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elementcollector1
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Excellent! How do I find out which grass is kept in my lawn?
Elements Collected:52/87
Latest Acquired: Cl
Next in Line: Nd
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CrEaTiVePyroScience
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Tried to extract potassium carbonate from banana peels. Well , it worked!
But I wouldn't say it's efficient , low yields and lots of work. Here is my video of the project, enjoy!
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NHDfGlJiFLI
~CPS
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bbartlog
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Well, OK. Decent video although I personally found the use of banana's (with apostrophe) rather than bananas (sans apostrophe) as the plural a bit
grating.
However, I want to point out that the only reason you can have any confidence that what you have is (mostly) K2CO3 is because of prior work on plant
ash. Although a decisive identification as K2CO3 would be a lot of work, you could at least do a few tests to confirm the idea rather than just say
'soluble white base, gotta be K2CO3'.
And I would expect that you have contamination in the form of a bit of KCl and K2SO4.
The less you bet, the more you lose when you win.
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CrEaTiVePyroScience
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Already did tests..
Did with Pb(NO3)2 and was almost no precipitate. Solution was a little bit cloudy but not much at all you could still look through it.
Anyhow, I will use the K2CO3 for KOH production so K2SO4 contaminations are a problem at all.
For KCl I honesty got no clue but I don't think it will be that high since I made KOH with ease. But might do some tests when I got time..
EDIT: It's about the science, chemistry not about spelling...
By the way , my native language isn't english.
[Edited on 1-1-2013 by CrEaTiVePyroScience]
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Metacelsus
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It's probably some variety of Kentucky Bluegrass. Or, if your lawn is like mine, crabgrass.
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violet sin
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thought I would add my account of this experiment
had a little fun doing this. I eat banana's often so saved a big freezer bag full of dried peels. I chose not to waste time documenting my
every move on the pilot run, just get a sense of the return. ash weight right after it cooled for a starting mass, and the mostly dry weight of the
first wash crystals were recorded though.
I would guess it was 25-30 banana peels to start, but measured 25.60g of well roasted ash. they became damp overnight so I was glad it was
weighed as soon as was possible. ash was washed with 2 x 50ml DW and maybe 20ml washing the filter down. it was a straw color when done so I added
~15ml H2O2 3% to improve color. filtered, reduced volume, hot filtered recryst again long story short 5.52g soluble basic salt dried to opaque
off-white/white. there were still a couple chunks(very few) with a clearer look that must have had some moisture left.
I didn't check for chloride or sulfate contamination. I would guess almost 2g more in the 2nd 3rd washes combined with filters and crystalizing
dish, but wasn't super important to get ALL of it this time.
25.60g ash begets >5.5g salts for me, I would say that is worth the time if you have access to banana peels. most were chiquita brand, few
were organic, all were from safeway.
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Poppy
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Dry leaves and s**t usually contains often more potassium than calcium relatively to other plant parts. Ask your gardeners to follow up your idea and
you can get a bust on that banana calcination of yours, as the leaves would help the peels make their way through fire!
Yeah potassium is relatively easy to be separated out...
And this would certainly collaborate not to make you obese 
[Edited on 6-25-2013 by Poppy]
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Fantasma4500
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does anybody have a list of the most potassium containing plants you can find around??
i remember this site which i recall as being of iranian origin..
they showed a list of different types of wood which contained ''0.2'' in general of potassium
not so interesting
then there was some other very interesting names i still remember..
''wormwood'' and thistles
thistles i recall as having around 7, isntead of 0.2 (measured by weight)
and wormwood somewhat around 8.5!!
wormwood is of what i found out not wood but rather a little plant which can be found at relatively dry places
bananas i dont see much reason in unless if you live in africa, the thing with potassium is that you want to make it BULK (the carbonate)
perhaps as part of the KNO3 'making' using ashes and dirt
in the old days farming places paid with potassium nitrate, the larger the farm was the more KNO3 they had to pay the government or well, it was
probably the king of denmark back then, believe denmark owned it all
another thing i looked at is that potassium burns with a purple tint if relatively pure when held in a flame
thistles have a purple flower on them
PLAUSIBLY this could mean that theres a connection there for less common plants you might find around where you live?
it mentioned also that leaves and bark from trees had as much as 3 times more than the wood, leaves can be collected in shittonnes when the weather
gets colder and its easy to turn into ashes (:
another thing would be 'guano' i believe its called
meaning ... shit from birds and bats also
this might be possible to collect in large amounts
again long back in time where blackpowder was really exciting KNO3 was made in the middle east by using gurana, in which apparently contains alot of
potassium, to make potassium nitrate
i know i didnt state any mg / kg of dry plant ash, i dont recall it as even being there back when i read it, i found the bookmark tho, fryingcolors
apparently, but the link is dead, approx +4 years old by now if not 5
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violet sin
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ya I have been saving up another batch as I'm outta town working again. lots of banana's eaten on breaks working construction. I was considering
contacting a juice place to see if they would throw the peels off to the side for me. but this is just for $hits and giggles as it were. so no
impetus to go full bore.
I also was reading on potassium nitrate the other day, and came across the thistle reference. I'm on lunch break so I'm not going to look for it now.
the lady I am working for does all kinds of earthy things and grows kombucha and other cultures. she was interested to hear about the banana
experiment. and offered this lill tid bit. the thistles being picked, may have been 2 birds with one stone type of thing. if the farmers had to
clear them any way for the sheep, why go out of your way to pick a separate vegetation source ya know. they may have been just convenient, and worked
enough for production. out by my family's ranches we have fields and FIELDS of pesky star thistle. if that could be turned into a cash crop, or at
least subsidize its removal. could be very welcome news to those that hate the plants. knee-chest high everywhere you don't want em. enormous fire
hazard in the dry foot hills where the summer gets to be in the hundreds often in summer. we have bailing machines for the alfalfa grown for cattle.
could use those to round the stuff up. and burn when you weren't likely to take the entire country side with it. that is IF they were worth all the
effort ya know. I'll have to try some or look for an online reference for the their combustion products. if one exists. that could be done in quite
BULK quantities. hell farmers may even pay to have them removed. I'll read up on it as this kind of thing is fun to me.
-Violet Sin-
*edit: realized some of my statements weren't totally clear.
-the potassium nitrate was from potassium carbonate n animal urine IIRC. I know we are talking about the carbonate
-the lady I am working for does all the earth stuff because she is well educated in farming, homesteading and self sufficient living. as such she
knows many antiquated farming techniques and practices pertaining to an older way of life.
- and finally specific plant I was talking about. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Yellow_Starthistle "It currently dominates over 15,000,000 acres (61,000 km2) in California alone"
[Edited on 6-8-2013 by violet sin]
second editing:
http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC396267/pdf/plntp...
guess the potassium is necessary for respiration in plants from the stomas. the guard cells that open or close are operated by potassium ion pump
systems. so it is likely the potassium is higher in the leaves than the wood. but I haven't found any correlation yet about concentrations in fruit,
seed or flowers. there may be special cases of accumulation for various functions there as well. my plant expert says potassium is used in
photosynthesis, protein manufacture and respiration (stomas). he runs a high end garden shop for the last decade or so. trust worth in my opinion
[Edited on 7-8-2013 by violet sin]
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