Home Chemistry

**LSJ** · February 10, 2007, 11:01 PM

I am a fan and a student of chemistry.
Anyone else here interested in it? Or actually done experiments/created compounds not for a professional business?

It can be fun, if you follow the proper safety procedures of course.

About my home chemistry: I have tried many of the simpler experiments, and very much like electrochemistry. Most of my stuff has been collected through chemistry sets, synthesized through electrolysis, displacement reactions, or obtained from household products.

I am making a book on experiments one can do at home, and detailed diagrams and charts for education and reference, as well as a list of chemicals that one can obtain legally, and how to make some safely. And trust me, I have experience on safety. I learned what NOT to do the hard way.

Now I can help others do it right the first time and save them from... mistakes.

I'd like to know if anyone else here does home chemistry, or if you're just interested in it.

**Darkragnar** · February 11, 2007, 06:21 AM

what standard are you in now? I got a fine knowledge about Organic Chemistry that i remember from School but besides that everything else is a bit hazy , i love Chemistry though for some reason nothing makes as much sense in science as Organic Chemistry does , its almost got a Mathematical Logic behind it.

**LSJ** · February 28, 2007, 03:27 PM

I forgot about this thread...

I have done some rather interesting things in the past two weeks...

I've obtained several compounds by displacement and electrolysis.
This week I made tin powder, tin chloride, iron chloride, and potassium hydroxide because I was bored.
I'm putting up instruction for things like this on a website sometime soon.

Making tin chloride is so easy. Unlike making other salt compounds, there is a low risk of the electrolysis going bad and releasing dangerous chlorine gas. SnCl2 is a very useful chemical as a reducing agent in various procedures. I decided to make some.

What I did was fill an empty jam jar with water, and mix in potassium chloride (dietary salt substitue) until no more would mix in. Then, I connected a 6 volt battery to the jar using a tin anode and cathode. After running it for a few hours....
I made tin chloride and potassium hydroxide. The only gas released is a bit of hydrogen, which, at this quantity, is nothing to worry about. The potassium chloride is broken apart. The potassium floats around freely, while the chlorine is attracted to the tin metal at the cathode (as it has a negative charge and tin is positive, especially as a cathode in a cell). The result is tin (II) chloride at the cathode, hydrogen gas bubbling by the cathode, and reactive potassium in the water. But of course ptoassium is very reactive; it can't stand being alone, so it grabs the first negatively charged thing it finds - hydroxide, OH, from the water (which has lost one atom of hydrogen). So, I got potassium hydroxide.
The tin chloride sank to the bottom of the jar eventually, while the KOH was suspended in the water. So, I filtered off the water and was left with a jar with somewhat pure tin chloride at the bottom.
It came out green, but after drying it turned light pink. The potassium hydroxide was in too small of an amount to be useful, and like sodium hydroxide it can bind to silicon compounds, such as glass, so it was disposed of in a rock garden.

This time my electrolysis was very successful. The first time I tried it with different ingredients and anode materials, I was glad I was doing it outside so I didn't inhale the chlorine gas. Obviously, I shut it off before the neighbours started to think I'm making chemical weapons for al-Quaida.

**tnick777** · February 28, 2007, 06:35 PM

Put a gummy bear in Potasiam Sulfide? Or something and it'll go crazy with flames etc.

**Dr. Dwermer** · February 28, 2007, 08:53 PM

solubility chemistry is really fun for demonstration. Also, while it's not my focus, I helped another professor perform a demonstration using photoreactive chemicals which produced remarkable florescence. Lots of "oohs" and "ahhhs". Not a whole lot of home chemistry, but I'll see if I can't post some of my favorite demos up later for gen chem.