nelsonB - 28-5-2016 at 12:17
Hi i was wondering if i could take some Oak Lump Charcoal
ground it, wash it multiple time with diluted Hydrochloric acid, rince it with distilled water and dry it to obtain some nice quality activated
charcoal ?
crazyboy - 28-5-2016 at 12:39
No that almost certainly won't work. See: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Activated_carbon#Production
You need to activate the carbon then carbonize it. Even industrial activated carbon varies in quality depending on the source and production method.
If you just want activated carbon I recommend going to a fish store and picking up some ROX carbon. See: https://youtu.be/JP5Vu6OvLOI?t=5m21s
nelsonB - 28-5-2016 at 12:45
yeah i saw some place say to heat it to 450 Celcius after the activation to remove the hcl gas,
but in anyway i have read that activated charcoal once used can be reactivated depending on what have been filtered.
so i guess when we have activated charcoal and only ester is stuck in the charcoal we could just reactivating it by heating it a lot so its get out
of it.
aga - 28-5-2016 at 13:41
The little bit of work i did on Activated Charcoal showed that you can get a degree of activation by simply bashing it into the smallest bits you can
manage.
Around IN 400 as i recall was obtained with just a pestle and mortar.
A ball mill (or put in more elbow grease) would 'activate' it more.
A dilute 5% HCl wash is part of the ASTM procedure for measuring the 'IN' of activated charcoal, so probably a good idea to do that, rinse with DIW
then oven dry.
Edit:
http://www.sciencemadness.org/talk/viewthread.php?tid=63181
[Edited on 28-5-2016 by aga]