Sciencemadness Discussion Board

Uranium

Pyrovus - 1-3-2004 at 01:08

Does uranium have any "legitimate" uses which can be used as a means of aquiring the element? I know it was once used as a pigment for colouring glass (makes a nice fluorescent green), but I'm pretty sure it's no longer used as such.

ech310n - 1-3-2004 at 02:54

I don't think you will have much luck, if any at all, of aquiring uranium in element form for civilian use in Australia. You could try www.unitednuclear.com where they sell uranium ore from time to time though I don't think they ship out to Australia.

I don't know if this is of much help but I have heard that the nitrate is used as a photographic toner unless that is no longer in use. Uranyl Acetate is also apparently used in analytical chemistry.

Edit: This could possibly be of a little help: Uranium Metal

[Edited on 1-3-2004 by ech310n]

vulture - 1-3-2004 at 03:31

Er, doesn't australia have some very large uranium ore mines?

Ofcourse you're not going to get in there, but I'm sure there must be other places with the ore that are not economical enough to be explored.

Uranite

Turel - 1-3-2004 at 04:11

Australia has the world's largest known uranite ore deposits. Over 60% of the globe's uranium ore is mined and exported from Australia.

Lugh - 1-3-2004 at 07:05

Does that mean Oz glows in the dark?;)

axehandle - 1-3-2004 at 10:12

Travel to Iraq and dig up some of all that depleted uranium ammunition lying around in the desert. Don't forget the radiation suit though...

DDTea - 1-3-2004 at 10:46

Prospecting is about the best way to get Uranium, if you live near a mine. Don't ever enter a Uranium mine, particularly if it is abandoned... but, if you can tell the various minerals apart, look around the outside of the mind for Uranium ore. Of course, if you need the Uranium as a reagent, you will no doubt have to process it further.

I am a fish - 1-3-2004 at 11:59

Some mineralogy suppliers sell uranium ore.

In the UK, Rubbleshop auction various samples. Unfortuantely, all of the high grade ores fetch a high price.

axehandle - 1-3-2004 at 12:02

We have more Uranium ore than we'll ever find a use for in northern Sweden. If you're rich enough to afford the trip, I'm sure you could (provided you're willing to disabide the law) steal a lot without too much trouble.

Edit: Actually, we have lots of high grade ore not far from where i live, only about 100km. Mining it was stopped due to environmental concerns, so it's in a foresty area void of people. I'd imagine it would be an easy excercise to dig up a few tons. Processing it, however....


[Edited on 2004-3-1 by axehandle]

Polverone - 1-3-2004 at 12:54

Do you already do business with a lab chemical supplier? Try making an inquiry directly. I was able to buy uranyl nitrate from one supplier, sent by mail. Later I asked another of my suppliers about getting thorium nitrate, but they said that it would have to be sent by truck (expensive). I wonder if the first supplier who sent the uranium was breaking regulations or if thorium is considered more dangerous.

Of course I know that Australia is not the US, but you should still try making an inquiry. Nobody (nobody informed and intelligent, anyway) is going to be alarmed by you wanting a few grams of uranium compounds.

hodges - 1-3-2004 at 15:27

I see Uranium rokcs from time to time on E-Bay. Usually they tell you what radiation count you get from the sample being sold also. I'm not sure if you will find many ads from your part of the world (or willing to ship there), though. You might wait until you see an ad and then contact the seller directly to see if they have other specimins they would be willing to ship.

unionised - 1-3-2004 at 16:29

Oz glows in the dark because that's where the UK tested its atom bombs.
If you need to ask "does U have any legitimate uses" then presumably you dont have a legitimate use for it.
Here in the UK I would struggle to get hold of U or Th even though I work in a government owned lab. The law fails to recognise the difference between a static eliminator and Chernobyl.
On the other hand, even our government has realised that it cannot ban rocks. So I can buy pitchblende or uranite as a sample for my rock collection.
I'm not permitted to extract the uranium from it (Actually, I'm not sure; I might be) but I wouldn't want to for any of the scientific games I would want to play wih it.

chemoleo - 1-3-2004 at 18:01

Unionised, would you like to disclose the locations where you obtain pitchblende, or related minerals? I was trying to find some myself here, but did not succeed - except for some insane prices which I am not willing to pay. Surely, industrial pitchblende ores got to be cheaper! A few grams is all I want...
U2U me if u prefer.

