Sciencemadness Discussion Board - New element collecting site!

New element collecting site!

Waffles - 7-10-2006 at 16:17

If you are a fan of Mr. Theodore Gray and his amazing collection, you will appreciate this very much indeed…an acquaintance of mine in Russia decided to put some nice picture of his collection online.
His English is not perfect, and the site is still certainly under construction, but his samples are absolutely outstanding, simply some of the best in the world.

here

Phel - 7-10-2006 at 16:48

Thanks for the link. Those Br crystals look amazing!

Jdurg - 7-10-2006 at 17:08

Beautiful! Thanks for the link.

12AX7 - 7-10-2006 at 18:00

Ooh, neat. Not as much story and richness as T.G.'s though.

tim

Fleaker - 7-10-2006 at 18:05

Yeah but look at some of his samples. My personal favorite is the liquid oxygen in the tranparent dewar--you can actually see the blue color!

The_Davster - 7-10-2006 at 18:16

Xenon difluoride

Fleaker - 7-10-2006 at 18:25

Yeah I saw that too, very impressive. Hmmm, he doesn't have any palladium you know...and he did say he would gladly trade for a good sample! (HINT lol)

Jdurg - 7-10-2006 at 18:38

Heh. I am tempted to trade some palladium for that liquid chlorine ampoule.

Waffles - 7-10-2006 at 18:51

Quote:

Originally posted by Jdurg
Heh. I am tempted to trade some palladium for that liquid chlorine ampoule.

He's selling them for $80 as well. So maybe you could get an ampoule + ~$200 for an ounce of Pd…

woelen - 8-10-2006 at 04:05

Ah.. I know this guy. I purchased a sample with a tiny amount of liquid chlorine (just a single drop), a sample with bromine, a sample with thallium and a sample with iridium from him. I hope to receive my samples next week.

He is a very cooperative guy and he has fair prices. He is not a professional seller, like the other companies in this business, but he has spare materials and is willing to share them for decent prices.

Jdurg - 8-10-2006 at 09:54

I agree with what woelen has said. I sent him an e-mail so he could have a copy of my element collection images and then asked what samples he has available. I was able to pick up a liquid chlorine ampoule, an ampoule of unoxidized lithium metal, and an ampoule of unoxidized potassium metal. I'll hopefully be getting the chlorine and lithium later this week.

He told me he's going to work on the potassium ampoule to come up with a nice sample at a good price.

I do want to mention, however, that he would prefer to do trades over direct sales. I'd feel really bad if the poor guy got hammered with requests as like woelen said, he does this on the side and isn't a professional retailer. Still, he seems to be a great guy and has some simply AMAZING samples on his site. It's nice when you can make contact with fellow collectors and help each other out.

craynerd - 8-10-2006 at 12:32

Thats a fantastic display. The liquid Oxygen is excellent, where could you find something like that? All the samples i have seen have been gaseous.

I noticed that he puts these samples together himself. Has anyone else tried this?

What is the best display method ? For example if i wanted to make a potassium sample, what would be the best way? I presume i could cut it into cube under paraffin so that the surface does not oxidise and remains shiny, but where would you go from there...
Any help or advice appreciated.

cray

[Edited on 8-10-2006 by craynerd]

Jdurg - 8-10-2006 at 12:38

Having an argon drybox is critical. If you have a drybox you can take your potassium sample outside of the oil storage container, dry it off then cut off all of the oxidation without any fear of oxygen or water in the air. Inside the drybox, you can then place it in a glass ampoule and using a heat source melt the ampoule shut. If you would like you can also melt the potassium inside the ampoule so you get the beautiful reflective surface.

Basically, without a drybox you will have a tough, if not impossible, time sealing the reactive metals up. Complete protection from oxygen and water is required and that's not easy to do.

