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jamit
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Hey, "food" you're right, the question is too general and broad. I live in the US and so I bought 1gallon of ACE hardware brand of toluene. I'm
going to do a simple distillation on it and see what might remain in the distillation flask as it nears empty. I'll give you a report.
However, I am interested to hearing if anyone else has purified hardware store toluene (whatever brand) by distillation and what results and
observations they notice. thanks.
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food
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I'll give my local brand a shot, I'll distill a bit of it and see how it goes. I ought to be able to do that at some time in the next couple of days.
Local brand is Recochem, They've got a snazzy little icon on their products, a little cartoon retort so it's gotta be pure, right?  'til then
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food
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I did this. 50ml Recochem brand toluene in boiling flask with a condenser attached via an adapter. I began collecting pretty much at a 100C, the
temperature rose to over 103C then dipped back to around 95C. When the mercury began rising again I swapped in a fresh collection flask. The
temperature on the thermometer rose to ~109.7C and eventually ~110.1C at the conclusion, most of the time spent at 110C, on the thermometer.
When the temperature all at once fell I pulled away the foil that I'd shrouded the boiling flask with, and it appeared empty. After pulling away the
hotplate a tiny bit of liquid from the flask wall accumulated under the stir bar. A drop or two.
The liquid collected at 100C-103C was a hair shy of 6ml. So this was an interesting and instructive experience for me. I am curious about my
thermometer placement. And I've included a snap. From wikipedia toluene BP is 110.6C. The thermometer is labelled as total immersion. I haven't
checked it against anything recently. Suitable location of bulb for taking temperature ? Lower maybe?
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jamit
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Hey thanks "food" for doing the experiment. I think the thermometer should be slightly lower, just at the entrance of the still head. Was there any
residue on the boiling flask or any coloration changes during the distillation?
Do you know why the temperature rose to 103C and then dipped to 95C before assuming a steady 110C? Did you put the foil up to the still head from the
beginning of the distillation?
Any guess as to what that 6ml was that you collected at 100-103C. It can't be toluene... maybe some additives of some sort.
I'm going to try Ace's brand of toluene purification via distillation on Monday. But thanks for trying to answer my question.
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hkparker
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Ill be distilling ace brand toluene probably later today so ill let everyone know how that goes.
EDIT:
Just went to buy the toluene at ace. I read everything on the bottle, and it says it is 100% pure toluene. From what I've found on google apparently
they only list toluene as an ingredient. So is it possible I don't need to distill it, and its pure enough as is?
[Edited on 16-4-2011 by hkparker]
My YouTube Channel
"Nothing is too wonderful to be true if it be consistent with the laws of nature." -Michael Faraday
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food
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Hey. No there was no real residue left in the boiling flask, and no colour change.
Quote: Originally posted by jamit  | | Do you know why the temperature rose to 103C and then dipped to 95C before assuming a steady 110C? Did you put the foil up to the still head from the
beginning of the distillation? |
The temperature fluctuation? Not really sure. Tentatively thinking that there is a lower boiling point fraction. I'd want to repeat this once or
twice, with some care, and see how it goes.
| Quote: Originally posted by jamit | Any guess as to what that 6ml was that you collected at 100-103C. It can't be toluene... maybe some additives of some sort.
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It smelled of toluene. 6ml seems like a large proportion of a 50ml batch. There's not much concrete that I'm taking away from this run. Except that my
toluene, out of the can, doesn't seem to be as pure as I'd been hoping for. Not a hell of a lot in the way of conclusions, but I am a novice, and I'm
still building faith in my technique. So this is good for now.
| Quote: Originally posted by jamit |
I'm going to try Ace's brand of toluene purification via distillation on Monday. But thanks for trying to answer my question.
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I hope that you have the time to do that. Be curious to hear about it.
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hkparker
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I used ace brand for the reaction with KMnO4 soln. and it seemed to work very well without distillation.
My YouTube Channel
"Nothing is too wonderful to be true if it be consistent with the laws of nature." -Michael Faraday
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jamit
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What are you talking about hkparker? Just because you used ace brand of toluene with KMnO4 doesn't mean that the toluene is pure. I've done the
benzoic acid synthesis with hardware brand toluene and permanganate. I want to know how pure ace brand toluene is. My guess is that you need to do a
distillation of toluene to partly determine the nature and content of the additives if any in ace's brand of toluene.
I'll let you know my results very soon.
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