lithium

[nitric]

I just extracted a lot of lithium from lithium batteries for element collecting. Any thing i can do except redox.

[Ladeira]

Sorry for the joke, but you can sell lithium for bipolar disorder patients ;D

 

I just said that because I don't know what you could do with lithium extracted from batteries...

[nitric]

wouldn't that be Li2CO3, as far as i know

[Ladeira]

yes and you're right, i don't think it's so difficult to react with H2CO3. just put in coke... ohh, it's more a joke. to tell you the truth, i'm smarter kidding than talking serious.

[DJBruce]

Well it is a alkaline so you could make a small explosion by putting it in water. I believe lithium is used to make fireworks red. If you can cool it around [math].0004 k[/math] then it would be a super conductor and you could do fun stuff with that.

 

Be careful though lithium along with all the alkaline metals are very dangerous. Inhalation of them can lead to pulmonary edema.

 

Yeah its lithium carbonate is used in antidepressants.

[nitric]

just tride redox with Na2CO3.Na2CO3+Li+xH2O=Na+Li2CO3+Li(HO)+xH2O

flame shot up a foot high:D

[jdurg]

You're probably not going to get an explosion if thrown in water. Lithium will hiss and fizz for a while, but it is VERY difficult to get it to ignite and explode like it's more reactive brethen.

[ellipsis]

That's right. Sodium is MUCH more reactive and lithium. You get LiOH after that.

[hermanntrude]

LiOH is a very strong base. There may be some interesting stuff you can do with that if you're careful.

[jdurg]

It's strong compared to aqueous Ammonia, but I wouldn't classify it as a "very strong base". It's more a strong base with NaOH, KOH, RbOH, CsOH, and some other bases taking the claim of very strong base.

[frosch45]

Well it is a alkaline so you could make a small explosion by putting it in water. I believe lithium is used to make fireworks red. If you can cool it around [math].0004 k[/math] then it would be a super conductor and you could do fun stuff with that.

 

Be careful though lithium along with all the alkaline metals are very dangerous. Inhalation of them can lead to pulmonary edema.

 

Yeah its lithium carbonate is used in antidepressants.

 

lithium is not alkaline, it is alkali

 

alkaline is the second group on the periodic table with Be, Mg, Ca, St, etc

 

 

and though you are right that it will react with water, it is not <that> reactive. it'll just fizz a little, it doesn't produce hydrogen fast enough or enough heat to ignite the hydrogen

 

 

it would be cool though to make it a superconductor

 

if you want, throw a few grams of what you got from the batteries into some water. if it fizzes and bubbles, its the pure element. if it dissolves (or doesn't because believe it or not, wikipedia says lithium carbonate is not very soluble) its the carbonate/sulfate/whatever

 

btw wiki...

 

"Lithium ion batteries are not to be confused with lithium batteries, the key difference being that lithium batteries are primary batteries containing metallic lithium while lithium-ion batteries are secondary batteries containing an intercalation anode material"

 

so, depending on where you got the substance that you are referring to in the battery, it may not have any lithium in it at all! could just be the layered anode material.

 

its probably safer just to buy some from a chemical supplier

[John Cuthber]

Lithium is a metal, it's neither an alkali nor alkaline.

 

Alkali is a noun alkaline is the corresponding adjective.

Be to Ra are alkaline earth elements. Without the word "earth" the description is inacurate.

[hermanntrude]

It's strong compared to aqueous Ammonia, but I wouldn't classify it as a "very strong base". It's more a strong base with NaOH, KOH, RbOH, CsOH, and some other bases taking the claim of very strong base.

 

it's very strong compared to anything this fellow is likely to have come across if he is forced to extract lithium from batteries rather than just buy it.

[nitric]

it's actually about 5 feet of Li foil in one battery. I'm attempting to make sodium metal.

[frosch45]

i thought the metals in group 1 were called alkali metals? thats what i've always heard them called....

 

sometimes though, alkaline is used to describe a basic solution though, right? not just the alkaline earth group

 

 

and as for the sodium....

there have been like billions of threads relating to that topic. use the search. you won't get anyware unless your willing to spend some money too. the process requires lots of continuous energy.

 

http://www.sciencemadness.org/talk/viewthread.php?tid=2103&page=1

 

a successful instance....but that cell was very well built by someone with a lot of expierence. if your not going to bother to read this entire thread don't bother trying to make any sodium. better read all 15 pages of it.

[John Cuthber]

They (Li to Fr) are alkali metals. They are not alkalis.

Similarly the alkaline earth metals are not alkaline and not earths.

 

 

"it's very strong compared to anything this fellow is likely to have come across if he is forced to extract lithium from batteries rather than just buy it."

Sodium hyroxide is (at least in solution in water) just as strong a base as lithium hydroxide. I can buy NaOH at the supermarket as a cleaner. I've never seen LiOH on sale there.

[nitric]

late response to frosch45, but it was metallic lithium i recovered and cost less than from chem. supplier.

[frosch45]

nice. how many grams did you recover? what are you planing on using it for? just a collection? were the batteries like cell phone batteries or otherwise? i'm interested

[hermanntrude]

They (Li to Fr) are alkali metals. They are not alkalis.

Similarly the alkaline earth metals are not alkaline and not earths.

 

 

"it's very strong compared to anything this fellow is likely to have come across if he is forced to extract lithium from batteries rather than just buy it."

Sodium hyroxide is (at least in solution in water) just as strong a base as lithium hydroxide. I can buy NaOH at the supermarket as a cleaner. I've never seen LiOH on sale there.

 

YOU know that oven cleaner is NaOH, he might not. My point is that it's a strong base. The "very" might or might not have been superfluous. Don't be such a pendant.

[John Cuthber]

"YOU know that oven cleaner is NaOH, he might not. "

Actually, I was talking about drain cleaner- the stuff I haver is labeled as "Caustic soda" and it lists the ingredient as 98% sodium hydroxide.

It seems to me that NaOH is easier to get than Li.

[hermanntrude]

nevertheless, it's not always obvious that what you're buying is NaOH, since on the fron tin giant letters it says "mr Muscle" or "wonderclean supreme winter-fresh" or something equally dumb, and then on the back in tiny letters because the law requires that they do so, it says that it contains NaOH, which some people read and some do not.

 

Again i'd like to point out that we're only debating the validity of a "very", not anything particularly important

[John Cuthber]

The word "very" has little to do with it. What we are talking about is that fact that from most people's point of view buying NaOH from the shop is easier than making LiOH by opening up batteries and reacting the Li with water.

"it's very strong compared to anything this fellow is likely to have come across if he is forced to extract lithium from batteries rather than just buy it."

No it's not- it's pretty much as strong a bas as NaOH. The guy may or may not know that he can buy roughly as stong a base from the shops rather than messing about with Li batteries- but that's his problem. He will have come across NaOH- possibly as you described it. Possibly like I buy it, clearly labeled with, I grant you, not its IUPAC aproved name, but hardly some obscure brand name. BTW, If someone knows how to shrink that image to a bit less overpowering please feel free.

[hermanntrude]

fair enough, I quit. it's all a moot point anyway since we're the only ones left even posting in this thread, and no-one really cared in the first place.