Rador Labs
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Rador Labs Challenge #2: Chemical Conflagrations VOTING PHASE
Aaand the competition is finished!
Unfortunately the turnout was small, but the entries we got were all very interesting.
Now for the winner, which unlike last time will be chosen by popular vote. Attached are the three entries to the competition. Each is labeled with a
letter; 'A', 'B' and 'C'. All you have to do is select the letter of your favourite picture in the poll and submit.
We would like as many votes as possible. People who submitted, AND people who did not submit are allowed to vote.
Voting is open now and will close on Saturday 28th March 0000h UTC.
After the winner has been chosen, the writeups and any extra pictures from each submission will be attached here for perusal of anyone interested.
Happy voting!
  
This account is open to be used by members of Rador Labs, the outreach collaborative for
amateur chemistry.
You can contact us via U2U, or by emailing us at radorlabs@gmail.com
We're also on Twitter, YouTube, YouTube for raw footage, and there is a dedicated thread on the forum.
Be sure to check out the current competition: Chemical Conflagrations which is now in the voting stage. Voting finishes on March 28th 0000h UTC
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j_sum1
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Was this supposed to be a poll?
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Volanschemia
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Mood: Pretty much all of them!
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It's showing up as a poll to me...
"The chemists are a strange class of mortals, impelled by an almost insane impulse to seek their pleasures amid smoke and
vapor, soot and flame, poisons and poverty; yet among all these evils I seem to live so sweetly that may I die if I were to change places with the
Persian king" - Johann Joachim Becher, 1635 to 1682.
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j_sum1
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It is for me now too.
Voting neck and neck at the moment.
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Amos
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Aaaand it's neck and neck again.
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Brain&Force
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I'm interested if you can guess how each of the flames was made...I have the answers but have not looked at them yet.
At the end of the day, simulating atoms doesn't beat working with the real things...
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Zombie
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Mood: I just don't know...
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B) I would guess Al powder
C) Barium or Copper salts
A) Zinc
They tried to have me "put to sleep" so I came back to return the favor.
Zom.
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Jylliana
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Mood: Bubbly ^-^
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Thats why write-ups will be posted 
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Zombie
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Mood: I just don't know...
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No doubt!
They tried to have me "put to sleep" so I came back to return the favor.
Zom.
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Jylliana
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Mood: Bubbly ^-^
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Very soft bump
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Volanschemia
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Voting finishes in just under 24 hours!
Anyone who hasn't yet voted on your favourite flame, there's not much time left. Get those votes in!
"The chemists are a strange class of mortals, impelled by an almost insane impulse to seek their pleasures amid smoke and
vapor, soot and flame, poisons and poverty; yet among all these evils I seem to live so sweetly that may I die if I were to change places with the
Persian king" - Johann Joachim Becher, 1635 to 1682.
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Rador Labs
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Well, we had quite a nice turnout with the voting.
And we have a distinct winner with 15 votes on her picture!
Congratulations to Jylliana who submitted photo 'B'. You win the total prize
pool of $9!
In second with 9 votes we have photo 'C' submitted by mayko and in third with 4 votes, photo 'A' submitted by zts16.
Attached are writeups done my the entrants on the details of how they created their flame and any extra photos sent to us.
zts16 will be posting his writeup himself soon.
A big thankyou to the people who entered and also to the people who voted.
Attachment: Writeup for Entry B.docx (1.6MB)
This file has been downloaded 552 times
Attachment: Writeup for Entry C.doc (7.4MB)
This file has been downloaded 9131 times
This account is open to be used by members of Rador Labs, the outreach collaborative for
amateur chemistry.
You can contact us via U2U, or by emailing us at radorlabs@gmail.com
We're also on Twitter, YouTube, YouTube for raw footage, and there is a dedicated thread on the forum.
Be sure to check out the current competition: Chemical Conflagrations which is now in the voting stage. Voting finishes on March 28th 0000h UTC
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j_sum1
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I like this comp. Let's do it again.
(I have some ideas but just wasn't able to get involved this time around.)
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Brain&Force
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There's a new, relatively simple competition coming up next, hopefully by next month it'll be out. We may also rehash this competition later on.
At the end of the day, simulating atoms doesn't beat working with the real things...
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Texium
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Well, I submitted picture A. If I learned anything from participating in this competition, it is that flames are fickle, and very difficult to take
still pictures of! When selecting the one that I submitted, I sorted through 26 pictures from that round of picture-taking alone. I didn't feel that
any of them conveyed the way the flames actually looked, and was quite disappointed in how they turned out. Because of this, I can say that there will
definitely be a possibility of having a redo of this competition come back around eventually, but with the option (or maybe requirement) to take video
rather than stills! Until then, we have a few more in the pipeline that should be quite fun.
Now as for the flame...
I started with pyro grade strontium nitrate, home made copper(II) chloride, and methanol. A couple grams of each of the two salts were mixed in a
mortar and pestle and ground together. Then they were added to a ceramic crucible, and methanol was poured over so that it was just barely covering
the mixture. I lit it on fire and turned off the lights. It was very beautiful, with the ghostly nearly invisible methanol flame occasionally lighting
up brightly with streaks of red or green, or sometimes both at the same time.
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Zephyr
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Unfortunately I didn't get around to conducting the experiment I had planned, maybe next time...
Congratulations to those who entered, nice photos!
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Brain&Force
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<iframe sandbox width="560" height="315" src="https://www.youtube.com/embed/2Ta-SsclaoY" frameborder="0" allowfullscreen></iframe>
More on Jylliana's entry
At the end of the day, simulating atoms doesn't beat working with the real things...
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![[*]](images/xpblue/default_icon.gif){kind=icon}
