Sciencemadness Discussion Board

sodium silicate from Calcium silicate

SAM4CH - 31-10-2008 at 04:14

How to convert a powder of calcium silicate to sodium silicate!??

not_important - 31-10-2008 at 20:26

It's not worth the effort, high SiO2 content sand is easy to get and makes a much better starting material.

Simply fusing calcium silicate with sodium carbonate will result in the formation of a glass. With enough Na2CO3 the glass will not resist water, but you end up with a solution of NaOH and solid calcium silicate again. You could extract the calcium silicate with HCl or HNO3 until all the calcium had been removed, then fuse the remaining SiO2 with Na2CO3, but that is a bit silly.

Ebao-lu - 1-11-2008 at 00:01

I dont know how in your place, but here Na2SiO3 is widely used and sold as "water glass" in any construction materials store