For the oxygen, you can temporarily view it like that but you can't do it long term. If you have some liquid nitrogen, you can place a glass dewar in the liquid nitrogen and run some oxygen gas through a coiled copper tubing submerged in the liquid N2. Oxygen will then drip out of the opening of the tubing as a liquid since liquid N2 is colder than the B.P. of oxygen. If you have a high enough flow of gas you will get enough liquid O2 to fill up a glass dewar and get a photograph before it all boils away and makes everything in the area HIGHLY flammable.

craynerd - 8-10-2006 at 12:55

A dry box! Of course, thanks for the reply!

chemoleo - 8-10-2006 at 15:26

Check out these fantastic pics:
http://www.periodictable.ru/034Se/slides/Se1.jpg
http://www.periodictable.ru/080Hg/slides/Hg1.jpg
http://www.periodictable.ru/031Ga/slides/Ga1.jpg
http://www.periodictable.ru/053I/slides/I1.jpg

Woelen, re. emovendo, they say nothing about international shipping. I take it you had it sent to the Netherlands, does it get delivered from the US? Or a local European retailer? I'd rather not get anything from the US, I don't want to get detained randomly next time I enter the US for a conference just because I bought some Se. Same goes for smartelements. What was your experience with it?

Jdurg - 8-10-2006 at 16:12

Smart-Elements is based out of Austria or Germany, I believe, so there is no reason why it would ship through the US. Though the prices are nuts high.

woelen - 8-10-2006 at 22:58

Emovendo ships to Europe, but yes, it is from the US. I purchased more than 10 element samples from him in a few different shipments. He is not expensive at all and also the shipping cost is very good (e.g. for the 30 grams of selenium, overseas shipping is only $2 or something like that). You have to pay by credit card or Paypal. My experience is good. Never had trouble receiving packages, usually, transit time is 10 to 20 business days.

craynerd - 11-10-2006 at 14:39

Sorry, back onto the subject ....

What do you think is the best think to use to "display" / store the samples.
Maybe i should say, what is the easiest thing to get hold of that still looks good. Those glass ampules look great but don`t have a clue where to get them from!

Chris

Waffles - 11-10-2006 at 15:46

http://stores.ebay.com/Discount-Vials

There's a place near me (and all over the U.S., I think) called The Container Store that has all sorts of glass and plastic vials, jars, acrylic display cases…i bought a sturdy plastic toolbox from them to hold my element collection and ship (all 51 pounds of!) it to college in.

Lots of places! Keep your eyes out.

Jdurg - 11-10-2006 at 17:36

Yup. Just do a quick search on Google and you'll find plenty of places that sell all kinds of glass jars and vials. For the actual ampoules, those can be made by taking a test tube and some propane torches and melting the glass shut. However, keep in mind that this requires quite a bit of practice and unless you have a constant vacuum or constant flushing of Argon you're going you'll have to deal with some oxidation caused by the heat.

Swany - 11-10-2006 at 21:08

Quote:

Originally posted by rogue chemist
Xenon difluoride

Yeah, my heart palpitated when I saw that. The man has inspired me, some very very beautiful samples!

Ivan - 12-10-2006 at 11:55

Quote:

Originally posted by Swany

Yeah, my heart palpitated when I saw that. The man has inspired me, some very very beautiful samples!

Actually I can exchange small amount of this funny crystals, But till now I could not found good PTFE vials for its shipping. It's VERY SMELLY, and corrosive.

P.S. Thank you VERY MUCH ! for you interest to my website!

[Edited on 12-10-2006 by Ivan]

[Edited on 12-10-2006 by Ivan]

Jdurg - 12-10-2006 at 13:12

Hehe. Yeah, the slow evolution of fluorine gas from those crystals are actually a kind of neat way to get some fluorine gas as a sample.

Ivan - 12-10-2006 at 13:25

I not sure, that crystals smelling due to decomposition of XeF2 (it's stabe at boiling point (>150c) ), I think it's smell of XeF2.

garage chemist - 12-10-2006 at 14:27

Xenon difluoride is available from Fluka.

1g 94 Euro
5g 355 Euro.

If I had the spare money I could well get some (via pharmacy or else).
However, it's listed as extremely toxic.

