plante1999 - 4-4-2013 at 15:14
I have the chance to get very cheaply (relative) a gallon of 70% HF. I will probably use it myself, but I taught I could also make salts and
trade/sell them to fund my lab. There are salts I can make easily such as:
Cryolite, Na3AlF6
Hexafluorosilicates --SiF6
Fluoroborate -BF4
K/Na/NH4 bifluorides -HF2
Is there anyone interested or I should buy 10x priced 500 ml?
If you are interested what cheap price could they be sold/ baugth for?
Thanks!
kristofvagyok - 4-4-2013 at 15:36
Be really careful with the bifluorides while making, handling them and during the preparation of HBF4 and other BF4 salts, it could easily end up with
really big problems.... Disaster on the horizon...
Pyro - 4-4-2013 at 15:38
A gallon of 70%HF? cool, how much? but dangerous!
elementcollector1 - 4-4-2013 at 16:17
I'm interested in sulfur hexafluoride, but sadly that's not on the list (and dangerous to make).
Mailinmypocket - 4-4-2013 at 16:29
The revenue vs. risk ratio of this endeavor seems to be off balance.
Hexavalent - 5-4-2013 at 01:16
Plante, we all know that you are a talented and original chemist but we don't want to see you getting hurt in your endeavours, paticularly when you
are making and handling very toxic compounds dangerously on a large scale. I'm not your mother to tell you, but I would personally re-consider this
scheme: a single accident could get you into some very hot water indeed.
Personally, I would not carry out some of these syntheses without a good fume hood, respiratory protection, other rigorous PPE items and advanced,
appropriate lab equipment to manipulate the reagents. From what I understand, you lack some of these and as a result it makes this already dangerous
plan even greater so.
You have the rest of your life to work with fluorine, beryllium etc.-based compounds, and I'm not being derogatory, but it may be better to leave this
work until you have more experience, have better equipment and are a better, more advanced chemist overall.
Just my tuppence,
Hex
plante1999 - 5-4-2013 at 03:07
I think you are being arogant about it hex. I probably have more experience than many here. There was a user, few year ago, is name was myfanwy if I
remember correctly, anyway he died from all is dangerous experiments. But I don't think you were on this board when he died so you may no know about
him. He was a very arrogant young guy doing very experienced experiments, but mostly very dangerous without much experience. I'm pretty sure he did
not had nearly s much knowledge as me, or experience. I can agree he had what can look to a similar instinct to me. I agree that it may seams like I'm
looking to make dangerous chemistry, and it may be so, but I do my things saffely, at least most of the time.
Hydrogen fluoride and related fluorides cannot be made using glass, and as such I'm not disaventaged from you, I'm probably even advantaged.
If you look in reference you will find that these salts are very straigthfoward to make and can be made safely.
Mailinmypocket - 5-4-2013 at 03:17
With all due respect, I don't believe he is being arrogant at all. Your last post however slightly is. In fact if we look at your thread called
"marked by chemistry" we can see photos of you with some pretty bad chemical burns to your face from an acid mixture. Would those burns have been from
40% HF things would have been a lot more serious, guaranteed. This isn't to say you did not learn from the experience, it's just that nobody wants to
see you get hurt with a vicious unforgiving poison!! Do you have calcium gluconate gel on hand in case of skin contact with the acid by the way?
woelen - 5-4-2013 at 04:01
Plante1999, I very much like the things you are doing and I have the impression that you are among the more talented people over here. But even
talented people can go too far and seriously injure themselves. I myself have purchased some 48% HF recently and I have done a few experiments with
that and I must say that each time when I do experiments with that I feel somewhat uncomfortable with that. I use 70% HNO3 and 96% H2SO4 routinely,
but use of HF will never become something routinely for me. And then you are talking about 70% HF, which is a strongly fuming liquid and which is MUCH
harder on storage than 48% HF.
