Sciencemadness Discussion Board - Aluminum alkoxides with gallium instead of mercury?

Aluminum alkoxides with gallium instead of mercury?

ManBearSwine - 24-4-2012 at 17:49

Would a gallium salt catalyze the reaction between aluminum metal and an alcohol to form the alkoxide? It would seem logical as both pure metals have the ability to permeate the crystal structure of aluminium. I've found a few patents, but they all call for dissolving the aluminium in liquid gallium and then reacting the mixture with alcohol. I bought a small amount of gallium as a novelty a while back and I'd like to actually do something with, but I also don't want to waste it unless I'm pretty sure it will work and don't have enough to carry out the reaction as suggested in the patents to make a worthwhile amount of product.

[Edited on 4-25-2012 by ManBearSwine]

weiming1998 - 24-4-2012 at 22:36

Quote: Originally posted by ManBearSwine

Would a gallium salt catalyze the reaction between aluminum metal and an alcohol to form the alkoxide? It would seem logical as both pure metals have the ability to permeate the crystal structure of aluminium. I've found a few patents, but they all call for dissolving the aluminium in liquid gallium and then reacting the mixture with alcohol. I bought a small amount of gallium as a novelty a while back and I'd like to actually do something with, but I also don't want to waste it unless I'm pretty sure it will work and don't have enough to carry out the reaction as suggested in the patents to make a worthwhile amount of product.

[Edited on 4-25-2012 by ManBearSwine]

Yes, gallium will definitely work as the goal here is to destroy the layer of protective oxides that usually surrounds the aluminum, preventing reaction with the alcohol. Gallium will do just that, and you only need a small bit of molten gallium on a chunk of aluminum. You can even recycle the gallium when the reaction is finished, as gallium doesn't react with either alcohols or water, and will simply sink to the bottom of the reaction flask, where you can freeze it and pick it up.

Aluminum Amalgam via Gallium

AlphanandOmega - 12-11-2013 at 22:27

Ok so I have been all over the web looking for a good way to produce Aluminum Amalgan and found that it can be created by using Gallium and Alumnium. However The procedure to create the Amalgam does not really coincide well with the procedure using Mercury as it is normally done with a Mercuric Chloride solution of some sort. How would using straight AL/GA be comparable to the procedure using Mercuric Chloride and Aluminum

blogfast25 - 13-11-2013 at 06:05

Quote: Originally posted by AlphanandOmega

How would using straight AL/GA be comparable to the procedure using Mercuric Chloride and Aluminum

Not at all. Ga/Al is an alloy of Ga and Al. An Al amalgam is an alloy of Al and Hg. Two different things. No comparison would be meaningful.

HollowMan - 10-12-2013 at 05:54

Hi,
it would be great if someone of u could explain to me, how to prepare the Al/Ga alloy. I saw severaly introductions, like to put 5gr Ga to 190gr cutter Alufoil in hot water at Mp of Ga (30°C). But how should this work? i tried to cut 10gr of alufoil to alloy with 10gr Ga in neural/basic/acidic conditions but with no result. The Ga just dont want to desolve de cutted Al. Its just going arround on the bottom of the flask. When i read to put 5gr Gr to 190Gr Al i was realy surprised. How could 5gr Ga cover up 190gr of Al? Al is a mountain and the Ga just a few drops of water.. I´m asking, because I want to replace Hg with Ga by reducing imin to amin.
Would be more than great, if someone could help me ;D
<<<thanks in advance

How to make Ga/Al alloy

HollowMan - 10-12-2013 at 06:00

Hi to everyone,
it would be great if someone of u could explain to me, how to prepare the Al/Ga alloy. I saw severaly introductions, like to put 5gr Ga to 190gr cutted Alufoil in hot water at Mp of Ga (30°C). But how should this work? i tried to cut 10gr of alufoil to alloy with 10gr Ga in neural/basic/acidic conditions but with no result. The Ga just dont want to desolve de cutted Al. Its just going arround on the bottom of the flask. When i read to put 5gr Gr to 190Gr Al i was realy surprised. How could 5gr Ga cover up 190gr of Al? Al is a mountain and the Ga just a few drops of water.. I´m asking, because I want to replace Hg with Ga by reducing imin to amin.
I used very thick alufoil (99%Alu) and 4N Ga.
I was looking to fix the problem by using Ga salts, but never saw a comment of someone, who got it done.
Would be more than great, if someone could help me ;D
<<

bfesser - 10-12-2013 at 06:06

HollowMan, don't cross-post.

HollowMan - 10-12-2013 at 06:45

Oh i´m sry i´m new to this forum. But anyway a helpful answer would be more appreciated

bfesser - 10-12-2013 at 06:56

An intelligible question would be helpful. Give the search function a try. You'll find that there have been dozens of threads on this subject.

Here's a link to just one of the relevant topics:
<a href="viewthread.php?tid=11687">Gallium-Aluminium alloy preparation</a>

HollowMan - 10-12-2013 at 07:04

Did u read my previous post? Couldnt u get what i wanted to say? I read already every post to this theme, that why i started a new on! Did u ever try it on ur own, to put some cutted alfloi pieces into melted Ga? How much time should it take to get the alu desloved in Ga? precise indicates would be nice of the exact procedure.
Thaks

bfesser - 10-12-2013 at 07:15

Quote: Originally posted by HollowMan

u i cutted alfloi alu desloved

I tried to read it, but I can't understand this chimpanzee-on-keyboard crap. Try writing in English; you're not 'texting' on a cellular phone, here. If you're looking for spoon feeding so you can continue with your cook, you're out of luck.