And yes, XeF2 is stable until its melting point (129°C).
The smell is due to the considerable vapor pressure of the solid at room temperature: 3,8 mm Hg at 25°C.

The_Davster - 12-10-2006 at 17:19

Xenon as a gas is already quite expensive. Alfa has XeF2 for 90US$/2g 10g-320$. Listed as a fluorinating agent. Apparently shipped in teflon.

I have 1L or so of Xenon in a big gas glass flask. A proff of mine has F2 gas. Now when I heard that I of course made the suggestion that they get together. But when I asked it came out wrong, and sounded creepy. I'll have to ask again. Unfortunatly he is under the impression that XeF6 is explosive, wheras I was argueing it is the XeO3 is. He seems like he might actually let me work with some in his lab. I want perxenates.

Ivan - 12-10-2006 at 22:04

Is your gas flask industrially sealed?
Would you like to exchange it into XeF2 ?

.

[Edited on 13-10-2006 by Ivan]

woelen - 13-10-2006 at 01:40

Quote:

Originally posted by rogue chemistI want perxenates.

Those would be quite cool I think. I, however, read that sodium perxenate (Na4XeO6.8H2O) is an insoluble solid. Being insoluble makes the compound less interesting. It may be a nice oxidizer though in a pyro-composition, albeit a little expensive for that

.

[Edited on 13-10-06 by woelen]

Ivan - 13-10-2006 at 02:41

Once I mixed together XeF2 and LiAlH4

, It was very funny

The_Davster - 14-10-2006 at 13:06

What do you mean by industrially sealed?

It is like Theodore Gray's here: http://www.theodoregray.com/PeriodicTable/Samples/018.2/inde... except it has xenon instead of argon inside. Labels are identical.
The ball-drop-valve thing is still intact. I still have the certificate of anaysis, it is quite pure, 5ppm krypton, balance xenon. from 1966.

How much XeF2 is it that you have/be willing to trade? Not sure if I am completly willing, however. I find both awesome.

EDIT: What is the rxn between XeF2 and LiAlH4 anyway?

[Edited on 14-10-2006 by rogue chemist]

The_Davster - 14-10-2006 at 13:12

Xenon flask

xenon.JPG - 33kB

mrjeffy321 - 14-10-2006 at 13:20

Those vials of liquid Chlorine are quite amazing.

I was thinking, how difficult would it be to make one of those one's self?
Making Chlorine gas is no problem, you don’t need all that much since it is just for display purposes. Put the Chlorine gas into a container and then cool it down until the Chlorine liquefies at around -35 degree C (you could use dry ice to get it much cooler). After you have the liquid Chlorine, pour it into a small, clear, STRONG, container and seal it up. For added strength, one could encase the container in acrylic plastic.
I would think the hardest part would be obtaining the container to put the liquid Chlorine into...it would need to be able to withstand internal pressures on the order of about 200 psi or more for safety.

woelen - 14-10-2006 at 13:43

@mrjeffy321: As an added thing, the chlorine you make must be dry, otherwise you'll get turbidity inside the ampoule of chlorine. Also, how would you seal up such a thing, while there still is liquid Cl2 inside. Probably it is not easy at all. These liquid Cl2 ampoules can be purchased at $80, sealed in resin. I think that is a good price for them, given the difficulty to produce them. You will need quite some apparatus to do so.

@rogue chemist: That bulb you show is quite amazing, but it is more because of the bulb, than because of its contents. Couldn't you just equally well take a bulb with well-dried air inside? Xenon is not interesting at all to display as a colorless gas. For that reason, I use gas discharge tubes in my collection of elements, which in some way make the element visible, although I must admit, that it is a little cheating.

http://woelen.scheikunde.net/science/chem/compounds/xenon.ht...

For all of the inert gases, I have such tubes. Personally, I find displaying these elements more interesting in this way, than as plain colorless gases.

mrjeffy321 - 14-10-2006 at 14:01

Quote:

Originally posted by woelen
@mrjeffy321: As an added thing, the chlorine you make must be dry, otherwise you'll get turbidity inside the ampoule of chlorine. Also, how would you seal up such a thing, while there still is liquid Cl2 inside. Probably it is not easy at all. These liquid Cl2 ampoules can be purchased at $80, sealed in resin. I think that is a good price for them, given the difficulty to produce them. You will need quite some apparatus to do so.

