Hey guys,

 

I am searching how I can make a solution of plastic. I have some plastic stars that glow in the dark, but would like to make a solution of it with the same properties (glowing in the dark). Has someone an idea. I don't even know what kind of plastic it could be. I don't think acids will work. I've tried to melt the plastic. It melts very fast at low temperatures, but loses it's yellowish color and becomes brown, due to combustion i think. And even if I would be able to melt the thing, it would become solid again. And i want a liquid.

what plastic are we talking about? i can find you a solvent, but not all plastics are the same.

hopefully the dissolution wont screw up the glowing additive

If you are lucky acetone may work, xylene or white spirit are more realistic. There are still lot of plastics that can not be properly liquified with easyli available solvents. Really strong solvents for plastics are dichlorometane, acetonitrile, chloroform or molten phenol.

you can also try DMSO (dimethyle sulfoxide, i believe). Id ealso try tolene and other solvents found at the hardware store.

Petrol works as the stars (if they`re the same as the bag I have) are a styrene base, you`ll need to heat it carefully though and use plenty of petrol so the liquid isn`t TOO viscous when you pour off the liquid, after a few washes you`ll get you Zinc Sulphide material, although there are Better sources of this than those star and Moon thingies!

 

have you tried the hallow`en glow in the dark face make-up? simple washing up liquid and warm water will do the trick AND give you more product per gram of starting weight

So, I put some stars in an erlenmeyer and heat it carefully with a lot of petrol. But what do you mean with 'washes'. Does the zinc sulpide precipitate ?? And what would be better sources ?

i suppose you could do it much easily with those glow-in-the-dark inks and paints

So, I put some stars in an erlenmeyer and heat it carefully with a lot of petrol. But what do you mean with 'washes'. Does the zinc sulpide precipitate ?? And what would be better sources ?

 

in reverse order my post #6 gave you an ideal source.

 

as for washing, you need to use petrol again, and then when not so viscous you may introduce detergents, the "glow in the dark" material is a crystal unaffected by these and will drop out to the bottom of the flask as they`re insoluble.

 

I PERSONALY wouldn`t even bother with such an extraction unless I was desperate, it`s a bad waste of good fuel and materials, but it`s your choice, and that`s how you`ll do it.

just a note, acetone also works with polystyrene.

just a note, acetone also works with polystyrene.

 

and at 10x the expense (

acetone isnt expensive.

compared to petrol it is!

 

what planet do YOU live on??? LOL

i have really no idea wat petrol is lol, i just know acetone is fairly cheep

oh dear lord!

 

petrol=petrolium distilate (gasoline) Octane etc...

Petrol = gas. In England, as well as many non-US countries, they call it that. And if it's cheaper for petrol/gas there, than it better be here, 'cause it's darned expensive over there. What is it YT, like 2 pounds per liter? That's what I heard...

its just gasoline? well now it makes sense. btw wats the formula for gasoline?

Best I can do is tell you it's got C's and H's... You'd think I'd know, seeing as I'm a pyro... (Who isn't?!)

id say 60 % of ppl get into chemistry cuz of pyro stuff

gasoline is a mixture of C5-C10 aliphatic hydrocarbons. the "octane" rating in gasoline is basically a measurement of the concentration of octane (C8H18) present in the gasoline.

octane is generally the best hydrocarbon of the C5-C10 aliphatic hydrocarbons because it requires more force to combust.

 

just a followup: "unleaded" gas refers to gas that doesn't have tetraethylplumbane in it.

Acetone is cheeper than gasoline in the USA (well, not close, but it getting expensive, TIME FOR H2 vehicles!!!)

 

 

But ya, gasoline is a mix of various hydrocarbons derived from the catylactic cracking of crude oil (and also distillation).

I'm not so sure about that... Even the (about) $2 for a gallon of gas is better than what it costs me at home improvement stores... Maybe you just have better sources than I do.

ya acetone is like 12-15 dollars i gallon at best

I've tried to make a solution of the glow-in-the-dark-plastic with acetone, but I had to scratch some of the plastic of the stars, and I obtained a sort of gummy ball. So it certainly didn't disolve in acetone. I think I'm going to try it with petrol like YT2095 said.

maybe u could put the stars/etc in ablender, then add that resulting "crud" into ur solvent