cnidocyte
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Aesthetically pleasing chemical reactions
Now that I've got a fire proof fume hood set up I'm trying to think of relatively safe, cool looking chemical reactions I can show people. Preferably
reactions involving OTC chemicals. I know the alkali metals in water look pretty cool. A flaming ball of lithium rolling around the surface of a
beaker of water is sure to fascinate some people but thats all I can really think of at the moment.
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chemoleo
Biochemicus Energeticus
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Please browse the forums, I recall several threads on this.
Search for demonstration , chemistry for kids, pyrotechnics, pharaoh snake etc. There'll be ideas in there to go further! I think there's little need
to open yet another thread so please continue posting your own ideas etc in there. cheers.
Never Stop to Begin, and Never Begin to Stop...
Tolerance is good. But not with the intolerant! (Wilhelm Busch)
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The WiZard is In
International Hazard
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Quote: Originally posted by cnidocyte  | | Now that I've got a fire proof fume hood set up I'm trying to think of relatively safe, cool looking chemical reactions I can show people. Preferably
reactions involving OTC chemicals. I know the alkali metals in water look pretty cool. A flaming ball of lithium rolling around the surface of a
beaker of water is sure to fascinate some people but thats all I can really think of at the moment. |
There are being any number of Chemical Magic books.
Run it through Amazon.com or same such.
I have yet to see this book :
Chemical Magic from the Grocery Store
Andy Sae
Speaking of good looking reactions —
A Reaction of Potassium Ferrocyanide.
A. Gutbier. Z. anorg. Chem., 1904, 41, 61-62.
In:—The Journal of the Society of Chemical Industry.
23 [18] 915. September 30, 1904.
A solution of potassium ferrocyanide, when warmed with a freshly prepared
solution of phenylhydrazine, acquired a brownish-red colour, changing to bright
red and then to deep red, and finally became suddenly colourless, with the
separation of a yellowish-green precipitate and with vigorous evolution of
hydrocyanic acid and nitrogen. The mixture was now distilled with steam ; a dark-
coloured oil insoluble in caustic soda solution, distilled over, whilst a greenish-
blue residue was left, below a layer of a violet-coloured liquid. The volatile oil,
after purification, solidified, when cooled by a freezing mixture, to a bright red
mass, from which, on a earthenware plate, a yellow oil ran off, whilst a bright red
mass, melting about 45o C., remained behind. The yellow oil, when treated with
strong sulphuric acid, was coloured first green and then brown, with separation of
a solid, apparently crystalline mass.
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Well …. I confess to not knowing just what the reactions involved are, and why
Herr Gutbier cooked them up! Me thinks a check of the original source would
prove productive.
However, remembering that some ferrocyanide compounds especially iron ones
are strongly coloured, e.g., “Prussian and Milori Blue”, perhaps Herr Gutbier was
looking for new pigments.
The Chemistry of Ferrocyanides. American Cyanamid Co. 1953. Cites this paper
under Table XV, Ferrocyanides of Miscellaneous Organic Bases.
Hydrazine, phenyl-
Also same author ( Ref. 309.) Chem Cent. 1904, II, 892
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mr.crow
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Resubliming iodine was aesthetically pleasing. The boiling liquid iodine and purple gas was pretty amazing.
Double, double toil and trouble; Fire burn, and caldron bubble
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