Sciencemadness Discussion Board - Whats the most dangerous chemical you've ever synthesized?

Whats the most dangerous chemical you've ever synthesized?

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nezza - 17-12-2015 at 05:37

One synthesis I am not going to repeat is Hydrogen selenide. I took a very cautious sniff of some once and it anaesthetised my nose for about a day. I could not smell anything. It was quite unpleasant.

ave369 - 18-12-2015 at 01:41

Quote: Originally posted by Amos

As for iron contamination in general, check Lowe's. The new brand of HCl they stock, at least in all of my city's locations, is water-clear.

Why buy HCl if you can make one? Table salt and battery acid in a flask, latch it on a distilling setup and distill colorless HCl with a known concentration (20+some%)

careysub - 22-12-2015 at 08:36

Quote: Originally posted by woelen

Quote: Originally posted by alexleyenda

[...]
The only thing related to physics I see which could a bit explain Joker's statement (which remains false anyways) is that when energy is dispersed in a spheric 3D way, the power decreases in a cubic way because the area covered by the power increases in a cubic way, so the power becomes a lot less concentrated very fast in comparison with the radius (linear distance from the explosion). The power of small amount of explosive can get "diluted" so fast that it appears that using a bigger charge is a lot more powerful as it takes more distance ( a bit more than a linear relation) for the power to be cubic rooted down to the same level.

There are some errors in your last paragraph:
The power is not inversely proportional to the cube of the distance, but to the square of the distance. Assume that power is transmitted as a spherical shockwave and no power is lost between center of explosion and the distance where the explosion is observed. The power is distributed over a sphere, whose surface area is proportional to the distance of center of explosion. So, this makes the perceived impact of the explosion inversely proportional to the square of the distance from the center of explosion. In reality, the exponent will be slightly larger than 2, but much less than 3, due to losses of power (e.g. frictional losses between air molecules while the shock wave travels through the air).
...

This is a bit late in the thread to comment upon, since this exchange occurred a year and a half ago, but I wanted to insert a correction in this thread about the nature of explosions, shock waves, and distance scaling.

We need to distinguish between strong shocks (a large pressure increase relative to ambient) and weak shocks (a small pressure increase).

Strong shocks do a lot of work on the medium through which they travel, accelerating, compressing, and heating (in something like that order of importance). This dissipation of energy is why strong shocks tend to cause things to fly apart. Strong shocks absolutely follow inverse cube root scaling since energy is being expended in three dimensions.

The limiting case of weak shocks is the "bang" sound you hear a good distance away. It is essentially just a noise (though with a rapid rise) so inverse square root scaling applies.

There is obviously a transition between strong and weak shocks were the exponent declines from 3 to 2. Modeling this in closed form is a bit complicated, and usually nomographs and the like are employed, more exactly numerical simulations are used that model the microscopic processes and give appropriate answers at all scales.

Quote:

In reality, the relations will be more complicated, due to losses of energy, due to widening of the shock wave while it travels outwards and due to different characteristics of explosion for different masses. At a larger distance, the explosive power is not only distributed over a larger surface area, but it also is distributed over a larger amount of time (widening of shock wave).

A shock wave is by definition an instantaneous energy transfer. They cannot "widen" because they always have near zero thickness (a few mean free paths in the medium). Discussions of the "thickness" of a shock are really talking about the time for equilibrium to be reached as the instantaneously transferred energy redistributes between translation, rotation and vibration of the molecules and is important with polyatomic molecules. This equilibrium is actually achieved faster on average with weaker shocks than stronger ones since it starts out closer to equilibrium anyway.

