You've just answered your own question.aga - 30-7-2015 at 12:59
Sure it is.
Easy for a 10th Dan Black-Belt Chemist with a fully equipped lab.
Blogfast25 means basically No in your circumstances.IrC - 30-7-2015 at 14:11
cds? Does that mean compact discs, Al and plastic, no Te, or Cadmium Sulphide, Cd and S, again zero Te. Add zero equipment and the question is, why
did you even ask? Fairly pure Te is readily available on fleabay for far less than the cost of the equipment you need/do not have.
cds? Does that mean compact discs, Al and plastic, no Te, or Cadmium Sulphide, Cd and S, again zero Te. Add zero equipment and the question is, why
did you even ask?
Rewritable disks contain a small layer of tellurium (in the form of a tellurium oxide, IIRC). You'd need to
destroy a ridiculously large amount of rewritable disks to get a very tiny amount of Te though, assuming you could separate it from everything else in
the disk and isolate the pure element in micro scale without it being too lossy. In other words: very impractical, and the lack of lab equipment makes
it even more so. You could buy yourself a nice set of decent lab equipment with all the money that you will save by not buying a ton of rewritable
disks.aga - 30-7-2015 at 14:21
zts16 said: hmm, maybe I could, not worth it, so No.
IrC said: Not worth it. No.
[Edited on 30-7-2015 by aga]IrC - 30-7-2015 at 14:33
Interesting to learn zts, the last time I read about CD's they mentioned Al but failed to cover rewritable's and the use of Te. The reason I like it
here so many have a vast store of useful knowledge to convey. Looking at wiki I see "By 1984, the company Panasonic was working on an erasable optical
disk drive containing "tellurium monoxide" (really a mixture of Te and TeO2)".
Still we all agree there is no logic in trying to recover Te from discs. If he is smart he will look at that eBay link if having some Te at low cost
is the goal. diddi - 30-7-2015 at 15:06
One of the other modern uses of Te is in solar panel technology, so you might be lucky to find a dead solar panel somewhere that contains enough Te to
actually make the project worth doing. that is after you buy equipment and reagents for your lab you are building. If it is for an element
collection... just buy some.
[Edited on 30-7-2015 by diddi]j_sum1 - 30-7-2015 at 18:29
I'm going to take issue with the "just buy some" philosophy. There are different kinds of element collections.
You might want pure samples -- in which case, buying some would be the way to go.
You might want to show elements as they are commonly used -- in which case put the whole CD in the collection along with a description of where the Te
is and how it is used.
You might want to have elements that you have isolated yourself -- in which case, go for it. However, Te would not be your first stop if you are
lacking equipment.
My collection is a combination of these. I have nice lumps of silicon but also Si obtained via a thermite from sand. I have lovey graphite
specimens. But also graphite rods from a battery, graphite brushes from a motor and both synthetic and natural diamonds. I have no intention of
isolating the Am from the smoke detector button that encloses it. I have a lovely radium clock with glowing paint. And although it probably only has
a couple more years before the ZnS fully breaks down and it stops glowing, I am not going to try to restore the glow.
As in any collection, focus and prioritise. Extracting Te from a CD is a noble goal and might fit in well with what you want. But be warned, it is
probably not trivial.diddi - 30-7-2015 at 18:42
Just buying is not the only part of my collection either. but for Te, if you want elemental, it is very hard to find. I do have a number of
telluride minerals which might be something for a collector to use to represent the tricky ones.blogfast25 - 30-7-2015 at 18:49
gotta watch out how some sellers package things... I got selenium from this seller ^^^ , paper envelope, with double *cheap* ziplocks and super fine
Se inside in that order. one sharp object away from a nightmare. I also still have a few pieces of Te laying around some where I think. no clue
when I will be home to look though. been gone working for 2 weeks, and my fam is visiting me on the coast so at least one more week before going
home. if the schedule permits, lotta mud work coming up.