Friedrich Wöhler - 2-3-2004 at 22:55

Last days I had an unbeliebable luck! I bought a lot of unknown analytic chemicals from laboratories of the old Eastern German chemical industry (Leuna, Bitterfeld ect...). By German reunion this industry broke down and a lot of these old lab-chemicals 'circulate' untill now in much private hands. As a blindly quick-purchase (for 750,-- Euro) I got more than 100 different chemicals in old dustily bottles and what did my eyes see...??? 100g of uranyl acetate and a black paper safed bottle with two big warning stickers 'radioactively', containing 1kg (!!) of thorium nitrate. The lable is in Russian, it doesn't show, if the nitrate is water free, but I think so. I still can't believe! I didn't try to get such stuff from official lab-store, I never asked them, in German Merck-catalogue is only a notice that Swiss costumers need a special license from Swizzerland's health ministry before order U- and Th- compounds. Now I need a 'geiger counter'. :o :D

tom haggen - 3-3-2004 at 10:46

Up untill the late 1970's some dentures sold in the U.S. contained Uranium. I don't think it would be a good idea to be playing with Uranium pyrovus.

[Edited on 3-3-2004 by tom haggen]

unionised - 3-3-2004 at 13:00

I never got round to buying any. I was just pointing out that that is the only legal way to get Uranum in the UK. (Of course, you can go prospecting with a Geiger counter)

Nick F - 14-3-2004 at 08:57

I got uranyl zinc acetate mail-order in the UK. It's not that hard...
But I was very disappointed when I found out that it isn't flourescent :( Hehe... The strange thing is though, some grains ARE, just not many. I wonder why..?

I am a fish - 14-3-2004 at 10:59

Quote:
Originally posted by Nick F
I got uranyl zinc acetate mail-order in the UK. It's not that hard...
But I was very disappointed when I found out that it isn't flourescent :( Hehe... The strange thing is though, some grains ARE, just not many. I wonder why..?


Where from? :)

axehandle - 26-3-2004 at 16:10

Seriously though, is someone really interested in high content uranium ore? I know where to get it.

/A

Uranium sources

Norm Alara - 17-5-2004 at 11:47

I've seen on eBay U acetate and nitrate.
I believe the nitrate is currently
about $12 for 2 g. Th nitrate has
been sold there too.

Radioactive rocks can be hotter,
and you can try to collect old
luminous hands and use acetone
to dissolve the paint.

A Fiestaware plate is a nice source
since it doesn't emit radon,
and gives plenty of betas, over
1 mR/hr at the surface. 100x background.

The marbles are mostly good because they
glow in UV.

I will try the tungsten in peroxide trick
for thorium chemistry.

Yellowcake from rock at
http://www.geocities.com/norm_alara

blazter - 17-5-2004 at 17:37

Not 100% sure about this, but was told that certain .50 cal rounds contain depleated U in the tips to add mass and improve the armor piercing aspects. I have seen just the bullets from these rounds and can say that it is rather heavy for its size. Apparently its not too difficult to find these rounds in the US because I have heard of clubs that have assembled bolt action .50 rifles from mail order parts. Supposidly they can hit a junk car's engine block at around a quarter mile away and can tell when it hits because it rocks the suspension.

Quantum - 18-5-2004 at 12:10

Yes blaster we in the USA have lots of guns. There is an event in tennessee called knob creek where people shoot .50cal rifles, machine guns and even chainguns, flamethrowers and automatic cannons.

Proteios - 20-5-2004 at 21:42

Quote:
Originally posted by Quantum
Yes blaster we in the USA have lots of guns. There is an event in tennessee called knob creek where people shoot .50cal rifles, machine guns and even chainguns, flamethrowers and automatic cannons.


with armour piercing cyanide tipped caseless rounds??????

But of course.... its in the Constitution! ;)

For an Englishman in NY....it does seem kinda strange.

Interesting side note on U238.... its got a half life of about 5 billion years.... comparable to the age of the universe......The practical upshot is... its not radioactive...... I remember hearing a ridiculous case where some guys was sueing the army for exposure to DU, saying how dangerous it was because it had a half life of billions of year... meh... clearly being smart is no longer a criterion for joining the army.

DU armour piercing rounds are exceptionally nasty pieces of work.
1)stike.... DU heats up to about 2000 K(white heat) and melts throught the armour.
2) still having lots of KE, the molten DU splatter over the inside of the armoured vehicle, instantly killing anyone inside in a very ugly fashion.
3) 2000K DU explodes (basically combustion of the hot metal).
4) DU 'dust' from the strike is everywhere.... maybe not a radiation hazard, but DU is not a very nice chemical.

Limpet Chicken - 10-6-2004 at 16:15

Just how radioactive IS DU? How dangerous would say 500 mg-1 gram be to handle, I'm starting an element collection, and would like to get my hands on a very small piece of metallic uranium.

I'm in the UK btw and the government seems to feel the need to poke it's ugly nose in pretty much everywhere chemicals are concerned :mad:

[Edited on 11-6-2004 by Limpet Chicken]

Mendeleev - 10-6-2004 at 17:25

http://articles.findarticles.com/p/articles/mi_m1111/is_n178...

