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Oxirane
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Wood would probably be less harmful overall and work as a practice to see how all is going. Also cleaning the mess from PVC pyrolysis can be a real
PITA. It's good to wash all the parts with toluene, it seems to dissolve all that gunk readily.
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aga
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Quote: Originally posted by Little_Ghost_again  | Ok I am going to stop reading this thread now, I found some PVC pipe off cuts in a shed  . The temptation to have a go is increasing, so for the sake of safety I will follow no more . good luck though, its a really neat way to do something with a waste product |
Do it Small Scale and Lab-wise to get the maths right (as blogfast25 suggested a while back)
~1 gramme of PVC, test tube, burner, water trap followed by cold trap.
Note all the exact weights of everything, and volumes of liquid in each trap.
Hit the TT with heat until stuff stops happening (~300+ C)
Note everything you can. Temprtatures, Times, Weights etc.
Titrate the water, weigh any stuff in the cold trap.
Scientifically, Your data will be more useful than what i'm welding up.
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aga
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| Quote: Originally posted by Oxirane | | Wood would probably be less harmful overall and work as a practice to see how all is going. Also cleaning the mess from PVC pyrolysis can be a real
PITA. It's good to wash all the parts with toluene, it seems to dissolve all that gunk readily. |
Does toluene dissolve PVC as well as the black stuff ?
Late here, so will have to try that tomorrow.
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Oxirane
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I must say I've never tested it on the plastic itself, but the solid distillate residue dissolved almost immediately upon pouring in some toluene. It
was very easy to clean the parts which I was afraid needing weeks of submersion as once happened in another case.
Some sources indicate that toluene would dissolve at least some PVC, and compatibility charts rank it as not compatible in all forms. VinyLoop uses
probably THF or something like that to dissolve PVC from other plastics and recycle it in high % and I though about this in order to quickly utilize
pvc from difficult sources like cables and shallow parts, but it would consist a major work to handle the solvent, not talking about the sheer price
of it..
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aga
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>not talking about the sheer price of it.
Good Point.
I'll do Wood first.
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Little_Ghost_again
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Ok I will see if my gas mask is upto the job . I am definitely up for the wood
one .
Since last year I have been playing with building a wood gas generator. I go look later and see if I can scale this down safely.
I will take notes etc .
As a side note is it worth also doing this under reduced pressure? I could use a very thick walled conical flask as the reactor vessel.
[Edited on 2-10-2014 by Little_Ghost_again]
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blogfast25
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| Quote: Originally posted by Oxirane | I must say I've never tested it on the plastic itself, but the solid distillate residue dissolved almost immediately upon pouring in some toluene. It
was very easy to clean the parts which I was afraid needing weeks of submersion as once happened in another case.
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I doubt if toluene would work as a solvent for PVC: too chlorinated, too high MW.
@Aga and Oxirane: are you using unplasticised PVC? Plasticised PVC contains dioctyl phthalate (well, di-(2-ethylhexyl)-phthalate, off the top of my
head), which would probably come off too at high T. Not to be confused with benzene/other aromatics!
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blogfast25
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Personally I don't think it's worth the hassle.
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aga
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Not the foggiest idea.
Mine was a bit of straight drainpipe connector, saying 'PVC-B' on it.
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blogfast25
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Ok. If it's kind of hard and not very flexible it's uPVC, like your piece. Also uPVC: most PVC plumbing, PVC window frames, PVC cladding, fascias and
other exterior bits on a house, most PVC flacons and containers.
Plasticised PVC: garden hose, vinyl gloves, vinyl flooring, vinyl shower curtains, low quality plastic seals and other generally soft and flexible PVC
items.
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aga
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so the 'u' in uPVC means 'unplasticised' ?
Edit
Sorry. Just googled it and Yes it does.
[Edited on 2-10-2014 by aga]
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Little_Ghost_again
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The wood one is interesting, I have vague memories of reading about different woods and what they yield, also the splitting of cellulose etc, with so
many different trees here I might give this a shot. I assume we are after saw dust? Or maybe fine shredded fiber? I was thinking willow put through a
high power shredder gives a kind of fluffy fiber.
