You have everything in the main post, just follow the steps. I had several failures, when I made the mixture in the flask with the aluminum and the 1-phenyl-2-nitropropene and others. The reaction was quite violent, it was my first experience with chemistry and the truth is that it scared me a bit. The substance remains very solid when I try to pass it through the strainer. I have weighed it and got a 55% yield on the main substance.
But I will leave it tonight to air and tomorrow I will weigh it again to see if the performance has been maintained before.
Challenge as such was to take the first step. Then everything goes fine. Although the reaction when you pour the contents into the aluminum amalgram I have to admit it scares me a bit.
I will continue doing a couple more syntheses with these proportions and quantities to practice.
I asked a couple of questions a little above my post.
How much could production be scaled with this method without hurting performance by 60%-70%?
What equipment would be needed? I would like to increase production to a minimum of 50g per cooking.
Ice water bath and top stirrer. I showed the example, you can carry out 100g at first and enlarge your synthesis step-by-step to avoid spoiling reagents.
This is a mixture of acetic acid, p2np and IPA, but a color appeared from this, why?
Knowing that the p2np was saved in the freezer? What do you think of the mixture?
I have been thinking what the right amount of Mercury nitrate is for amalgamation. I haven`t got Mercury nitrate or chloride so I have to use the nitric acid method, however the amount given in the video for Mercury nitrate synthesis is 5ml, which is about 25% of the Thermometer`s mercury content.
In the video which uses already made dry Mercury nitrate 0.1g Mercury Nitrate is given. This corresponds to roughly 62mg mercury. In the Mercury Nitrate/Thermometer video it is suggested that we use 1/4 of the total amount (5ml out of 20ml), which is at least 250mg Mercury if the thermometer contains 1gr. (normally mercury content is given between 0.6 and 3g). This is quite a substantial difference (X4).
Another question. Can you `overdo` amalgamation e.g. by using too much Mercury nitrate? I have tried to make amalgam, but it somehow disintegrated, the whole thing happened very fast well under 15minutes and most of my foil became `sludge`. Any tips on how to spot the right time and how to make the reaction slower? Sorry if this is something very obvious, but I still managed to get it wrong, even if I was watching for signs like bubbles etc.
Hi Patton, in a way yes, as you actually gave a proportion 1300:1 for Al:Hg, which roughly corresponds to the 0.1g of pure Hg(NO3)2 given in the video. On the other hand I still don`t know why fresh Mercury nitrate is given in a different proportion, or (another possibility) where my calculation goes wrong. That thread is very useful thank you for thinking of it.