The guy made U-233, which can be used in bombs by irradiating thorium with and americium-radium neutron gun. The americium was procured from thousands of smoke detectors, the radium from old clock paint, and the thorium from lantern mantles. This guy is my hero.

[Edited on 11-6-2004 by Mendeleev]

Limpet Chicken - 10-6-2004 at 17:55

When I was about 13-14 I used to be totally fascinated by phosphorus
(I still am :D) , at that age, I knew only very basic chemistry, but I used to play with the impure red phosphorus I scraped off matchboxes and burned in piles on tin can lids to make a really fine glow in the dark film of white P, and I loved to watch it burn when I poked it with matchsticks and stuff.

axehandle - 11-6-2004 at 14:17

If someone finds a "stone age" method of extracting U from ore, I'm all game. I have access to lots of high content uranium ore and I would love to have another small sample for my collection of elements.

Mendeleev - 11-6-2004 at 15:12

I don't think there is any easy way to purify uranium. The industrial method involves sulfuric acid, tertiary amines, ammonia, nitric acid, hydrofluoric acid, and calcium metal, all of which are not too hard to get, but it is a lengthy process and some of the equipment is probably hard to construct. If you want uranium really badly I'd go with the ordering hundreds of replacement thorium lantern mantle, which are relatively easy to get, and irradiate them with the americium-radium neutron gun, like the one David used in the article. This is U-233 however, still fissionable, still possible to use in nuclear reactors and bombs.

[Edited on 11-6-2004 by Mendeleev]

axehandle - 11-6-2004 at 15:18

Yes, yeeeess... But what I want is stable, nice U-238, not stuff that will give me cancer. I have actually been playing (together with my GF and her father (who is a doctorate in psysics)) to build a cyclotron, but I'm not sure where to place my priorities......

what's in the ore?

Polverone - 12-6-2004 at 10:18

Besides uranium compounds, that is? I'd imagine that doing a crude uranium extraction could be as simple as determining the main components of the ore, looking at Sidgwick's Chemistry of the Elements or a similar book, and trying to figure out what U compounds are more/less soluble than what you're trying to separate it from. I do think you may have a hard time given your limited access to chemicals, but that's part of the challenge, right?

Nick F - 29-6-2004 at 10:45

Limpet Chicken: http://www.element-collection.com/index.html

You can buy a sample of uranium metal (or any other element) from these people. The uranium is not cheap though, you get very little, and it's encased in resin. No fun!
I still have not been able to obtain any by any other route, and I'm normally very good at scamming things. I'm still trying though, occaisionally.

Mendeleev: do you really think that kid actually managed to transmute a noticable amount of material? I don't know what his set-up was, but I'm really not convinced at all. I believe most of the story is urban legend.

Uranium from Uranium Ore

Chemtastic - 30-6-2004 at 17:41

United Nuclear sells bulk uranium ore, as well as higher purity individual samples...

http://www.unitednuclear.com

Also, this page claims that a process for obtaining uranium compounds from the ore is coming soon...hasn't been updated in a year though:P, so if you really want to know when it might be available, I'd email the company.

http://www.unitednuclear.com/extract.htm

Boj - 1-7-2004 at 03:02

Quote:
Originally posted by ech310n
I don't think you will have much luck, if any at all, of aquiring uranium in element form for civilian use in Australia. You could try www.unitednuclear.com where they sell uranium ore from time to time though I don't think they ship out to Australia.

I don't know if this is of much help but I have heard that the nitrate is used as a photographic toner unless that is no longer in use. Uranyl Acetate is also apparently used in analytical chemistry.

Edit: This could possibly be of a little help: Uranium Metal

[Edited on 1-3-2004 by ech310n]


You can get Uranium ore from Ebay or several online sellers like United Nuclear just don't go buying any ore before I clean up there.

I'm from Melbourne and I received my first sample the other week. I got it from an Ebay seller, most of them should be willing to ship to Australia and I'm also in contact with United Nuclear and they are very helpful as well.

As for legality of owning it I was told by the Victorian regulatory body that any sample below 40 Mbq doesn't require license to own but to be honest the difficulty in determining activity of the samples and practical impossibility of policing this here makes me think that so long as you can get your hands on it nobody will give you trouble whatsoever (the way it should be ;)).

Legally however (I was told) you would need to get an import permit which is $110, however to cut a long story short, US sellers don't label packages as radioactive (they don't have to by their law) so they pass customs and arrive in the mail just like any other package which is sweet by me. ;) My impression of the whole legal procedure for getting ore in Aus was that there was little or no interest from the public on the subject hence little or no concrete and meaningful regulations so when I called them up they gave me the usual procedure for importing all things radioactive. In any case in the real life any ore you buy from overseas will get in no problem (as it should) so long as selllers don't label packages with radiation symbols.