As the shock decays into a sound wave it stops being a sudden jump and becomes the very steep leading edge of a sound pulse, but by this point it is no longer a shock wave. As this sound pulse broadens, the sound stops being a bang and becomes imperceptible to human hearing (Krakatoa pressure wave you hear of circling the Earth was just such an inaudible pressure pulse).

woelen - 22-12-2015 at 10:50

No problem that this is a response to an old thread. If all responses to old threads were like this then it would be good to have many of such responses

Interesting read and good to see that there are people who are knowledgeable about this subject. Thanks for the corrections and making things more precise. There is one question left for me. Strong shocks have cubic fall off of intensity with increasing distance, but this would mean that a lot of energy is "lost" (converted to heat), especially near the center of explosion. Is it true that near the center of explosion there is a very strong heat-up of the air, even if the chemical reaction does not produce that heat? Otherwise I see no possibility of cubic fall off (only sub-cubic, like exponent 2.5 or even less).

careysub - 22-12-2015 at 11:15

Quote: Originally posted by woelen

Yes, prompt heat dissipation (that is, a sudden temperature jump along with the pressure jump behind the shock front) is prominent in very strong shocks, declining in relative importance as the shock weakens (the limiting case is half of the total energy appearing as heat).

It is a reasonable approximation to assume cube root scaling if the shock is intense enough to damage physical objects; square root at a distance when you are considering only the sound. I recall that for some damage modeling rules-of-thumb an exponent of 2.7 is used (much closer to 3 than to 2).

With very large explosions, at extreme distances, the dissipation of sound can actually fall below inverse square as the sound becomes channeled by inversion layers within the atmosphere. This creates loud and silent ("shadow") zones on the ground with the audible zones extending great distances from the sound source. This accounts for people hearing Krakatoa thousands of miles away (a spotty phenomenon, only intermittent areas heard it).

These refraction sound zones are separate from the inaudible pressure pulse I mentioned in my previous post, the explosion energy in air having split into separate methods of transmission.

[Edited on 22-12-2015 by careysub]

crystal grower - 5-1-2016 at 13:49

Quite scary was for me reaction of hcl and h2so4 I wasnt expecting anything and it suddenly started making a lot of hcl gas

zed - 1-2-2016 at 18:56

Ethanol. It has killed billions.

Atrum - 1-2-2016 at 21:09

Sadly, it would be hydrazine sulfate.

.......stop laughing, I can feel you all laughing. ....

j_sum1 - 1-2-2016 at 21:24

Hey. I haven't made hydrazine sulfate yet. It is on my list. So, no laughing here.

My best is either Cl2 or Br2 depending on which you consider more dangerous.
And also some accidental NCl3 in very small quantities. Quite the pop in the beaker.
Of course quantities come into play in a discussion like this one.

crystal grower - 2-2-2016 at 23:54

The most dangerous chemical is .......................
............................my DNA

Sulaiman - 3-2-2016 at 00:13

Coming up to two years as a hobby the most dangerous substances made or isolated
Mn2O7, Aqua Regia, Pirrhana solution, Br2, NO2.

I have noticed that I,m a lot more careful (respect bordering on fear) doing chemistry than when I was a teenager.

Eddygp - 3-2-2016 at 02:25

Hahaha, best answer to crystal grower (however, let me add that my DNA surely is more dangerous!)

szuko03 - 3-2-2016 at 08:51

Quote: Originally posted by Sulaiman

I have noticed that I,m a lot more careful (respect bordering on fear) doing chemistry than when I was a teenager.

Isnt it funny how that works. Up until recently its not that I wasnt concerned I just somehow got more aware of the danger. I watched some documentary on environmental pollution building up in human bodies, after that I became aware of something i always knew "if you can smell it then its getting into your blood" and now I cant help but think anytime I smell something "oh man the ventilation isnt good enough, that stuff is getting in my blood" and that thought like haunts and bothers me. Its good now im at less of a risk for cancer through exposure to fumes from things i suppose, not that i was purposely inhaling vapors before.

But yeah i dont really deal in danger so just acetone peroxide when i was younger I wont do things like that now.

[Edited on 3-2-2016 by szuko03]

woelen - 3-2-2016 at 10:13

Wisdom comes with the years. This also is true in chemistry

crystal grower - 3-2-2016 at 11:25

Quote: Originally posted by Eddygp

Hahaha, best answer to crystal grower (however, let me add that my DNA surely is more dangerous!)

Thanks for compliment, but I don't think anything is more dangerous than DNA of 16 years old curious chemist

The Volatile Chemist - 3-2-2016 at 16:12

Quote: Originally posted by crystal grower

Quote: Originally posted by Eddygp

Hahaha, best answer to crystal grower (however, let me add that my DNA surely is more dangerous!)