It is certainly easier said than done to seal the liquid Cl2 up in the container, but how you would go about doing this I guess would depend on the type of container used. Since the container would be subjected to such high pressures one would almost have to use a very thick glass ampoule, right? In which case then one would need to melt it closed which would not be an easy task while the Cl2 is boiling away inside.

By the way, woelen, you have an excellent looking element/compound collection.

The_Davster - 14-10-2006 at 14:08

I am only kind of an element collector...I collect until I find something I can do with it. I am not a fan of buying something sealed in an ampoule, I want to able to get at my chemicals, although shiny metals sealed im ampoules are very nice. But I have professors who I know will let me make those if I choose. Argon glovebox, hydrogen oxygen torch and silica glass tubes could go a long way if I wanted to ampoule stuff. The xenon flask is nice because of the history and the age, but the moment I can make some XeF6 with it I will. And from there, the oxide(should be 'interesting'

) and then perxenate.

woelen - 14-10-2006 at 14:23

I want to show you a few amazing samples I just received from Ivan for fair prices:

http://woelen.scheikunde.net/science/chem/compounds/chlorine...
http://woelen.scheikunde.net/science/chem/compounds/bromine....
http://woelen.scheikunde.net/science/chem/compounds/iridium....
http://woelen.scheikunde.net/science/chem/compounds/thallium...
http://woelen.scheikunde.net/science/chem/compounds/scandium...

Ivan, thanks!

Ivan - 14-10-2006 at 15:16

>What do you mean by industrially sealed?

I meant not self-made

(I like your flask very much! )

I have In Zurich ca 1 g of XeF2, For this very nice flack I am ready to exchange all this amount.
But sertanly If you have another offer, suggest it.
I have Xe in aluminium pressure vessel, but you absolutely right, this vintage flask is more then just 1l of Xe.

XeF2 LiAlH4 mixture is sensitive to the rub

and it have made loud boom

. (but I have mix only 20 mg of ach compaund).

evil_lurker - 14-10-2006 at 15:16

Hey didn't that Xenon flask come offa Ebay a few weeks ago?

Coulda sworn I seen one just like it.

[Edited on 14-10-2006 by evil_lurker]

Ivan - 14-10-2006 at 15:42

I didn't saw it

The_Davster - 14-10-2006 at 16:20

Nope. Basement of physics/chemistry building about to be torn down/asbestos removed. A scavengers paradise. I got to scurry around the abandonned equipment with professors in a feeding frenzy of academia. Damn I miss it.

It is also how I got much other equipment...which I really should sell on ebay.

Got to see two old physics professors squabble over a vaccuum diffusion pump...it was hilarious.

[Edited on 15-10-2006 by rogue chemist]

Jdurg - 15-10-2006 at 16:10

I must also say that Ivan ships these samples so completely safe and secure and in a method that I honestly had not seen before. He takes a huge lump of styrofoam and carves out parts of it so that the samples fit in there very snugly. The carved out "lid" is then placed back and heavily taped up. There is no way the samples will jostle around or break during shipping. Thank you so much Ivan for shipping in that manner.

It is really quite remarkable to see liquid chlorine gas. The acrylic/resin casting the ampoule is in makes it very easy to display. (My current samples of Fluorine, Chlorine, Bromine and Iodine are being sealed in a resin casting right now. A fellow element collector was able to get a mold made for me so that I could safely store all of the halogens, especially after the bromine ate through the glass ampoule it was stored in).

I also have to give my thanks to Ivan for being able to provide me with an unoxidized, reflective sample of lithium metal. Once I get myself an ampoule of unoxidized potassium, I will have a sample of every alkali metal in their pure, unoxidized form. I can't wait for that to happen as I'll then be able to possibly have them all cast in a resin block and have a great display to go along with the halogens.