As for legitimate uses, as a member of public you would have none other than perhaps as educational material.

unionised - 1-7-2004 at 14:13

according to this
http://members.tripod.com/vzajic/1stchapter.html#Table%204
40MBq is about 800 g or Uranium +daughters.

budullewraagh - 2-8-2004 at 08:15

if you have urananite ore, just replace the uranium with a more active element (ex any alkali metal). you'll end up with an alkali metal oxide and uranium metal. if you're trying to separate the isotopes of the uranium, however, you won't be able to as the methods require thousands of dollars worth of equipment that you'll never get your hands on legally (or illegally) anyway.

Marvin - 2-8-2004 at 09:32

budullewraagh,

Speculating with no examples is a really bad idea.

U ore is never pure oxide and most sold minerals are secondaries. Scholl method is worth a look. Digest mineral with nitric acid, dilute, treat with ferric chloride and sodium carbonate. Discard ppt. Ppt by boiling with caustic soda and then redissolved in nitric acid. Ammonia is added to ppt ammonium uranate and ignite this strongly to get the oxide.

Heating this with an alkali metal wont work. Thermite might work. Carbon reduction works but the result contains a lot of carbon - enough to radically alter the melting point. Safest bet is probably to convert to chloride and reduce with calcium.

The Curie method is similar only precipitation is done first with hydrogen sulphide, and then with sodium sulphate. Polonium ends up as part of the sulphide ppt, and the radium ends up in the sulphate. To concentrate the radium the sulphate ppt is subjected to prolonged boiling with sodium carbonate solution, and the ppt containing radium carbonate is treated with hydrochloric acid. The resulting chloride is then fractionally crystalised and when the amounts are small dilute hydrochloric acid is used to reduce solubility.

Uranium is quite reactive, its similar in many ways to group 2 elements like magnesium.

[Edited on 2-8-2004 by Marvin]

budullewraagh - 2-8-2004 at 11:16

hey word is "URANANITE" (ore). please note that i didn't say "uranium ore". urananite ore is quite pure uranium oxide. also, i'd like to add that lithium or any alkali metal would replace the uranium in any form seeing as it is more active and the alkali metal is not ionized in the first place which counts out the possibility of electronegativity differences with anions.

BromicAcid - 2-8-2004 at 14:07

Quick thermodynamic calculations give the following information.

UO2 + 4Na ----> U + 2Na2O

DeltaH = +256.6
DeltaG = +280.8
DeltaS = +73.2

Therefore the reaction is non-spontaneous at STP. For G to be a positive quanity we can set G to 0 and calculate the temp with the Gibbs free energy equation.

T = deltaH/deltaS
T = [(256.6 kJ)(1000 J/kJ)]/73.2 J/K
T = 3505 K

So although this reaction could theoretically be used, it only becomes noticeable above 3505 K. Not really reasonable. But there is one obvious flaw to this, who can name it?

Yes, that's right, sodium had a bp of 892C or 1165 K, so unless there are some massive pressures involved this is not going to be feasable. Doesn't look to promising with the other alkali metals either. Thermite type reactions with aluminum and magnesium are also endothermic.

budullewraagh - 2-8-2004 at 20:16

lithium works better.

Marvin - 3-8-2004 at 10:15

"if you have urananite ore"

I can only assume this mythical mineral is gem quality UO2 and nothing but. The rest of the planet has to make do with a mineral we call uraninite and this is typically small malformed cubic crystals in a much larger mass of material (uraninite ore). Its mined typically where the rock contains only a few percent UO2 and this is more than enough for profitable extraction. This is where industry gets most of its uranium from. Massive UO2, called pitchblende is also seldom the pure mineral and large rocks of it over 50% pitchblende are typically museum specimens, rare and expensive. Even solid UO2 in nature (seperated from the ore, isolated crystals etc) is not chemically pure (to the point of being useful) UO2. It all needs chemical processing.

Noone expects metals to gracefully and completely displace eachother according to reactivity outside solution, particulally with oxides. Chemistry just isnt like that. As a general rule alkali metals do not work for reducing oxides. The reason probably has much to do with the poor lattice energy of the alkali metal oxides and is related to the fact they volatilise at relativly low temperatures. The low boiling points of the metals themselves also causes practical problems as Bromic has demonstrated.

"lithium works better. "

Based on what?



After looking up working methods (Mellor) the following is typical.