Thanks for compliment, but I don't think anything is more dangerous than DNA of 16 years old curious chemist

May I second that, I too know what you mean (I'm 16 too)

The most dangerous compound that happens to be forming in my lab is ethanol (a joke, aga, arkoma), but I'm not making it, and it's tainted with an unknown, wild yeast I'm trying to grow, so it's both useless to me, and not the purpose of the experiment.

jokull - 4-2-2016 at 13:37

Potassium cyanide, however the method is not dangerous.

Kind regards.

chemplayer.. - 12-2-2016 at 22:50

Cyanogen iodide and then attempting to isolate it by vacuum fractionally distilling a solution of it in DCM (guess what, it just comes over alongside the DCM and then vapourises right into the vacuum pump even if the receiver is cooled in ice!).

The brown-polymeric stains of decomposing CNI (slowly emitting even more badly staining iodine) literally took weeks to get off the glassware and out of the filter pump.

But the crystals forming as the solid evaporated were simply stunning. As thin as a spiders gossamer thread and 7-8 cm long extending through air! There's an old video of ours which has some of the crystal footage in it.

Xanax - 5-10-2016 at 06:16

I was extracting ricin from castor beans, and abrin from the rosary peas. The FOA (the military forensic station) in sweden was analysing it, and they said that abrin is about 50 times more poison than ricin. The police said, it was so dangerous that no delivery service wanted to transport it to the NFC (Nationell Forensic Central), so the police drove self with the bottles. Then it was to poisonous for NFC, so it was sent to FOA...

The newspaper wrote on the first side:

"Hundreds could have died"
WAR AGENTS WAS MADE IN
KITCHEN IN ÄNGELHOLM

Then I was prosecuted on 5 points;
1. Crime against the radition safty law (I had a lot of radioactive material at home)
2. Crime against the radition safty law (yes it was the same on 2 points)
3. Crime against the law about chemical war agents (ricin)
4. Crime against the law about war material (abrin)
5. Illegal enviroments activities (ricin, abrin and nitric acid)

If here is someone who can swedish, you can read the judgment here:
https://docs.google.com/file/d/0B3-9YUgtqBa0RVJWWWpQRmIyczg/...

I was guilty at point 1 and 5, and freed on point 2,3 and 4. I didn't know it was illegal to extract the poison from the beans, because the beans are sold everywhere. My penalty was fine on 13 600 swedish kronor, it is about little less than 2000 $.

Now I don't lab at home anymore. But had a search warrent for a half year ago. It was my psychopath to ex-girlfriend who wanted to fuck up my life and tipped the police. They seducted the whole block, and men went in to my apartmen in protection-suits with breathing-units... The bombsquad was also with them, and they had with them firetrucks and ambulances was ready...

Some pictures (and swedish text) in the newspaper:
http://www.hd.se/2016-04-01/han-forsokte-bygga-karnreaktor-i...

I'm still intressted in specially toxicology. I know how simple it is to make for example botulinum toxin, but I will never do that!

EDIT 1: They took all my toxic and radioactive stuff (even welding-electrodes which was 98% Tungsten and 2% Thorium). But the let my collection of elements still (except Uranium, Thorium, Radium, Americium and Trithium). There I have some dangerous elements, Thallium, Selene, Arsenic and pure Cesium. The Cesium is not poisonous, but it will explodes in contact with water. They all are in glass-ampoules.

EDIT 2: Some english news about it:
https://www.theguardian.com/world/2011/aug/03/atom-splitting...
http://www.bbc.com/news/world-europe-14406766
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/newstopics/howaboutthat/8679...

EDIT 3: When I was working and extracting ricin and abrin, I got sick, I womited blood, and there was blod in the feaces. I had a little fever, but it went back...

