Godspeed429
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is this Cobalt(II) sulfate?
Hello
i have been getting very interested in Electrochemistry and chemistry in general lately and i would like some help in the next step of my "project".
My project is to separate the metals from a carbide end mill. so here is what i did.
I took a piece of carbide as my anode, used a piece of banding steel as the cathode, NaHCO3 as my electrolyte and ran electricity through it for a
very long .................long time.Then collected the waste and filtered.(A)
From my research the piece is made of tungsten carbide 60-100% cobalt up to 30% chromium carbide .1-1% vanadium carbide .1-1% and tantalum carbide
0-50%. I highly doubt that there is much or any tantalum carbide in it because this is just a General Purpose end mill but i could be wrong. After
more research i found that cobalt is the only element that would react with Sulfuric acid under normal circumstances so i took 1 gram and added to
1.5ml diluted Sulfuric acid (B). After about 5 minutes it turned a dark red/Burgundy color.(C) After the reaction stopped i filtered what i assume
is Cobalt sulfate from what did not dissolve.
So is that Cobalt sulfate? if it is couldn't I use this process to extract all of cobalt from the material?
thanks!
FYI the end mill is made by IMCO part# 30761
   
[Edited on 4-7-2013 by Godspeed429]
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woelen
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The color is indeed is the color of cobalt(II) in aqueous solution. The solution you show is quite dark, this could be due to high concentration or
due to impurities.
So, I think that you have cobalt indeed, but you probably need to recrystallize it once to get rid of impurities.
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Godspeed429
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Thank you !
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