Carbon reduction of the oxide above 1500C, contaminated with carbon.
Aluminium reduction of UO2 works and is highly exothermic (sorry Bromic, but its what it says here) and is better than with U3O8. Product contaminated with aluminium typically.
Conversion to chloride, or to sodium uranyl chloride and reduce with sodium works but there may be a purity problem and the uranium is produced in a finely divided state - often pyrophoric.
Use of iron crucibles contaminates the uranium but not as much as iron in the reductant. Platinum crucibles has the same problem. Nickel, graphite, magnesia and silver containers are all totally unworkable.
Reduction of the oxide by calcium can be used and purity can be high but the yeilds given are low.
A lot of people used CaCl2 as a flux with good results.

The gold prize for purity and yeild goes to... (drumroll)
Conversion to chloride and reduction with calcium.

budullewraagh - 3-8-2004 at 10:26

can you not be so condescending?

lithium works better in that it releases less energy AND is a better reducing agent than sodium.

BromicAcid - 3-8-2004 at 18:31

Don't you mean lithium works better because it releases more energy?

Regardless, I was wrong about aluminum, I accidently subtracted by reactants from products for my delta H calculation :(

Never the less, it is exothermic, as is the reaction with lithium, however the temperature at which the reaction becomes rapid is still past the boiling point of lithium and even if it would self sustain a majority of the lithium may boil off.

ADP - 19-9-2005 at 18:19

My school chem lab has a small bottle of reagent grade uranyl acetate about 28 grams to be exact. What is the stuff good for? Any interesting experiments that it can be used for? Any interesting reactions?

akinmad - 20-9-2005 at 09:58

Enrico Fermi's patent no 2708656 describes a method called ether extraction for purifying Uranium. Actually the procedure make use of the solubility of Uranium Nitrate in ether and impurities migrate to and stay in the aqueous phase (which is already saturated with Uranium Nitrate).
As for U-233 from thorium, I would not try it if you don't have a good moderator since if you bombard Th-232 with fast neutrons then you will have U-232 which splits into very harsh gamma emitters.
I believe the industrial processes use a method called acid leaching from the ore. HTH.

P.S. As for the depleted uranium, this name is misleading. While it is called depleted there is nothing depleted in it. It still contains a good deal of U-235 (above zero percent) and still harmful. When a DU projectile is used for piercing an armor, the uranium projectile burns (due to friction occurring during penetration) and produces tiny (microscopic) particles of uranium and uranium oxides which may settle in the body cavities and cause serious illness. In addition, even if DU contains pure U-238, it's still a radioactive (not fissile but fertile) substance which has at least a half life - an indicator showing its little radioactivity. In addition it may undergo spontaneous so called fast fission by the background neutrons causing mayhem in the body cavities.
A friend of mine from Iraq claimed that after the first Gulf War there was an increased incidence of cancer in Iraq due to DU projectiles used by GI Joes.

[Edited on 20-9-2005 by akinmad]

He was trying to convert thorium into something else

HammerOfLight - 11-5-2010 at 17:37

He was on the right track, but never made it because his neutron gun was short low energy thermal neutrons, not the higher energies needed to cause a transmutation reaction to occur. Now if he had built a FUSOR with some modification, he would have had a better show at transmutating the thorium paint into something else.

HCl

HammerOfLight - 11-5-2010 at 17:42

Quote: Originally posted by axehandle  
If someone finds a "stone age" method of extracting U from ore, I'm all game. I have access to lots of high content uranium ore and I would love to have another small sample for my collection of elements.


You could use a ball mill to pulverize the ore, then react it with dillute HCl to dissolve out the uranium, it still won't be pure, but it will get all the silica out. then allow it to crystallize, you should have uranium chlorides. You could then melt it down in a crucible in a really hot furnace to burn off the chlorides leaving you with mostly metals including URANIUM.

12AX7 - 11-5-2010 at 18:28

Too bad there's an awful lot of iron and other things in there.

IIRC, nitric is usually used to extract uranium. I suppose sulfuric would work too.

An alkaline or (after mixing a ligand) solvent extraction would be a good way to purify it somewhat.

Thermally decomposing chlorides will yield very little metal, indeed you can't even get copper this way, let alone iron, uranium, magnesium, etc. However, you can manage to boil off a lot of your materials, since all chlorides have high vapor pressure. A more reactive metal, such as calcium, is required to displace the metal in solution, or electrolysis of the molten salt.

Tim

densest - 11-5-2010 at 19:08

My copy of solvent extraction has gone walkabout... there are several chapters on extracting U from various ores. Having tried solvent extraction with gold, I'd recommend it as an easy way to bypass a whole lot of ugly lab work. It has its own downside, including spilling the working fluid all over everything or breathing too many vapors, but for small quantities and amateur work it is very appealing.

If the book surfaces I'll post relevant material.