[Edited on 5-10-2016 by Xanax]

Tsjerk - 5-10-2016 at 06:57

A colleague of mine accidentally made some hydroden-telluride the other day... While making Baird-Parker plates she dropped the last couple of milligrams in the wast bin. The next colleague dropped some acid in the same bin. The result was hydrogen-telluride. The smell was comparable with rotten eggs and dead bodies, but it was really hard to tell where the smell was coming from... it was persistent although the room is cleaned of air every 5 minutes, heavy stuff...

Xanax

Sulaiman - 5-10-2016 at 07:59

1 did you have an actual nuclear meltdown ?

2 did the authorities send you for any medical tests ?

Xanax - 5-10-2016 at 11:10

Quote: Originally posted by Sulaiman

1 did you have an actual nuclear meltdown ?

2 did the authorities send you for any medical tests ?

1. It was absolutly not a meltdown, I just made fun of the situation. I was boiling Beryllium, Americium and Radium in 96% sulfuric acid to blend all the substanses. And suddenly it boiled almost explosivly and splashed down the stove.

2. Yes, I was sent to do a forensic psychiatric investigation.

Sulaiman - 5-10-2016 at 12:42

ok, first answer as expected, just checking.
your second answer surprised me, I was thinking of radioactivity etc.
but then you were rather crazy

P.S. I hope that you did not get dosed like David Hahn
http://www.dangerouslaboratories.org/radscout.jpg

[Edited on 5-10-2016 by Sulaiman]

Xanax - 5-10-2016 at 14:06

Quote: Originally posted by Sulaiman

ok, first answer as expected, just checking.
your second answer surprised me, I was thinking of radioactivity etc.
but then you were rather crazy

P.S. I hope that you did not get dosed like David Hahn
http://www.dangerouslaboratories.org/radscout.jpg

[Edited on 5-10-2016 by Sulaiman]

The Swedish Radiatonsafty Authorothy said that I probably not was exposed for harmful doses of radiation.

But David Hahn was a big inspiration source for my project.

TheNerdyFarmer - 5-10-2016 at 15:22

Just started so probably nitric acid.

(Considering I forgot to delude the HCL and had a runaway reaction.

OOPS! )

Sulaiman - 5-10-2016 at 15:43

conc. nitric acid with almost any metal looks very calm ... for a few seconds
then a brown cloud of very nasty NO₂ tries to choke or kill you ... take care

j_sum1 - 5-10-2016 at 16:18

I can't think of anything that I have done that is scarier than chlorine gas. Mind you, it was a bit uncontrolled. (cough!)

On second thoughts my accidental production of trichloramine was a bit memorable. But I think this question is very much relative to the quantity produced. A little bang in a test tube (ok, a fairly large bang then) really does not compare with evacuating the lab until the air becomes breathable again.

Texium - 5-10-2016 at 16:51

Quote: Originally posted by TheNerdyFarmer

Just started so probably nitric acid.

(Considering I forgot to delude the HCL and had a runaway reaction.

OOPS! )

How exactly were you using HCl to make nitric acid?

woelen - 5-10-2016 at 22:28

The nastiest I ever had, in terms of toxicity is the little accident I had with synthesizing mercury(I) arsenate and mercury(II) arsenate.

I prepared both salts, fortunately only in small quantitity (maybe 300 mg of each). I allowed them to dry, each on a piece of thick white teflon, which is very smooth and from which they can be easily scraped when dry.

I had these two little piles of these toxic chemicals drying on my workbench, on a dry and cold winter day. One day later, I decided that the material was nice and dry and I carefully took away both pieces of teflon. While doing so, I see two little fountains of dust, and both little piles spray around and all of the material is gone.

I immediately left the room, closed the door and the next day, I carefully mopped up everything in the workplace with a wet towel.

What happened was that the teflon built up a lot of static charge when moved away from the workbench and as a result, all solid fine material was expelled, all little particles were forced into the air by means of electrostatic forces. I learned that using smooth teflon as a container for dry powders is not good at all.

Sulaiman - 6-10-2016 at 03:12

As I was reading your post I thought

... mmm... teflon ... what a clever idea ... ????? ... oh, of course, what a dumb idea ...... wtf is mercury arsenate used for? .... mercury AND arsenic ... close call !