First the hose pipe and boiling tube (save me cutting stuff up too small)
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xfusion44
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Few months ago, I did this experiment (pyrolisis of plastic) and I ended up with product seen on picture below. It has really strong smell of I don't
know, maybe gasoline/diesel or something like that. It burns similar to diesel - releasing lots of soot, but the color is rather yellowish, than black
and it's rather oily liquid. I don't know what stuff is this, but probably all kinds of different toxic chemicals... I made it using a lot of
different plastics, but I've also tried only with PS plastic and the appearance of product was pretty much the same...
[Edited on 9-10-2014 by xfusion44]
[Edited on 9-10-2014 by xfusion44]
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blogfast25
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@xfusion44:
Some more detail would be welcome.
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xfusion44
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@blogfast25
Well, what do you have in mind?
If you mean how I've done pyrolysis itself, I've used empty acetone can (I threw pieces of plastic inside) and then attached copper pipe to it (I
sealed the gap with 100% PTFE tape). Then I've heated the can with butane burner and directed gases to the beaker with cold water. When plastic
started to boil, it started to decompose and the gases produced were cooled by water and formed that liquid, which floated to the top of the water.
Then I just separated the product from water by pipette and that's it.
PS: if doing that, you may need to stop the process from time to time and let the water cool, to prevent evaporation of the product and insufficient
cooling of the gases. Anyway this does not necessary happen if you use larger quantity of water (better heat dissipation ability).
[Edited on 11-10-2014 by xfusion44]
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Little_Ghost_again
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What is the pH of that solution?
Do you have a fractionating column?
Have you tried to distill it using tight temperature bands for the fractions?
Failing that would it be possible to do a TLC on it?
If you leave 5ml out how much evaporates in say one hour (weight wise), does the colour change if it evaporates?
Approx how much plastic is that?
Sorry for all the questions but I got a feeling about this
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blogfast25
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LGa:
I'm rather surprised he got a clearish liquid pyrolysis product at all, instead of black goo. Starting from undifferentiated 'plastic' (there are
literally hundreds of commercially used polymers today) leads of course to a witch's brew that would require serious separating power to obtain
something useful.
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Oxirane
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It is very easy to get liquid distillate in large amounts from any PE, PS, PP or these common plastics. It is actually performed in large scale.
XFusion's product looks pretty familiar, and by greenish color I would say there was little residue of PVC, pure PS yields mostly deep yellow liquid.
PE and PP yield mostly medium length hydrocarbons and major impurities are BTX. With fractionation these can be used on diesel engine. There was an
article on this on a german forum where guys made a reactor from oil drum and produced quite large amounts of fuel subsitute from common waste
plastic. From PS one will get mostly styrene which can be fractionated to pure form as well. 5-30% will be gaseous form, and one can actually use
these to fuel the heater for the reaction. There will be 10-20% of weight of residue which is very dark, heavy fuel oil-type goo and soot, which is
sticky as hell and probably very highly carcinogenic.
From PVC there may be little liquid residue. It should be mostly benzene, if it is common, non-mixed PVC. PVC must not be used if liquid fractions are
wanted, because large amounts of HCl formed, which may contaminate the liquid and cause major problems in use.
[Edited on 11-10-2014 by Oxirane]
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Little_Ghost_again
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| Quote: Originally posted by blogfast25 | LGa:
I'm rather surprised he got a clearish liquid pyrolysis product at all, instead of black goo. Starting from undifferentiated 'plastic' (there are
literally hundreds of commercially used polymers today) leads of course to a witch's brew that would require serious separating power to obtain
something useful.
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Yes but its clear.......
Is it possible that there is a strong oxidizer in there that ate most the gunk? That fact its clear makes me think its worth a look into it.
It also looks very much like a petrol type mix. He might have thought he used many plastics but when I went a looking around here for PVC all I could
find was various versions of PP and PeP.
So just maybe he actually used just one or maybe two different types. That may account for the clarity. I tried drain pipe and got awful smelly black
thick residue.
I tried milk bottles and got a awful smelly yellow liquid........So bad I had to chuck it straight away.
Surely its worth a couple of test's?