----

It surfaced. "Solvent Extraction Principles and Practice" 2nd edition, Rydberg et al. editors, ISBN 0-8247-5063-2 Marcel Dekker Inc.

pp 507-557 "Solvent Extraction in Nuclear Science" has a lot of random stuff (I didn't know that Ruthenium was a fission byproduct - wonder what isotope....). The most interesting detail was that TBP = tributyl phosphate is the solvent of choice, in less than 30% concentration in a carrier (kerosene?). Australian ores are said to be dissolved in H2SO4 + oxidizer. Additives to the lixivant are mentioned in various contexts - tridecanol is used in a number of processes.

Apparently if TBP picks up too much U it gets so heavy it doesn't separate well from water which is why a lighter carrier liquid is used.

Hope this helps. I don't have a lot of time to scan things and my scanner is slow, so if the book is available in a library I'd recommend getting it there. A number of scientists in CSIRO are very much in the forefront of solvent extraction, so reading their papers should be helpful, and talking to them might get even more information.


[Edited on 12-5-2010 by densest]

Local Uranium Mines/Mill

grndpndr - 11-5-2010 at 22:58

Were in a similar situation as axehandle,perhaps a bit less healthy.Uranium ore was processed IN town,DOWNTOWN actually a few blocks off main.
The Piles of uranium tailings sandlike were used by local children as very large sandboxes surrounded by nonexistent fences.The workers didnt change at work back then so thier contaminated clothing came home with them to irradiate the familys.Tailings were also considered a very good building material or rather fill for new basements etc.Lots of radon in the basements.Why?This town I believe or rather red canyon some few miles distant is considerd the hottest property in the US if your a Uranium miner with many manmade caves with a pretty YELLOW CAKEing on the rock after a few years of water leaching through the rock.Even our 2500ft waterwells are above nat standards for radon content.Good news is all those struck down by cancer, workers at the mine and familys of the mineworkers
recieve a very generous $250,000 get well check from tennese valley authority.Some pretty natural yellowcake high grade Uranium ore is for the taking by the truckload if so inclined here in west SD.Ill collect some and sell it to ya?Whats it worth?
Im pretty sickly anyhow so it dont matter a whole bunch.Might be interesting to take some to the university and have it tested.possibly try to nitrate a sample.It was the 50s/60s I guess? Still,they knew but mum was the word and cold war the threat.

About DU, best thing to happen to kinetic energy AT weapons.I have no Idea how many ft steel armor a 120mm discarding sabot fin stabilized long rod penetrator will hole,though Im sure the 120 will hole the glacis plate of a T72 and better@ least 3k plus.Nasty stuff but its AP propertys have saved many lives in AT work.I wouldnt closely inspect the hulk of a DU penetrator victim,whats left anyway after the secondarys and fires!!:o

But! Does the post office have any means of radiation detection in the system.Selling it following regs might be tough?And Im certainly NOT interested in being party to a naturally dark skinned,toweled headgear, foriegners Idea of a radioactive joke.

[Edited on 12-5-2010 by grndpndr]

woelen - 12-5-2010 at 01:08

@HammerOfLight: I have a small sample of finely crunched technical grade U3O8. It is a very dark green solid, almost black. I don't know its origin, it might be mechanically selected and crunched pitchblende, or chemically treated pitchblende which contains mostly U3O8. To me it was sold as "technical grade U3O8", several years ago. I have tried your method of extraction with HCl. It does not work. Not even in boiling conc. HCl does any of the oxide dissolve. It is too inert. The same is true for moderately concentrated sulphuric acid.

The U3O8, however, does dissolve in 53% nitric acid. You need some heating but it does dissolve, giving a yellow/green (non-fluorescent) solution of uranyl nitrate and some brown nitrogen oxide gas mix above the liquid. Some dark insoluble stuff remains (I think that is silicate crap), but 90% or so dissolves.

I even was able to purify to some extent. I decanted the liquid from the remaining dark crap and neutralized the acid with dilute NaOH such that the final solution only is slightly acidic. Next, I added some 10% H2O2 (which gives a pale yellow very fine precipitate) and waited. The next day I had a layer of pale yellow UO4.2H2O at the bottom and this can be rinsed with clean water to get rid of most sodium nitrate and other impurities from other metals. The UO4.2H2O can be further worked up. Heating converts it to ochre UO3, which can be dissolved in nitric acid to give uranyl nitrate. The formation of the peroxo compound UO4.2H2O is very specific to uranium and provides a fantastic means of isolating uranium from other metals.

I am not sure whether I will make a webpage of this stuff for my website. Uranium is too sensitive in the eyes of the government and I don't want legal trouble. If you wish, I, however, can post some pictures of the UO4.2H2O and the solutions over here.

Ozonelabs - 12-5-2010 at 03:38

We have a quantity of uranium nitrate, uranium zinc acetate and thorium nitrate available for sale. U2U or email for pricing.

Ozonelabs

peach - 13-5-2010 at 14:14

Quote: Originally posted by 12AX7  
Too bad there's an awful lot of iron and other things in there.


