Sciencemadness Discussion Board

KMn04 with wax?

mykrowyre - 12-12-2018 at 09:42

I saw this comment on youtube and wondered if anyone had tried this and could explain the details of the reaction which happened here:

"I once added a chunk of wax to manganese heptoxide thinking it would catch on fire and maybe pop a bit. Instead it detonated and cracked a window. That was a huge surprise. I couldn't hear for about four hours in one ear. It didn't react right away, it sat for a minute and nothing happened so I thought maybe it wouldn't react because it's molecules were too tight like most plastics (the polymers don't seem to react with it in solid form, if they were liquefied they probably would). I used a metal rod to move the chunk out of the stuff and as soon as I applied pressure to it, boom! Made a big dent in the metal it sat on."




[Edited on 12-12-2018 by mykrowyre]

Sulaiman - 12-12-2018 at 10:13

KMnO4 is a purple/black crystaline oxidiser.

Manganese heptoxide is a green liquid with crazy powerful oxidiser properties.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Manganese_heptoxide
http://woelen.homescience.net/science/chem/exps/mini-expl/in...
https://www.youtube.com/results?search_query=mn2o7

Tsjerk - 12-12-2018 at 11:48

I'm not surprised manganese heptoxide reacts with wax, it would be strange if it hadn't. That it doesn't right away could be, but as soon as it goes it goes exponentially, if the metal rod triggers that exponential reaction you get something like this. I guess it would have done it anyway when given time.

mykrowyre - 12-12-2018 at 20:30

Whoops I was reading down the comments regarding a KMnO4 reaction with Sulfuric Acid and Ethanol, and when I saw this comment I overlooked HEPTOXIDE.

Sorry ignore : |