I personally would advice against doing experiments with this at all. This does not mean that I think you are incompetent or something like that, but
HF simply is truly nasty stuff and the inherent risk is too high. Keep in mind that you live with other people (your parents and brothers/sisters if
you have them) and you also put them at risk with the 70% HF. If the HF is in a plastic jerrycan, then also expect some outgassing through the
plastic. Even my 48% HF bottle become slightly wet when the weather is cold and humid. And you have no option of storing it in glass, like I do with
37% HCl and 70% HNO3 which also tend to outgas a little when stored in plastic containers.
Why such dangerous chemistry? There are so many other also very interesting and challenging things you can try, such as making and isolating SO3,
making and isolating KN3O4, isolating U-salts from ores, maybe even making white P from phosphates or boron from borates. These things also can be
quite dangerous when done carelessly, but I consider you serious enough to be able to do these things without killing or maiming yourself.
Hexavalent - 5-4-2013 at 06:13
I agree with the others, plante: I'm not being arrogant or whatever, just advising you not to run before you walk and to deeply consider the possible
effects and impacts of what your experiments may cause on yourself, and, as woelen mentioned, others.
I have heard of myfanwy's unfortunate expiry, and we don't want that to happen to you. Furthermore, the "invincible" attitude you seem to have - "I
probably have more experience than many here", "I'm pretty sure he did not had nearly s much knowledge as me, or experience", "I'm not disaventaged
from you, I'm probably even advantaged", etc., in addition to you thinking you will be able to handle 70% HF, whilst woelen (quite possibly one of the
most experienced and knowledgeable chemists here), is uncomfortable handling a much lower concentration. The "invincible" attitude is quite different
from determination to do things and generally results in serious injury or worse.
We appreciate that you will take some precautions against the hazards presented with these reagents, but working safely "at least most of the time" is
simply not good enough in these instances.
Dr.Bob - 5-4-2013 at 06:57
Having worked in a fluorine chemistry lab a while, as well as working with HF itself, in gas and liquid (at low temp) form, I can attest to the fact
the HF can be very difficult to work with, although not always as bad as it sounds. It depends a lot on the equipment and facilities. The HF work
was done in specialty made Teflon apparatus, in a real chemistry hood, with very gloves and then heavy overgloves, and still scared me a little. I
had K2CO3 in beakers in the hood in case of any spills and to pour any remaining drops of HF into, as well as a HF spill/burn kit nearby. My old
boss (the source of the glassware) who is now about 88, burned himself once or twice with HF, despite being one of the leaders in the fluorochemistry
field, and a careful man and still has a scars left.
While I think people should be able to do what they want, I would agree that if you want to do this, you need to be in your own house/home/lab, not an
apt. or house with others nearby. I have seen too many people here describe spilling chemicals in their apt. or shared house and create a mess.
This would be more than just a mess, and if you were to have any incident, it would likely become one of those "overblown" regulatory responses
involving three letter acronym agencies. So please make sure that you are not in that situation before doing anything dangerous.
Vargouille - 5-4-2013 at 07:46
Might I be putting my two cents in on the issue?
Plante, while I would very much like to get my hands on a good source of fluoroborate (after all, who doesn't love weakly coordinating anions?), I
would prefer it not to come stained with blood, in the metaphorical sense. We've spoken on this subject a few times before, and I don't believe that I
have put it across as strongly as I would like. I shall do so now.
The first step in the argument I put forth is to begin by defining you as a subset of people. Moreover, a characteristic of people is the ability to
make mistakes. A similar characteristic is the ability to either a) willfully disregard such mistakes, or to b) be ignorant of the mistakes. Hence, it
follows that it is possible for you to not only make a mistake, but not to know that the mistake has been made at all. In chemistry, especially of the
sort that you propose, such mistakes will likely be fatal.
