I have read a few threads where people say that making acetyl salicylic acid is easy enough to do in the first week of an o-chem lab. I have little experience in organic and I was wondering how hard it is to get salicylic acid from aspirin. Any help and/or suggestions for other easy o-chem experiments is appreciated!

-Justin

It's easy. Extract the acetylsalicylic acid from Bayer pills with a suitable organic solvent and then you will have reasonably pure acetylsalicylic acid. Add the acetylsalicylic acid to sodium hydroxide solution and heat it for a few minutes. Cool the solution, then add dilute hydrochloric acid to preciptate salicylic acid. Filter the salicylic acid.

 

That's the method I used, it was suggested by someone in another thread.

Thanks a lot latentheat. What kind of solvent should I use? Also, what concentrations and amounts of NaOH and acid should I use? How hot should I heat the solution? When the salicylic acid precipitates, what will it look like?

 

Sorry for all the questions. I just like to be precise and exact.

Thanks a lot latentheat. What kind of solvent should I use? Also' date=' what concentrations and amounts of NaOH and acid should I use? How hot should I heat the solution? When the salicylic acid precipitates, what will it look like?

 

Sorry for all the questions. I just like to be precise and exact.[/quote']

 

I used acetone and it worked well.

 

I kinda estimated with the NaOH. It was dilute tho, not concentrated. I don't have a scale yet Don't make it conc. because then it could deprotonate the resulting acids (salicylic acid and acetic acid). In other words, have a slight excess of acetylsalicylic acid.

 

The salicylic acid will look like a white powder when it precipitates.

 

EDIT: oh, and heat it until it just begins to boil, just slightly.