Inorganic Chemistry

Hi, Can someone explain 'Inert Pair Effect' to me. It is not in A'levels syllabus but is important in understading the stabilities of Group IV element. I have read all the books I have and got nothing out of it. You can provide links that could explain it easily, if you like. Thnxx

hi please give me the instructions for making calcium acetate using hydrated lime and acetic acid. how do i get it to crystallise?

Hi, I just read Group IV today and was surprised to know that Carbon melting point was higher than that of lead or tin. The explaination the book gave was that the giant covalent bonding in carbon doesn't allow the electron to move and thus it requires greater energy to separate the bonds and melt carbon. While metallic bonding shown by tin or lead is weak. the idea didn't sink in. Can any 1 help.

Does anyone know how to make potassium permanganate (KMnO4) or a good source of it?

To weigh as much as a penny, how big would a ball of Aerogel have to be? It would have a diameter of about ... 35% - a) 15.75 cm 46% - b) 11.5 cm 12% - c) 6.25 cm 8% - d) 3 cm Answer is: b) 11.5 cm The latest aerogel weighs 1.9 milligrams per cubic centimetre, just .7 milligrams more than the same volume of air. Yet it's strong enough to support thousands of times it's own weight. It also withstands extreme temperatures, and as an insulator, aerogel is about 40% more efficient than fiberglass. To get the answer you had to know that a penny weighs 2.35 grams. If you divide the weight of the penny by the weight of one cubic centimetre of aerogel, you ge…

Testing for Fe(II) Lab I'm trying to create a lab that tests for Fe (II) in solution. We're supposed to make a 'control' set for the experiment by creating FeCl2 from FeCl3 and testing to see if the indicator we selected worked. i have several questions: does anyone know a good way to go from FeCl3 to FeCl2? Its .002 M FeCl3 and I think we have all standard chemicals available. can anyone help me find a way to test if there is actually Fe(II) in the solution? I'm just so lost right now... any help would be appreciated!

Hi to all great member, This is my first post on this forum after joining a few days ago. Nice meeting all of science people here.... I am really need clarification on how to calculate the purity of Sodium Meta Bisulfite above. I do the titration with Iodine 0.1 N until the color changes to faint black with starch indicator. In water the Na2S2O5 + H2O ---> 2NaHSO3. The purity calculated as: {(VxNx47.5) / W mg)} x 100% = % w/w Na2S2O5 as Na2S2O5. Is the above equation correct?. Any other thought? Google was no help anyway . Thankyou in advance.

do helium form any compounds ,no matter how drastic the conditions are(one such example i found on wikipedia where it termed the compound as strongest acid with pKa -63!)

i am a total newbie here....i understand basic principles like supercooling, phase change, etc, but otherwise a total dummy, i have equivalent to 1st yr university in chem, but that was a long, long time ago. so go easy on me. i am trying to find out the difference btwn sodium acetate trihydrate (used in handwarmers), and anhydrous sodium acetate (used as de-icer). is it the same thing? the former seems to be kind of expensive, sold by the gram, the latter seems to be cheaper, sold by the ton. specifically, i guess i want to know, does the latter share the trait to be easily supercooled? the reason i ask, is i like the potential for sodium acetate trihydrate to "s…

Hi I am doing a diploma work on the subject recycling ionising smoke detectors. The radiation source is Am(IV)dioxide that has been melted into a gold matrix. What I wanted to do was to dissolve the gold and AmO and later use some separation technique to get the Am out. The problem is that I did not manage to dissolve with aqua regia as I thought I would be able to. I am using 5ml aqua regia for less than 1g of gold/AmO, some of it has been dissolved, but not at all as much as I would have guessed. I have it at room temperature and have been thinking of heightening the temperature to get better dissolving. To go to even stronger acids then aqua regia feels a bit u…

Ive Been collecting iron oxide by exposing it to bleach for extended amounts of time. recently i left the bottle cap on and it was inflated with a gas (i was kinda in shock when i blew up in my hands so thats all the info i have). Any guesses as to what i may be?

I am working with gold, looking for all info. i can get on the reaction with gold ?