Chemetix - 11-10-2016 at 02:32

Liquid Chlorine; 200ml in a glass bottle sitting on a bench has a very unnerving quality about it. Is the vapour pressure going to exceed the bottle's capabilities, theory says it will be ok? If theory is wrong, how far and fast can I run holding my breath? A close second is a bottle of liquid SO2; the runner up was the Sulfuryl Chloride made shortly afterwards, it has a smell that really means business and demands to be taken seriously. I was young and ballsy then.
Nitroglycerine gave me the fear of god while making it, but in hindsight wasn't all that bad. HMTD! I still have scars.

fusso - 15-4-2018 at 13:21

Hg2(NO3)2, i thought it was Hg(II) as I dunno Hg has +1 state at that time
unknown blue liq formed while bubbling NO2 into test tube cooled w dry ice, during metal + HNO3 rxn
Ni nitrate, dissolving CuNi coins
unprocessed Na2S, S+NaOH
Pb(NO3)2, PbO+HNO3
Pb(OAc)2, PbO+AcOH
Cl2(l), bubbling Cl2 into dry ice cooled test tube from MnO2+HCl
unknown Cl-butanes, bubbling Cl2 into C4H10(l) in dry ice cooled test tube, along w a small explosion producing some black ash

probably all of them IIRC

LearnedAmateur - 15-4-2018 at 13:29

I’d have to go with either NO2 or Cl2, I suffered exposure symptoms once from the NO2 for a couple of weeks but luckily neither were made on large scale. I actually deal with NO2 somewhat frequently but it’s literally only in minute quantities as byproducts, nowhere near enough to cause harm from atmospheric exposure but it does leave that characteristic bleach like odour hanging around..

IMO, gases are the worst common poisons to be dealing with, of course there are explosives and toxic salts but these can actually be contained and dealt with easily. Breathing in poisons is by far the fastest and most efficient route to exposure and they’re quite difficult to contain, especially with continuous generation where pressure may build up and cause strong leaks.

DavidJR - 15-4-2018 at 14:18

NO₂ isn't anywhere near as unpleasant as the halogens imo. Also, spend the £35 or whatever on a proper respirator, it's well worth it.

LearnedAmateur - 15-4-2018 at 14:21

Depends on what it is, if you’re dealing with fluorine and chlorine then they’re quite bad, but with bromine it’s not overly hazardous unless you leave it sitting in an open container, and obviously iodine is always a solid unless heated and doesn’t readily sublime at standard conditions. I’ve even vapourised a small amount of iodine before creating a pale purple haze which filled a room but suffered no ill effects from it, whereas if that were enough NO2 or chlorine to do the same then you’d probably be dead within minutes!

PirateDocBrown - 15-4-2018 at 15:17

When I was in grad school, I made hydrocarbons that later would ligate to metal centers, forming catalysts. But they had to be made enantiomerically pure, so the later catalysis would be chiral. To do this, the synthetic substrate would first have to be bound to a natural product that would itself chirally direct the synthesis. One of these natural products was a very potent neurotoxin, similar structurally and in effect to ricin. Micrograms could kill if inhaled, ingested, or gotten into the eye. Most of the time I handled it in a dry box, so I was pretty safe.

I'd rather handle liquid phosgene than that, though. And I have.

[Edited on 4/15/18 by PirateDocBrown]

Leafs - 28-4-2018 at 21:48

Bromine (gnarly stuff)
Purified and concentrated sulfuric acid using the H2O2 method, boiling H2SO4 in an open vessel, super sketchy in my book.
H2S (I believe this was accidentally generated when I reacted NaHSO4 and NaBr in solid form at very high temps in an attempt to generate HBr, definitely a rotten egg smell)

Melgar - 3-5-2018 at 20:58

Quote: Originally posted by fusso

unknown blue liq formed while bubbling NO2 into test tube cooled w dry ice, during metal + HNO3 rxn

Sounds like nitrous acid. It's more stable at lower temperatures, at room temperature and above it tends to disproportionate and form NO2 among other things. I've only ever seen it in cold solutions, and even then it doesn't last very long.