Ask United Nuclear for one of their ridiculously powerful Neodym. monsters, that might take care of the iron for you.

I know people pull iron ores out of sand using the same idea.

You'd obviously want it as finely dispersed as you could get it, perhaps by dissolving it and then re-extracting.

Honestly though, as much as I hate the unnecessary fear surrounding these kinds of things, I'd still be wary of powering even the ore to a fine particulate and the possibility of it getting into the air.

A half face respirator with a P3 or something on it might be an idea. But that's prevention rather than cure, I wouldn't want it hanging around all over the place to start with.

It won't be hard to check if that's necessary, just check what the guys in the mines & refineries wear if there's dust around.

"What are we going to do tonight United Nuclear?"
"Same thing we do every night Pinky. Try to take over the world!"

[Edited on 13-5-2010 by peach]

12AX7 - 13-5-2010 at 15:09

Ridiculously powerful magnets don't do much to aqueous iron...

Tim

Uranium ore from Amazon

watson.fawkes - 22-7-2010 at 08:09

Amazon is selling small tins of uranium ore. Please, please, do yourself a favor and read the reviews; they almost constitute a genre.

plastics - 23-7-2010 at 08:18

Quote: Originally posted by watson.fawkes  
Amazon is selling small tins of uranium ore. Please, please, do yourself a favor and read the reviews; they almost constitute a genre.


Almost as funny as the reviews (now removed) for the book by Martin Wank entitled "Sex, Freud and Folly: The Truth About Psychotherapy" eg "Wank has a firm grasp of his subject"

Sorry completely off topic but couldn't resist

[Edited on 23-7-2010 by plastics]

mr.crow - 23-7-2010 at 09:32

You can get 100mg of U metal from eBay... for $20. no thanks

spong - 28-7-2010 at 03:37

If you want to make it from ore, have a look here, it's only the first step as they haven't completed the rest but it'll make things a bit easier.
http://web.archive.org/web/20070911192343/http://www.unitedn...
It seems they've taken down that page so webarchive really comes in handy for stuff like that.
Otherwise, this place is in Melbourne:
http://www.vanbar.com.au/catalogue/product.php?id=72175
100g uranyl nitrate for $376.20. It would probably be cheaper to fly to a mine, collect some yellowcake and make your own for that price :P

[Edited on 28-7-2010 by spong]

peach - 28-7-2010 at 04:58

Quote: Originally posted by watson.fawkes  
Amazon is selling small tins of uranium ore. Please, please, do yourself a favor and read the reviews; they almost constitute a genre.


:D

MagicJigPipe - 31-7-2010 at 16:31

I realize this may sound a little pompous but, I don't care: some of those people on Amazon are morons.
Quote:

pleez tell me this is a joke guyz, omg! lik we wnt terrozists 2 b able 2 by dis nukular bomb juice!

*not a real quote


U.S. Uranium concentrations:

http://energy.cr.usgs.gov/images/other/uranium/uranium_conce...

Some mines:

http://www.defendblackhills.org/img/original/uranium-map-lar...

If you happen to live in or around Montana or the Appalachians, you're in luck.

Hmmmm... Looks like there are two small red dots in my area... I wish there were highly detailed maps I could get my hands on. Perhaps going to the geology department of the nearest University might lead you to some information regarding local U deposits.

Also, although my state is not well known for uranium deposits, I found a paper published almost 50 years ago that gives a very detailed description of a location with an anomolously large amount of "highly concentrated" uranium ore.

Just keep on looking (those of you that are interested in finding ore). I find this very fascinating (the potential of "proscpecting" for U ores).

entropy51 - 31-7-2010 at 16:59

Quote: Originally posted by MagicJigPipe  
I realize this may sound a little pompous but, I don't care: some of those people on Amazon are morons.

Quote:

pleez tell me this is a joke guyz, omg! lik we wnt terrozists 2 b able 2 by dis nukular bomb juice!

*not a real quote


U.S. Uranium concentrations:

http://energy.cr.usgs.gov/images/other/uranium/uranium_conce...

Some mines:

http://www.defendblackhills.org/img/original/uranium-map-lar...

If you happen to live in or around Montana or the Appalachians, you're in luck.

Hmmmm... Looks like there are two small red dots in my area... I wish there were highly detailed maps I could get my hands on. Perhaps going to the geology department of the nearest University might lead you to some information regarding local U deposits.

Also, although my state is not well known for uranium deposits, I found a paper published almost 50 years ago that gives a very detailed description of a location with an anomolously large amount of "highly concentrated" uranium ore.

Just keep on looking (those of you that are interested in finding ore). I find this very fascinating (the potential of "proscpecting" for U ores).