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blogfast25
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Hmmm... what something looks like and what it is are poorly correlated: could you distinguish a bottle of diesel from a bottle of water, even from
small distance? Careful of wishful thinking and confirmation bias.
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blogfast25
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BTX?
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Little_Ghost_again
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| Quote: Originally posted by blogfast25 |
Hmmm... what something looks like and what it is are poorly correlated: could you distinguish a bottle of diesel from a bottle of water, even from
small distance? Careful of wishful thinking and confirmation bias. |
Yes very sorry I wrote that poorly, I wasnt trying to say he had made petrol. I was kind of thinking more down the lines of flammable fractions or
oils. Plus his description of smell suggest something in there might burn.
I do find the whole thing interesting but cant help feeling this is a dangerous path.
Like you said its a brew of god knows what. I doubt its something safe to mess with without taking precautions.
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xfusion44
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| Quote: Originally posted by Little_Ghost_again | What is the pH of that solution?
Do you have a fractionating column?
Have you tried to distill it using tight temperature bands for the fractions?
Failing that would it be possible to do a TLC on it?
If you leave 5ml out how much evaporates in say one hour (weight wise), does the colour change if it evaporates?
Approx how much plastic is that?
Sorry for all the questions but I got a feeling about this
|
-The pH seems to be around 7, but I don't know if pH indicator paper is really best to use with oily liquids? Well, it seems to be good. If it
wouldn't be 7, it would mean, that I have an acid or base.
-No, I don't have fractionating column, I just have the "device", which I described in my last post.
-No, I didn't try to distill it, I just wanted to see if I could get usable fuel out of it.
-Sorry I don't have equipment for TLC.
-I would need to try that with evaporation (I think that the color wouldn't change, but there are some small crystals, that formed over time, who
knows, what that would be - interesting).
-I don't really know, I think I used maybe 100grams of plastic, but I didn't used it all.
-No problem, just ask anything you like 
I'm not sure, but I think I've used only HDPE, LDPE and PS. Oh, I've forgot how strong that smell is - when I was checking pH of it, it made whole
room smell... And I can tell: don't breathe it, it can happen fast, that you'll become nauseous and you'll get headache. I seriously doubt, that this
is not very toxic product.
Oh, and I have this erlenmeyer flask kept closed with ballon over it, but the smell can come through, if you smell it from small distance and it even
dissolves ballon rubber.
PS: if you want to know, how it smells, just heat PS plastic until boiling and smell the vapors (that's exactly how it smells). DON'T SMELL IT TOO
MUCH!
[Edited on 11-10-2014 by xfusion44]
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xfusion44
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| Quote: Originally posted by Oxirane | It is very easy to get liquid distillate in large amounts from any PE, PS, PP or these common plastics. It is actually performed in large scale.
XFusion's product looks pretty familiar, and by greenish color I would say there was little residue of PVC, pure PS yields mostly deep yellow liquid.
PE and PP yield mostly medium length hydrocarbons and major impurities are BTX. With fractionation these can be used on diesel engine. There was an
article on this on a german forum where guys made a reactor from oil drum and produced quite large amounts of fuel subsitute from common waste
plastic. From PS one will get mostly styrene which can be fractionated to pure form as well. 5-30% will be gaseous form, and one can actually use
these to fuel the heater for the reaction. There will be 10-20% of weight of residue which is very dark, heavy fuel oil-type goo and soot, which is
sticky as hell and probably very highly carcinogenic.
From PVC there may be little liquid residue. It should be mostly benzene, if it is common, non-mixed PVC. PVC must not be used if liquid fractions are
wanted, because large amounts of HCl formed, which may contaminate the liquid and cause major problems in use.
[Edited on 11-10-2014 by Oxirane] |
It just looks like that on the picture (in reality it isn't greenish, only yellowish). And over time some crystals formed in it, as I mentioned in
post above.
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Oxirane
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The smell of styrene is very distinguishable. Your product is very much like mine when I did PS pyrolysis, it smells very strongly, it has nice
chemical-laced sweet aroma and it will form some white crystals eventually. They are likely polymerization products, and the distillate can be
purified by fractional distilling it.
BTX stands for Benzene, Toluene and Xylene. A term from pet industry. Sorry.
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