For me, the least pleasant was probably bromoacetophenone. It's a really irritating tear gas, but there's a delay between when you're exposed to it and when you start feeling the effects. The one time I made the stuff, I just had my face buried in a towel with my eyes and nose running directly into it for the better part of an hour.

Also, cyanide gas. Alkali cyanides really aren't as dangerous as people imagine they are, if you're just not stupid or careless about it. But trace amounts of cyanide gas are almost inevitable. Fortunately, it has a distinctive smell that you just have to immediately be on the alert for whenever you're using these salts. It also helps to know if you can smell it or not. Most people can, but if you're one of those that can't, it's really important that you're aware of that. It's lighter than air though, so it's a lot safer to use outdoors. In fact, they'd tried to use it as a chemical weapon in World War I, but couldn't because it wouldn't stay near the ground. So they mostly resorted to using chlorine and phosgene.

[Edited on 5/4/18 by Melgar]

VSEPR_VOID - 3-5-2018 at 23:59

Liquid Bromine
Uranyl Nitrate
Chlorine
White Phosphorus
Piranha solution

LearnedAmateur - 4-5-2018 at 01:22

I was looking up nuclear related stuff yesterday and stumbled across uranyl nitrate, very cool compound indeed. It’s such a nice colour and has the neat effect of being triboluminescent too as I’m sure you’ve likely discovered.

VSEPR_VOID - 4-5-2018 at 01:45

I was about 14 when I made, garbed in a military grade gas mask, full hazmat suit, and thick goves, by the reaction of UO2 with nitric acid. I observed the formation of a light yellow-green compound and then washed it down the utility sink. I only made a very small amount and once I was done I disposed of it. I never was able to observe the triboluminescence.

coppercone - 11-5-2018 at 13:57

flush that shit ese someone opened the pig pen

but various halogens

kinda suprized no one in this thread mentioned explosives though.... considering the sub forum and all

guess swim does not post here

[Edited on 11-5-2018 by coppercone]

Rhodanide - 14-5-2018 at 06:38

Chloropicrin, TATP, Diiodoacetylene, Hydrazine, Hydrazoic acid, Chlorine Dioxide, etc etc

Doped-Al2O3-fusion - 14-5-2018 at 07:26

The things I've made which have made me most nervous have been chromium chloride--(the fumes are incredibly volatile and toxic), potassium chromate/dichromate, roasting of chromium metal with sodium hydroxide and various other chromium and heavy metal compounds I've extracted from igneous rocks such as arsenic salts.

Aqua-regia - 14-5-2018 at 11:48

phosgene, liquid HCN and dimethylsulfate in vapor phase

mackolol - 15-5-2018 at 01:30

Yesterday i tried to remove my pbr5 from pcl3, pbr3 mixture so i heated it up but nothing happened. I ended up with it boiling at 300C and filling almost all my condenser.

SWIM - 15-5-2018 at 07:33

Quote: Originally posted by coppercone

kinda suprized no one in this thread mentioned explosives though.... considering the sub forum and all

guess swim does not post here

[Edited on 11-5-2018 by coppercone]

Actually, I do post here, but never made anything more dangerous than dimethylsulfate.

AJKOER - 17-5-2018 at 13:33

Actually, per a recent thread comment:

"Not sure if I mentioned the results of the reaction of NaOCl (chlorine bleach), NaCl and oxalic acid previously on SM, the advice is a warning, the reaction is exceptionally vigorous liberating Cl2 and CO2 per my experience!

Reactions:

H2C2O4 + 2 NaOCl --> Na2C2O4 (s) + 2 HOCl

2 NaCl + H2C2O4 --> Na2C2O4 (s) + 2 HCl

HCl + HOCl = Cl2 + H2O

Cl2 + H2C2O4 --Ferrous--> 2 HCl + 2 CO2

Reference on the action of chlorine with oxalic acid with a Fe(ll) or Mn(lll) impurity, see https://pubs.acs.org/doi/abs/10.1021/ja01208a024 and https://pubs.acs.org/doi/abs/10.1021/ja01198a052 , where a chain reaction mechanism has been proposed. "

where I may have dissolved the H2C2O4 in transition metal containing tap water. My point is that it is not just how problematic the substance is (like chlorine), but also how one mismanages its preparation!
--------------------------------------

I also recall a reported lab accident involving the creation of N2O that was exposed to a side reaction evolving hydrogen (another chain reaction event, see http://pubs.rsc.org/en/content/articlelanding/1975/f1/f19757... ). The explosion/fire ball produced extreme high temperatures resulting in severe burns. One does not usually think of Laughing Gas as potentially dangerous.

