Sciencemadness Discussion Board

Silver Mirror with Tin (II) Chloride

QuicksilverHg - 8-5-2020 at 10:29

Salutations,
I have been preparing to perform the Tollen's aldehyde/silver mirror reaction, and I came across some information saying the addition of stanneous chloride will help expedite the silver deposition. Can anyone attest to this? I was wondering of the tin chloride/HCl solution is simply a pre-treatment that is removed from the vessel before addition of tollens reagent or if it should stay in solution. I imagine it helps by reducing the silver ions, as it reduces gold ions.
I have yet to perform this because I am hesitant to go shopping just for a reducing sugar, or buy some online, and I feel using vanilla extract would be wasteful.
Appreciate any insight =)

Sulaiman - 8-5-2020 at 13:50

when I was considering silvering a mirror I did a little research,
from memory tin chloride will aid in adhesion of the silver
but for optics purposes it does not give such a smooth surface.
More important seems to be the cleaning of the glass before silvering.

j_sum1 - 8-5-2020 at 17:23

I would have thought tin II would hydrolyse in the alkaline environment. But what do I know?

Sulaiman - 8-5-2020 at 18:25

AFAIK the tin chloride is a pre-treatment of the glass,
after a nitric acid clean, then a rinse,
before the silvering solution is applied,
not as a part of the silvering solution.

QuicksilverHg - 11-5-2020 at 12:22

j_sum1 I think you are absolutely correct, when I was synthesizing the tin (II) chloride I tried to get the best yield with a quantitative transfer of the solution to my reagent container and as soon as water came in contact the hydrolyzed tin hydroxide was formed.
I have acquired some dextrose reducing sugar in the form of sugar substitutes so I plan to follow the procedure prescribed by Sulaiman. Next comes the task of selecting the glassware to be adorned with silver. What does the acronym AFAIK stand for? I'm still getting accustomed to the lingo.

DraconicAcid - 11-5-2020 at 12:59

As far as I know