Chemistry Alchemist
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Unknown chemical on Floppy disc's
I cut up an old floppy disc (the flexible disc inside) and added it to a small bit of HCl... i read somewhere that its Sm, but on the MSDS of
Samarium(II) Chloride it says its a pale yellow to white... this is a deep yellow... does anyone know what this could be? The Floppy disc has also
gone from a non transparent disc to a bit transparent...
As u can see in the picture the disc is now transparent... so what ever was in the disc has been leached out into solution...
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ScienceSquirrel
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As far as I know the material is iron III oxide based which would account for the yellow colour.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Floppy_disc#Structure
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Arthur Dent
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It's pretty safe to assume that it will be mostly ferric chloride, since floppies use a similar iron oxide coating on a flexible plastic media like
4-track cassettes, VHS/BETA cartridges and open reel tape.
If there is Samarium in this stuff, it will probably be in minute quantities, but I doubt it, because the magnetic properties of Samarium and Cobalt
together make them more appropriate for actual magnets.
You are more likely to find some Chromium Oxide, that was used many years ago to improve the magnetic properties of recording media, but that was
mostly audio cassettes.
Robert
--- Art is making something out of nothing and selling it. - Frank Zappa ---
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Chemistry Alchemist
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Where would u most likly find Samarium Magnets being in use? the link below shows a picture of what 2 uses samarium has....
http://www.jce.divched.org/JCESoft/CCA/CCA4/STILLS64/S_elt/S...
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ScienceSquirrel
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Seek and ye shall find!
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Samarium#Applications
http://www.ebay.co.uk/sch/i.html?_from=R40&_trksid=p5197...
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