[Edited on 17-5-2018 by AJKOER]

JJay - 18-5-2018 at 10:07

I haven't handled anything super dangerous... the most dangerous is probably peroxymonosulfuric acid, mercuric nitrate, or perhaps chromium (VI) oxide peroxide... I have produced gaseous hydrogen cyanide and carbon monoxide but only in very tiny amounts, and I do remember doing some uranium chemistry on a very small scale in high school....

Doped-Al2O3-fusion - 16-7-2018 at 18:39

TATP on accident. I put a couple videos up on YouTube. Here is the shorter one at around 1.5 minutes so it's easier to watch.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=k2WSAgKFjrk

Sulaiman - 16-7-2018 at 23:44

that video just reminded me of the largest batch of NI₃ that I made in my youth ..
my father gave me an area in his garage/workshop for my schoolboy experiments,
I once made a pile of NI₃ about 1" diameter and 1/2" high (pre-metrication) and left it to dry on a brick on my bench space with a BIG warning sign something like
DANGER
EXPLOSIVE
DO NOT TOUCH

Apparently this was too tempting for my father

According to him, he touched the pile with an outstretched arm and a very long screwdriver
- ringing in the ears for hours, a shattered brick and a bent screwdriver.
I may have made a little too much ?
----------------------------
At around the same time;
My schoolmate partner in chemistry crimes used to like flicking little bits of NI₃ off the filter paper when almost dry, out of his bedroom window, to explode when hitting the ground.
(I preferred using it to fill air rifle pellets, or making minefields for insects)
I went round to his house because he was not at school for a few days,
but he did not want to see me

later he explained ...
whilst leaning over the filter paper the whole lot exploded,
leaving him with an iodine-stained face
... except for the shadow of his (small round John Lennon style) spectacles

For some reason he thought it better to stay home than come to school

[Edited on 17-7-2018 by Sulaiman]

Doped-Al2O3-fusion - 21-7-2018 at 16:21

TATP (Acetone Peroxide)

I accidentally created this compound recently while attempting to further oxidize some iron oxide. However, I was soaking the iron oxide in a flask with acetone to draw the water out and dry the product quicker. I added 35% H2O2 to the solution and didn't think about the organic solvent in solution. A short while later, I had white crystals grow off my drying pile of rust. I was able to float the crystals off the iron oxide with just water as the acetone peroxide crystals were rather insoluble. I uploaded a couple of videos showing how scary this stuff is, but I'll save you some time and only link the second video.

*As a side note, iron oxide is naturally slightly acidic. This is the probably cause as a catalyst in the formation of TATP & most likely a significant portion of DADP crystals after the H2O2 was added to the solution.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=k2WSAgKFjrk

[Edited on 22-7-2018 by Doped-Al2O3-fusion]

Culpable Cuprate - 8-11-2018 at 12:32

As far as synthesizing I'd have to say:
Peroxymonosulfuric acid
Conc. Nitric acid (RFNA)
Aqua regia
Nitrosyl chloride
Nitrosylsulfuric acid
Various heavy metal salts and complexes
Arsine (accidentally)

Dangerous things I plan to attempt to synthesize are:
Dinitroacetylene/copper acetylide (as possible precursors to cubane/octanitrocubane)
Octanitrocubane
Hydrazoic acid
Copper azide
CuNTZ (and various metal NTZ complexes)
Octaazacubane (I have a theory that Cu could stabilize the structure and allow for the isolation of it in an economical, environmentally friendly, and viable way)

