe that Pyrex glass is borosilicate, and that stuff can handle very high and very low temperatures. You just don't want to make the temperature change too sudden. If you take the ampoule and put it at -8 and let it slowly warm up to room temperature, everything will be just fine. I've done it many times with my bromine cuz it's really neat to see it solidify and then melt.

 

I still think seeing the liquid iodine was amazing. I still am not quite sure why it liquified in an open test tube without any pressure above the surface. The ONLY thing I can think of is that the weight of the iodine vapor on top of the sublimating solid created a good deal of pressure. Still, it was really neat seeing the thick, soupy purple liquid that was readily giving off purple vapor. Then when it was sealed and started to cool, the vapor crystalized on the sides of the ampoule. I have subsequently heated up the ampoule slightly to get the little crystals off of the sides of the glass, but at the bottom of the ampoule you see the solid mass where the liquid iodine solidified again, and against the white background of the holder you can readily see the purple color in the tube. (Though nothing beats the orange-red bromine vapor color. The setup I have holding all four of the halogens is pretty neat because the whie background really shows off the colors. For Chlorine you can see the pale green color next to bromine's intense red-orange next to iodine's pale violet vapor. The CaF2 isn't really doing anything other than serving as my fluorine sample. )

[akcapr]

ive dun ammonia, yes its stuck to especially the smell, i havent done h2so4 yt but will.