But could it not be the case that you won't make a mistake? Perhaps, but the psychology of humans makes the determination of the probability of that
indeterminate. There are a number of cognitive biases in play, including the Dunning-Kruger Effect, Illusory Superiority, the Overconfidence Effect,
and what I call the "Immortality Fallacy". The Dunning-Kruger effect states that incompetent people will consider themselves to be more competent than
they are in reality, due to an error in self-analysis. While not fully applicable, for you are clearly not incompetent, it shows that there is a risk
for such an error in self-analysis. This is related to illusory superiority, in which people will emphasize their positive traits and diminish their
negative traits due to such an error. The overconfidence effect, comes into play when already competent people overestimate their competence. The
final, the "immortality fallacy" goes as follows: I have not died, therefore I will not die. I think the fallacy, and how it may be extended to other
areas, is quite clear.
You are clearly competent, but how competent are you? Is it possible that you are such a sterling show of mental prowess that you are unaffected by
any forms of mental bias? The answer to that is something I will leave for you to divine, though I will comment on one thing: the surest show of
competence is knowing what is too difficult for you to do at the moment and what you can glean from them in the meanwhile. I, for example, recognize
that much of Einstein's Field Equations are above my current level of understanding, but I can grasp some of the implications: that a representation
of the curvature of the universe is related to the energy contained in the universe, for example.
You have mentioned to me on at least one occasion that most of your money is being spent on safety equipment, which implies that, on some level, at
least, you recognize that you are imperfect; that it is conceivable that you can make a mistake. If this is the case, then it can be carried to the
utmost: there are certain dangers of working with a chemical that can be counter-acted.
[url=http://www.allsafetyproducts.biz/page/glove-selection-chart]This site/url] demonstrates that 70% HF is quite a monster when it comes to gloves.
The neoprene gloves you bought are adequate, but they aren't the best that you could use. Goggles that surround the eye are also important. Then there
is the concern of fumes. One method is a good fume hood, but a gas mask with a special HF-canister would decrease the risks tremendously. With no
hood, a gas mask, goggles, and coveralls made from Tyvek or other such chemically resistant material are almost a necessity. And, if it so happens
that you are not perfect, and a mistake is made, use of zephiran solution (for short-term contact) or calcium gluconate gel (for long-term contact)
and a trip to the hospital for further treatment (either via ambulance or by your own steam, so to speak) will make the lasting danger of the mistake
negligible. It's expensive, yes, but it is instructive to consider it the cost of remaining safe.
In short, I won't go so far as to say that you should not work with this whatsoever, rather that you should not work with it without the
aforementioned safety precautions in place.
DraconicAcid - 5-4-2013 at 08:05
I've worked with HBF4, triflic acid, and a number of other horrible things. But if someone were to offer me a bottle of hydrofluoric acid, with my
current lab set up, I would politely decline.
Good luck to you, plante1999, if you choose to work with it, but be careful.
plante1999 - 5-4-2013 at 08:34
I take consideration of what everyone have to say here. Few days ago I taugth about making Nitronium nitrate, I dessided that I won't do it, at least
not now. Some people migth think I think I'm invincible, but it is not really the case, but at least not in all the possible danger. I seriously
dislike explosive material, it is not fear, but more of a repulsion toward them, when I was younger I had made a few drop of glycerine trinitrate. I
had burn most of it, but I had a drop left, after some research I dessided to detonate it with an hammer. The explosion was not very impressive, but
the ringing in my ear made my repulsive about energetics, even thinking about an explosion make me fear the sound. It made my idealogy about
energetics. Never made anything energetic after this.
I live with my father only, in a quite rural area (in a house), as far my consience goes, I'm only concerned by myself. I do most of my experiments
outside, and when they are bening I do them in the garage.
As far as I can think of I may overestimate myself, true, but I may have an explaination for it. In my life, never anybody/nothing made my personnal
estime good, actually I used to be pretty sad about the life (tip for the parents here: if your child is good at something, tell him!). When I
discovered chemistry I finnaly found something I could do to forget things... Later on it became my first, and only source of estime.
