Sciencemadness Discussion Board

Got some rare stuff. Arsenic trioxide

vibbzlab - 4-12-2019 at 06:44

I got some arsenic trioxide and I tried some experiments with it.
I tried making metal arsenites and even made arsenic trioxide. I found a local chemical manufacturers were making them and I got it pretty cheap around 2 USD for 500g
Then I made copper arsenite beautiful green colored thing
I also made arsenic sulfide , beautiful yellow stuff.
I was planning to try the marsh test. If anyone knows the procedure please give it here .
I was taught about all the toxicity and danger from that stuff so I used less than a gram in total and I gave it to nearby school for disposal.

I even recorded my works
https://youtu.be/ZGTZHHHtCTM

Ubya - 4-12-2019 at 07:23

https://youtu.be/DKE18vfV314

vibbzlab - 4-12-2019 at 07:38

Thanks for that

Ubya - 4-12-2019 at 11:03

you are welcome.

i might be interested in buying some, 2USD for 500g it's just dirt cheap, but shipping costs to here might make it expensive anyways

woelen - 4-12-2019 at 12:02

Quote: Originally posted by Ubya  
you are welcome.

i might be interested in buying some, 2USD for 500g it's just dirt cheap, but shipping costs to here might make it expensive anyways

If you want cheap arsenic compounds, then buy orpiment. Almost pure arsenic sulfide, which can be dissolved in strong alkali and with an acidic solution of an oxidizer you can make arsenate.

At the moment there is this: https://www.ebay.nl/itm/Bulk-Lot-1-2-LB-Red-Realgar-with-Gol...

or this:

https://www.ebay.nl/itm/85g-Magnificent-Red-Realgar-with-Yel...

Unfortunately I do not see pure orpiment on eBay right now. The above is a mix of orpiment and realgar, so you get arsenic sulfide, but with variable composition.

I obtained similar samples and pulverized the items. This is not hard, the stuff is very brittle and is easily crunched. Sometimes there is a piece, which contains white calcite or quartz. These white pieces are very hard and cannot be crunched easily. This makes it easy to separate them from the arsenic sulfide.

I even made a tiny amount of pyrotechnic mix of KClO3 and orpiment (50 mg or so), just to see the burning of this, but I took care very well not to get exposed to the smoke!

If you intend to experiment with this, be careful. This material is TOXIC!!

It is amazing that it can be found on eBay so easily. This is because it is a natural mineral and it is marketed like that. If someone were to sell arsenic compounts by name and chemical formula, then eBay would remove those offerings immediately.



Boffis - 4-12-2019 at 15:35

I have worked in mine where native arsenic occurred in seams and blocks more than 15cm thick in calcite. I brought home specimens up to 4kg in weight. Native arsenic is actually more common and widespread than orpiment and realgar just not so pretty, it tends to look like broken cast iron so if often overlooked but it is common. The most spectacular occurrence I ever saw was in an iron mine in on the Russian-Kazakh boarder where calcite veins carried spherical masses made of concentric shell of arsenic that came apart like an onion, they reached 10cm or more in diameter. Though I saw some stunning solid masses of orpiment in the mercury mines in Kirgyzstan too. Specimens crop up online but tend to be expensive.