As for dangerous compounds I've isolated, years ago I isolated about 100mg of crude alpha-amatoxin just for shits and giggles (scary deadly shit, more toxic than strychnine. Amatoxins have an LD50 less than 0.1mg/kg). I ended up getting paranoid about having it around, so I ended up incinerating my sample. Which I'm now kinda kicking myself ass for after learning that the current going rate of it is about $900 USD for 99.87% pure alpha-amatoxin (5mg)

Tsjerk - 9-11-2018 at 02:56

Quote: Originally posted by Culpable Cuprate

Which I'm now kinda kicking myself ass for after learning that the current going rate of it is about $900 USD for 99.87% pure alpha-amatoxin (5mg)

That doesn't mean that what you have is worth that, do you have the means to assay compounds needed to claim any purity? Even if you can you still need someone to sell it to

Culpable Cuprate - 9-11-2018 at 08:35

Quote: Originally posted by Tsjerk

Quote: Originally posted by Culpable Cuprate

Which I'm now kinda kicking myself ass for after learning that the current going rate of it is about $900 USD for 99.87% pure alpha-amatoxin (5mg)

That doesn't mean that what you have is worth that, do you have the means to assay compounds needed to claim any purity? Even if you can you still need someone to sell it to

I wasn't necessarily planning on selling it, but I do have access to the equipment necessary to provide accurate data on purity. Although, I have been mulling the idea of extracting more for the purposes of selling the more I look at the studies being done with amatoxins. The reason it's price is so high is due to supply/demand. There's a huge demand for the amatoxins (particularly cancer research as antibody-drug conjugates, showing single dose remission of prostate cancer and similar results for breast cancer) but extremely short supply, as the only source is wild mushrooms and the lethality of the compounds dissuade people from running extractions.

Hell, I'd farm Destroying Angels and Death Caps year round in mass if it meant someone would use em to cure cancer. The lucrative aspect of it is certainly a good motivator too of course hahaha

Hendrik - 9-11-2018 at 09:02

Definitely the worst thing I've ever synthesized was hydrogen cyanide (via a process in which a ferrocyanide was heated and acidified with phosphoric acid). The quantities were low enough and the fume hood I worked under was very powerful, so I guess I was safe.

BakingBrownies - 14-11-2018 at 12:16

potassium cyanide

but also white phosphorus... not sure if I synthesized the white phosphorous I just took it out of another compound.

[Edited on 14-11-2018 by BakingBrownies]

TheMrbunGee - 15-11-2018 at 07:26

Quote: Originally posted by BakingBrownies

but also white phosphorus... not sure if I synthesized the white phosphorous I just took it out of another compound.

I distilled red P, to form WP, did not seem that dangerous, stool was not smoking after. Jaw still strong.

Most dangerous thing I have done was not synthesis, but identification. I posted that on SM, I found these nice looking, dense "glass" things, did the density measurements and determined melting point, sadly - without much protection (no respirator, no gloves at all the times I handled it) - turned out to be Thallium Bromoiodide (KRS-5) Optical Crystals. Definitely got some in my system. Very good lesson for me.

Rogeryermaw - 19-5-2021 at 08:46

i can add tetramethylammonium nitrate to my list. not super dangerous but it is quite flammable and an absorption toxicity hazard. synthed from tetramethylammonium chloride and silver nitrate. sick stomach and brown skin are the worst of this one. i was trying to get a working version of Clive Jennigs-White's blue strobe star.

the clean up is a pain. all the tma compounds i've messed with are stupid hygroscopic and i think trace amounts of unreacted silver nitrate screwed with the burn result. otoh, if you don't go far enough with the nitrate, the resulting tman will be deliquescent.

Jenks - 19-5-2021 at 11:42

A long time ago, when interested in pyrotechnics, I made silver acetylide. This gray solid is extremely flame sensitive, instantly exploding with a sharp "crack" when exposed to flame in milligram amounts. It didn't seem to be sensitive to pressure, so after drying a few grams of it I ground it in a mortar and filled a little bottle with it, to show off proudly. But I noticed, while brushing out the last bit of dust from the mortar, that it made some small cracking sounds, apparently from the static electricity generated. I realized that I had probably come close to losing a hand and deactivated my sample by wetting it before disposal.

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