For sure I was not good when I came here, I was not even able to read in english! I learned english during my trips on sciencemadness. Google trad
helped me here!
By auto-psycological analysis, I think I do not do dangerous experiments because I want to, but more to prove myself. I already said it many time, but
I do not report everything I do on the internet, SO3 beign one of them. As for U- salts, I don't want to make radioactive waste, and if there was an
accident, a spill on the ground for exemple, now it would be dangerous! A spill of HF on the ground is ok, it will go away, but not something
radioactive. It is definetly not my kind of buisness.
EDIT: I wonder who think it is a spam?
EDIT 2: Woops I had wrote a ml of nitroglycerine!!!!
[Edited on 5-4-2013 by plante1999]
bahamuth - 5-4-2013 at 08:57
I've been working briefly with 48% HF for dissolving quartz samples for trace metal/isotope analysis where we digested the quartz in FEP erlenmeyers
and boiled the samples to dryness to get rid of the formed silicon tetrafluoride and remaining HF. We did this in the most massivly sucking fumehood
I've ever been working with but despite that everything in that lab was frosted or had fluoride salts on them. And I've never been so careful in my
live, even we had special pressure tested gloves up to our shoulders and full body apron, face shield and rubber boots.
The toxicity of 48% HF is about that of if you wet your glove slightly with the acid and put that on your skin, giving a palm sized wet spot one
exceeds the LD50 many times. And there is no antidote, calcium gluconate gel may help, but in the lab I worked we had a multi nozzle shower, a bathing
tub adjacent to the HF lab with a giganormous bag (200-300L) filled with concentrated calcium gluconate hanging above it with a zipper like opener so
one could be submerged in the matter of seconds, also our personnel was trained in giving calcium gluconate IV as we had several bags of it hanging at
the emergency station, also we had drinkable premixed pouches of it which had to be downed in case of body spills. And this was only first aid, as the
calcium gluconate would most certainly kill us if no further action would be taken to rid our system of it after (if) one had been cleared of the HF
poisoning. Combined with the lack of smell induced by small exposures and the similarity to regular water, HF is indeed a dangerous poison and should
only be used in proper lab settings, which the likes of what I just described, I doubt anyone on this forum has.
Mind you that we were working with liters at a time in several dozen erlenmeyers and I'm not trying to fearmonger this subject.
All I'm saying is that you should really think this through, and good luck staying safe if you choose to proceed.
garage chemist - 5-4-2013 at 11:31
I personally briefly possessed and handled a quantity of 72% HF in my home lab. By "briefly" I mean that I diluted all of it down to 40% soon after
receiving it and use the 40% acid for all my syntheses.
70% HF has two properties that make it much more dangerous than the 40% acid.
One: it emits a HUGE amount of HF fumes when poured in the open. My fume hood was completely filled with the white fumes as I poured it from one
bottle into another. Breathing one whiff of these fumes would result in serious poisoning or lung damage. Handling it without fume hood or a
respirator is impossible. In contrast, 40% HF does not even visibly fume in air and can be poured safely without a fume hood.
Two: HF of more than 50% concentration significantly attacks polyethylene at room temperature. This is a little-known fact.
The PE bottle it came in was extremely thick-walled, about 5mm, and its appearance was most alarming. The PE showed intense blistering on the entire
outside surface and had lost its flexibility. The paper label on it had completely disintegrated over the years and turned into mush. I never picked
up this bottle without gloves. The acid itself had turned slightly yellowish.
A thin-walled PE bottle that I poured it into acquired a frosted appearance after only three days and became hard as well.
This was the ultimate reason for me to dilute all of it down to a concentration that is safe to store.
Go to the Sigma-Aldrich page for technical quality 72% HF and you will find the statement "May discolor on storage". This is the acid reacting with
its container!
plante1999 - 5-4-2013 at 13:27
Does concentrated HF react with polypropylene? I have a lot of polypropylene ware dating from the time I used to make my own 9% HF. My use of HF is
not new! I was planning to use my old PP ware with the HF.