I've asked my chem teacher this before, but still don't quite get it. In titration curves, e.g:http://www.chemguide.co.uk/physical/acidbaseeqia/summary.gif Why is there a sudden drop or rise in pH towards the equivalence point, is it due to the logarithmic nature of the pH scale, or am I missing something?

What are the products of electrolysis of aqueous KMnO4?

Hello all. Some friends of mine are concerned about a future potential mining operation in their forest and near their country town via copper iron sulfide. This ore is going to be extracted and trucked through the town and pristine forest. The concern stems from someone's assertion that CuFeS2 can be oxidised to CuFeSO4. I'm concerned that in acidic moist air, hydrogen sulfide may evolve. I don't understand this in terms of oxidation numbers because it seems to me that copper's oxidation number doesn't change in going from the CuFeS2 to CuFeSO4. Is it because of the aquisition of oxygen that copper iron sulfide is considered to oxidise into copper iron sulfa…

I know that Gold is a tried and true option for a nice "release" of the gold metal coating from glass or most metals. What is the property of Gold that makes it a good option? I really hope that there is a cheaper option with similair "chemical release properties." Thanks very much for any help. I have spent considerable time google monkeying this, but that and my chemistry 101 background are failing me.

While refining some NaOH/Al/Cu batteries I have made for charging nicads and ultracaps,I noticed that at a certain low cell voltage the aluminium electrode ceased to give off hydrogen, even though the cell was producing wattage that varied predictably above and below this voltage, as if there was no electrochemical change. (The non-linear factor was the anode/cathode area ratio.) Some weeks ago I came across a reference to the "hydrogen threshold", and what this voltage was for different elements. Now I can't find it again! I am interested because such a cell that does not produce potentially explosive hydrogen, nor a fine mist of caustic vapour is a much friendli…

Does anyone know what the names of these ions would be??? 1. SeO4 with a 2- charge 2. HSe with a 1- charge 3. HSeO3 with a 1- charge

Hi all! I'm a bit of a fan of electrolysis, there is something compelling about those bubbles rising from the metal while it falls apart. Anyway, I gave up on messing with NaCl solutions for this 'hobby' because I find the Cl2(g) is a bit to aggressive to toy with. So I tried some CH3COOH this time, concentration around 8%. Very nice stuff to remove oxidation from copper wires and I wanted to try electrolysis with it. So I used two copper 2.5mm^2 wires and a variable power supply set at 12V DC. Fired it up, waited a day and I wanted to share the results with you because I have some questions.... Here we see the kathode after 24 hours, which I tapped eve…

traditionaly this is a mixture of potassium perchlorate and either Sodium or potassium benzoate, I got to thinking, if we strip the Na or K off the benzoate and leave benzoic acid, wouldn`t that allow for a more complete combustion with less solid product remaining? thus you could get away with less mixture OR add more binder to make a whole array of new firework designs where pressing the powder isn`t always practical. Secondly, as sodium benzoate makes the flame yellow, how about Barium or Strontium benzoate instead, it would be nice to see a rocket go with a colored flame trail!

I am tryng to use P2O5 as desiccant to dry the atmosphere( air) in a glove box. In the glove box there will be maybe small amount of evaporated HCl. because P2O5 is corrosive, not easy to handle. therefore, could somebody give me any advice how to handle the drying process at best.

Hi, is there a way to increase the consentration of a 10% HCL solution that i found to a 30-40% HCL ?

Hi all ! this is my first post here...i am a hobbyist from Greece and i just discovered this forum. for experimenting purposes i tried to melt Zn extracted from an alkaline battery. I had read in wikipedia that Zn melting point is abou 420 degrees Celsium so i heated Zn with a MAPP blow torch that i have but instead of melting it turned more solid and it took a pale yellow color !? Does anyone know why so ? Thanks in advance

The commercial process for manufacturing Portland cement produces large quantities of carbon dioxide gas as a by-product. Does the technology currently exist to capture this carbon dioxide gas and convert it into some useful product rather than release it into the atmosphere? If so, I wonder what factors keep the technology from being used in commerce?

Hello, I was wondering if hydrochloric acid (~.008M) could be used instead of sulphuric acid to initiate the reaction between patassium chlorate and sugar.