Or shall I rephrase that?
ts;cr: if ur lookn 4 halp wit u cook, u foad

[Edited on 10.12.13 by bfesser]

HollowMan - 10-12-2013 at 07:46

Ok thats the problem i got it. Of course, i will rewrite it, to make it understandable for you.
Hopefully, after this i will get the advice i´m looking for. Otherwise it was just wasted time.
I can do this in german too, maybe it works better this way.

ts;cr: if ur lookn 4 halp wit u cook, u foad
"Das ist nicht nur nicht richtig, es ist nicht einmal falsch!"
Thats all i say to this (i can understand hopefully you, too)

No I´m not looking for spoon feeding. Thats why i was asking if you read my previous post, because to answer your phrases is just wasting time. It seams to me, that you got a bit to much of free time to shit around on people, who are not talking like your teacher did in elementary school?

So thats enough now comes my rephrased question:
Hi Guys,
i was looking for an exact introduction, of alloying Aluminiumfoil with Ga. I already tried it severely times, but the Ga (4N) never really dissolves the Al (99%) pieces.
I got this preperation by using the searching function :
Aluminum gallium amalgam prep:
The gallium amalgam is an excellent substitute in an al/hg reductive amination procedure. it's non-toxic, and stronger.
A search of the internet will reveal, a patent where it has been used already to reduce NO2 and NH2. gallium is also
easily sourced. If you wanted to make a Ga-Al alloy, simply gently heat the Ga (m. pt. 29.7646ºC) until it is liquid, and
it will start to readily form an alloy by dissolving the Al. However, the resulting amalgam will have a higher melting
point than the liquid Ga, so you would have to keep heating the mixture until all the Al is dissolved. In a 10,000ml
wide-mouthed flask, 190 grams of aluminum foil cut to 3x3cm pieces was amalgamated with 5grams gallium in 7000ml
warm water until the solution became greyish, and hydrogen bubbles was evolved in a steady rate from the aluminum surface. The water was decanted off, and the aluminum amalgam was washed with 2x5000ml cold water.

My question:
Did anyone of you tried that that on his own? 190gr Aluminiumfoil is such a big surface, how could this be covered by 5gr of liquid Ga?
I started it the same way with 10gr cutted Aluminiumfoil mixed together with 10gr of liquid Ga for about 1 hour. After this, i dropped some water to the mix, to see how the hydrogen production will be.
But there was nearly nothing. never comparable with HgCl2 + Al.
I restarted the experiment in neutral/acidic/ basic conditions but with no significant difference.

So what was going wrong?
thanks in advance for help

MrHomeScientist - 10-12-2013 at 08:07

Was that so hard? See how much nicer that looks? If you type intelligently, you're much more likely to get intelligent responses.

In my experience with gallium and aluminum, the gallium readily amalgamates as long as it's liquid. If the going is slow try scratching the surface of the aluminum underneath your molten blob of gallium. This lats the gallium penetrate and dissolve the Al easier. Perhaps use sand paper to rough everything up directly before addition of molten Ga.
190g per 5g of gallium sounds a little ridiculous to me. Do you have a link pointing to your source for this info? I would not expect basic or especially acidic conditions to help either, as these would dissolve the aluminum or both metals into solution instead of allowing them to form an amalgam.

HollowMan - 10-12-2013 at 08:20

No thats not. It was just how blesser answered to me.
At first, he is not able to understand and after correcting he cannot or don´t like to give an intelligent helpful answer.
Thats sth i really hate.
Thanks for your answer.
Thats the link i got the information from:
http://www.sciencemadness.org/talk/viewthread.php?tid=14173#...

So should i prepare the washed Alfoil with sand paper to remove the oxid layer?
How far can the Ga go inside the Al? is there no possibility, to do the same by using for exampla Gacl3 like its common by Hgcl2 + Al procedures?
I used acidic/basic conditions, to get the oxid layer a bit destroyed, to make it easier for the Ga to get into Al.
regards

vmelkon - 10-12-2013 at 12:08

Quote: Originally posted by HollowMan

So should i prepare the washed Alfoil with sand paper to remove the oxid layer?
How far can the Ga go inside the Al? is there no possibility, to do the same by using for exampla Gacl3 like its common by Hgcl2 + Al procedures?
I used acidic/basic conditions, to get the oxid layer a bit destroyed, to make it easier for the Ga to get into Al.
regards

I would suggest that you put the molten gallium on your Al. Then use a iron knife or something to scratch the surface of the Al. I have seen this done with Al and Hg.

Method 2 : I have seen someone (Youtube) with a pool of Ga (500 mL or 1 liter). He heats it and dumps small Al pieces in it.

I haven't done these but I plan to someday. I plan on reacting with with propan-2-ol.

HollowMan - 10-12-2013 at 15:29

I will try it next time too. Hopefully it works.
Thanks for your advice when you keep it going just feel free to post on.

eidolonicaurum - 4-1-2014 at 01:40

I tried this, making gallium aluminium alloy, then adding it to isopropanol. No reaction what so ever. And its not my alloy thats dodgy, it reacts with water beautifully.

eidolonicaurum - 5-1-2014 at 01:25

This talks about gallium/aluminium alloy.

http://www.sciencemadness.org/talk/viewthread.php?tid=19866