I won't work on hundred of ml HF at one time. Just enough to make 25g of the desired salt. It should be about 20-40ml HF per reaction.
Anyway, what price does the salts sold for? A cheap price I mean, not aldrich or similar.
garage chemist - 6-4-2013 at 02:52
Plante, you didn't understand the problem. The resistance of your PP labware is not important. 70% HF can be handled in PE and PP vessels just fine,
it's permanent contact over long periods of time which damages the plastic.
The material of your storage container is what counts. What container does your 70% HF come in? If it's PE or PP, then you shouldn't store it in
there.
According to http://www.coleparmer.com/Chemical-Resistance, PP has excellent resistance (A rating) to 20% and 50% HF, while the resistance to 75% HF is only
"fair" (C rating).
For LDPE, it's exactly the same. So there is no difference between PE and PP regarding resistance against aqueous HF.
franklyn - 6-4-2013 at 12:14
A gallon jug of fuming poison requires extraordinary safety consideration
before it is ever actually used. The immediate issue is that of storage. It
must be stored isolated separately from anything else , prominently labeled
of it's dangers and secured so that nobody can out of ignorance unknowingly
come into contact with it ( gee what is this ? open it , sniff it , pour it down
the drain etc.). It is prudent to subdivide this amount into four quart sized
containers for easier handling. Shrink wrap all caps. Teflon lined bottles will
be stable in the long term, but are extremely expensive to buy. Immersion
of these under alkaline water with pH indicator inside of a large sealed bucket
provides an added measure of security in storage, in such event that a
breach occurs you are unaware of.
Pay extra notice that any sizable spill of this material instantly renders an
enclosed area into a hazardous material emergency requiring the wearing
of a moon suit to clean up safely. Be aware in the event you ever need to
summon the fire department to attend to your accident , it is the practice
of many municipalities to bill for the incident response which can minimally
amount to many thousands of dollars.
http://chemistry.asu.edu/safetyweb/PDFfiles/HFsafetyGuideline.pdf
Where I live in a large metropolitan city some years ago , someone recklessly
discarded a jug of Hydrofluoric acid along with the garbage for routine curbside
collection. Something which is expressly criminal to do. Unaware , the sanitation
worker placed the package into the rear compactor of the truck as anything else
and as it was crushed the acid content spewed out drenching the hapless man.
Despite the quick response by paramedics and hospitalization at a renowned
world class medical facility the stricken victim was dead hours later. This event is
emblematic of the plight of hobby chemists beleaguered by public concern for safety.
Both of these links are to the same article also attached below_
http://bit.ly/ZnLDbR , or else , http://tinyurl.com/cymdnmq
Attachment: Hydrofluoric Acid Causes Death of Sanitation Worker - Fire Engineering.txt (24kB)
This file has been downloaded 1087 times
.
plante1999 - 6-4-2013 at 14:21
OK, OK, I will buy only 500ml of 50% HF. And I'm not that stupid, won't trow chem in garbage! I dispose of them by precipitating metals as
sulphide and other insoluble compounds, then I dig a hole in rock and put it there. It doesn't take look to make a funky colored mineral wich is
completly insoluble. After all metals occurs as the sulfides!
Thanks for everyone input, I may still make 20-30g salts for sale.
franklyn - 6-4-2013 at 16:33
There is no benefit to obtain 500 ml instead of 8 X as much.
You still need to apply the same precautions. If you plan to
do much chemistry with this in the next 2 or 3 years avail
yourself of the economy of the volume purchase. The
comments on this thread are intended as informative and
cautionary advice to give the acid the due respect. It is
expected that you are responsible but unless you are sitting
upon the box in which it is contained you will not be in control
of it except when you are present with it. You own it and are
therefore responsible for whatever can become of it. You
cannot disavow responsibility because of unforeseen events.
It is advisable that you inspect it at regular intervals every
3 months or so to assure yourself of the containers integrity.
.