Sciencemadness Discussion Board

Addressing a few copper anomalies (Copper I and II, Nitromethanates, etc)

Rhodanide - 22-6-2017 at 18:51

Hi all, good evening.
I just went to try my hand at making Copper Nitromethanate. I dissolved 10 grams of anh. CuSO4 in 30 mLs of hot water, and 5 grams of Sodium Nitromethanate in 10 mLs of lukewarm water (very soluble). I added the Na Nitromethanate solution to the CuSO4 solution dropwise. I was left with a very dark, emerald green solution. Is this Copper Nitromethanate, or just copper chloride from the likely (though minor) impurity of NaCl?

Next up, I thought that, why not try making the Copper (I) version of Schweizer's reagent? I "dissolved" an arbitrary amount of Copper (I) Hydroxide in "some" 10% Ammonia. It gave a weakly blue solution, but it was a fair bit blue nonetheless. My question being: is this simply Normal Schweizer's reagent resulting from the inevitable oxidation of the Copper I to II, or is there really a Copper I complex present with a blue color?


Finally, my last experiment of the night. I reacted enough Cu(OH)2CO3 with a dilute H3PO2 solution in water, until no more CO2 was evolved. I left this in a shallow Tupperware in a corner to evaporate. I came back to check on it and was surprised to find a... white precipitate. Links to photos are below. What is this?
I'm at a loss.

https://ibb.co/h9fFHk


https://ibb.co/bEWBq5


https://ibb.co/hmOD3Q



Cheers,
-T/Azide