electrokinetic
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Separating copper and nickel
Got a solution of an approx 11:1 copper chloride:nickel chloride solution, with whatever other ions come in tap water here in Los Angeles. I'd like
to separate the copper from the nickel and both from all other trace ions. I have whatever chemicals can be reasonably found in a high school chem
supply closet. Can anyone offer any suggestions other than electrolytic reduction (which I'm not sure would even work well)? Thanks
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cyanureeves
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there is already a big big thread on this.let us know which route you take and the out come.
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plante1999
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UTFSE. This as been covered many time before.
I never asked for this.
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MR AZIDE
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If you want to try and get the elemental metals. Then I have though of this.
1) add carbonate or hydroxide solutions to then solution. This will precipitate the insoluble carbonates or hydroxides from the solution as a mixture.
2) wash and dry the precipitates, and heat them ( the mixture of the 2 insoluble Cu (ii) or Ni(ii) hydroxides / carbonates, untill they decompose to
the Cu(ii) and Ni(ii) oxides.
3) use Al powder to use the aluminothermic thermite reaction to reduce the mixture of the 2 oxides to an impure mixture / possible alloy of the
reduced Ni and Cu metals. ( some yield loss)
4) wash this mixture with dilute HCl or H2So4 to dissolve away any unreacted insoluble oxides. ( some yield loss)
5) react the resulting metals with conc HNO3, , this will produce soluble copper (ii) nitrate ,and hopefully the Ni which exhibits the property of be
passivation, and will not react with the HNO3, ,and should be left behind......
6) repeating the carbonate / hydroxide precip with the Copper (ii) nitrate, and alumono thermic reduction / acid wash etc will separate the copper.
I think this would work, but i think there would be quite a few % yield losses with this. This would inly be useabke if you had a LOT of initial
solution.
Ni is fairly magnetic, so is Ni(ii) oxide maybe very weakly magnetic......? could you separate the oxide mixtures this way....?
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m1tanker78
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As others mentioned, there's already a hefty thread on this very topic. Since you have access to some reagents, you may be able to plug some holes and
answer some unknowns.
http://www.sciencemadness.org/talk/viewthread.php?tid=16811
Are you after the nickel or do you simply want to purify the copper solution? If you have the means to produce and manage H2S gas, that's one method
that's been proposed but not demonstrated in the thread I referenced above. It would be much easier if you were starting from the alloy rather than a
solution of the metals.
Tank
Chemical CURIOSITY KILLED THE CATalyst.
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electrokinetic
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Sorry, deserve to get flamed. You all are correct, there is a very lengthy post on this and I should have been more diligent finding it. I'll try
those ideas and report back any results.
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electrokinetic
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Unfortunately, H2S is beyond my abilities at this point.
Quote: Originally posted by m1tanker78  | As others mentioned, there's already a hefty thread on this very topic. Since you have access to some reagents, you may be able to plug some holes and
answer some unknowns.
http://www.sciencemadness.org/talk/viewthread.php?tid=16811
Are you after the nickel or do you simply want to purify the copper solution? If you have the means to produce and manage H2S gas, that's one method
that's been proposed but not demonstrated in the thread I referenced above. It would be much easier if you were starting from the alloy rather than a
solution of the metals.
Tank |
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