Thanks for sharing!

woelen - 9-8-2010 at 10:48

I made a webpage about solutions and precipitates of uranium compounds. Its chemistry is quite interesting and I think it would be nice to share with others:

http://woelen.homescience.net/science/chem/solutions/u.html

psychokinetic - 9-8-2010 at 13:01

Notice that most of the argument against uranium is that you wouldn't eat it?

These are people who NEED to eat it.

Edit: No wonder people are fat. "Ooh what's this then? *nom*"

[Edited on 9-8-2010 by psychokinetic]

peach - 9-8-2010 at 18:32

Quote: Originally posted by psychokinetic  

Edit: No wonder people are fat. "Ooh what's this then? *nom*"

Globey - 19-8-2010 at 06:29

A UVA (black light) will help in the abandoned mines, but really, mostly what you'll get is composed of U238, and not the fisible 235 isotope. In fact, I believe Yellow Cake itself is used in the pottery/glazing business. Until recently, the refined ore represented the naturally occurring isotopic distribution. But now, almost all ceramics grade pigment has already been processed by one of our national plants to remove the valuable 235. And this process is one of the reasons U235 is so expensive. Also, the necessary closed loop controls make control of heroin & cocaine look like a walk in the park. Trying to acquire uranium, even depleted, is likely one step worse than making meth, counterfeiting greenbacks (or whatever colors hey are now), and(or) being a pedophile child molester sexual baby predator.

entropy51 - 19-8-2010 at 16:33

Quote: Originally posted by Globey  
Also, the necessary closed loop controls make control of heroin & cocaine look like a walk in the park. Trying to acquire uranium, even depleted, is likely one step worse than making meth, counterfeiting greenbacks (or whatever colors hey are now), and(or) being a pedophile child molester sexual baby predator.
WTF are you rambling on about, son? Uranium is easily available to anybody.

MagicJigPipe - 20-8-2010 at 16:42

I can only assume he was talking about pure U235 (which I still think would be a cool thing to have in an element collection!) If you could pull that off (getting a sizable amount) you wouldn't be posting here and you'd be rich; and possibly also an accessory to mass murder.

Well, I don't know... Maybe you would post here...

entropy51 - 20-8-2010 at 16:59

Quote: Originally posted by MagicJigPipe  
I can only assume he was talking about pure U235 ...
Why would you assume that? He said "Trying to acquire uranium, even depleted, is likely one step worse ..."

Depleted is not pure U235. But you knew that.

Has your fall semester started? What courses are you taking this year MJP?

Contrabasso - 20-8-2010 at 23:56

Just be aware that the chemistry of uranium has hazards as well as the radio-chemistry hazards. Even the fine particles of U238 (stable isotope) are regarded as possible problems with acute human contact.

entropy51 - 21-8-2010 at 08:19

Quote: Originally posted by Contrabasso  
Just be aware that the chemistry of uranium has hazards as well as the radio-chemistry hazards. Even the fine particles of U238 (stable isotope) are regarded as possible problems with acute human contact.
Contrabasso, I agree about U toxicity, but amateurs do perform uranium chemistry without serious problems.

woelen - 21-8-2010 at 11:05

Yes, I also did some home chemistry with uranium (I posted a web page about that a few days ago), such as reducing it to lower oxidation states and testing its fluorescent properties. I now made some of the formiate, which is not fluorescent.

Uranium salts are toxic, but not as toxic as salts of e.g. mercury, lead and cadmium.

My starting material is some powdered uranium oxide (a dark green powder, mostly U3O8, UO2 and maybe some silicate material in it as well). I think it is crushed pitchblende ore. It dissolves fairly easily in 50% nitric acid, when the acid is heated. Some insoluble crap remains (the silicate stuff) and with H2O2 I can precipitate the uranyl content of the solution. Then I have the material for further experimenting.

Btw, the posted link is a fantastic one. This is really nice home chemistry. Everything (except maybe the last step of reduction to metallic uranium) could be done by even a moderately equipped home chemist.

[Edited on 21-8-10 by woelen]

MagicJigPipe - 21-8-2010 at 16:52
Quote:

Why would you assume that? He said "Trying to acquire uranium, even depleted, is likely one step worse ..." Depleted is not pure U235. But you knew that. Has your fall semester started? What courses are you taking this year MJP?


You're right, I just chose to assume he didn't know what depleted U was.

Yes, the fall semester just started last week. I will be taking one chemistry course (damn scheduling conflicts), a physics course, a math course and a programming course. Also, a couple of hours of undergrad. research in chemistry and possibly physics. Details are in U2U.

uchiacon - 12-9-2010 at 01:08

This guy here has 3g of depleted uranium for sale for like $55.
Just found it while lurking through ebay. It looks of a decent size.

http://cgi.ebay.com/Pure-Uranium-Metal-Sample-RARE-2-728-gra...