dissolving lead

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All,

On the subject of buying HCl, today a terror suspect was arrested in the US. They found he was using HCl to make a bomb or something (I don't know the details) of some sort.

I heard on the news tonight the government is now going to add HCl to it's watched chemical list! Making HCl may become yet another hurdle for hobby refiners and swimming pool owners!! :lol:

Steve
 
home brew HCl
table salt and sulfuric acid to make muratic acid
2NaCL + H2SO4 --> Na2SO4 + 2HCl
(HCl gas if no water was involved),
2 NaCl (table salt),
2 Na --- 2 x 23 g/mol = 46g/mol (sodium),
2 Cl --- 2 x 35 g/mol = 70 g/mol (clorine),
(46+70) = 116g/mol (2 table salt),
plus,
H2SO4 (sulfuric acid),
2 H --- 2 x 1 = 2g/mol (hydrogen),
S ---32g/mol (sulfur),
4 O ---4 x 16 = 64g/mol (oxygen),
(2+32+64)=98g/mol (sulfuric acid),

so 116g/mol table salt reacts with 98g/mol sulfuric acid on left side of arrow,
---------->
now for our products on the right side of arrow,
Na2SO4 (sodium sulfate),
Na2 -- 2 x 23 + 46g/mol (sodium),
S --32g/mol (sulfur),
O4 -- 4 x 16 = 64g/mol (oxygen),
(46+32+64) = 142g/mol (sodium sulfate),
plus,
2HCl (hydrogen chloride) gas if no water involved,
2H --- 2 x 1 = 2g/mol (hydrogen),
2Cl --- 2 x 35 = 70g/mol ( chlorine),
(2 + 70) = 72g/mol (2 HCl gas)
so our products on right side of arrow is 142g/mol of sodium sulfate and 72g/mol of hydrogenchloride gas if no water was added in equation,

some water would be there and how much we used can be another story, if we had alot of water the HCL (mixed like muratic acid) up to the azeotrope of the solution (I'm not sure but 20% seems familiar I may be wrong here?),HCL would be in this water solution and the sodium sulfate will be a precipitant at bottom of this, chilling may help to get most of it to settle out, for processes that the sulfate which may stay in solution this would be all you needed, but for others distilling would leave all the salt behind in reaction vessel. and running gas through water by bubbling would give you a pretty pure muratic acid (if dilute can be concentrated to azeotrope, if too concentrated will have excess HCL gas leave water solution),

Now forgive me if there are any mistakes in this as I have never had a chemistry class and could not even read when I got out of school, so my math and chemistry is not the one to learn from.and I hope I did not mess this up to bad.I'm just learning too. :lol:
 
butcher said:
home brew HCl
table salt and sulfuric acid to make muratic acid
2NaCL + H2SO4 --> Na2SO4 + 2HCl
(HCl gas if no water was involved),
2 NaCl (table salt),
2 Na --- 2 x 23 g/mol = 46g/mol (sodium),
2 Cl --- 2 x 35 g/mol = 70 g/mol (clorine),
(46+70) = 116g/mol (2 table salt),
plus,
H2SO4 (sulfuric acid),
2 H --- 2 x 1 = 2g/mol (hydrogen),
S ---32g/mol (sulfur),
4 O ---4 x 16 = 64g/mol (oxygen),
(2+32+64)=98g/mol (sulfuric acid),

so 116g/mol table salt reacts with 98g/mol sulfuric acid on left side of arrow,
---------->
now for our products on the right side of arrow,
Na2SO4 (sodium sulfate),
Na2 -- 2 x 23 + 46g/mol (sodium),
S --32g/mol (sulfur),
O4 -- 4 x 16 = 64g/mol (oxygen),
(46+32+64) = 142g/mol (sodium sulfate),
plus,
2HCl (hydrogen chloride) gas if no water involved,
2H --- 2 x 1 = 2g/mol (hydrogen),
2Cl --- 2 x 35 = 70g/mol ( chlorine),
(2 + 70) = 72g/mol (2 HCl gas)
so our products on right side of arrow is 142g/mol of sodium sulfate and 72g/mol of hydrogenchloride gas if no water was added in equation,

some water would be there and how much we used can be another story, if we had alot of water the HCL (mixed like muratic acid) up to the azeotrope of the solution (I'm not sure but 20% seems familiar I may be wrong here?),HCL would be in this water solution and the sodium sulfate will be a precipitant at bottom of this, chilling may help to get most of it to settle out, for processes that the sulfate which may stay in solution this would be all you needed, but for others distilling would leave all the salt behind in reaction vessel. and running gas through water by bubbling would give you a pretty pure muratic acid (if dilute can be concentrated to azeotrope, if too concentrated will have excess HCL gas leave water solution),

Now forgive me if there are any mistakes in this as I have never had a chemistry class and could not even read when I got out of school, so my math and chemistry is not the one to learn from.and I hope I did not mess this up to bad.I'm just learning too. :lol:
Click to expand...



Now really thank you Butcher, I don't want to produce HCl on industrial scale, but does not hurt to learn from people with your experience more about chemistry and about the chemicals I work with...

teclu
 
Hello All,

I am a new member.
This thread is interesting to me because I use lead-bearing enamels on silver.
Most of the time I refine my own silver, but now I am not sure as some of it is contaminated with lead-bearing enamel. Reading the responses to the original question, I think that I am safe if I just dissolve the silver in nitric acid. It will also dissolve the lead. There can be other elements in the enamel like cadmium, selenium, arsenic, I am not sure where this will lead to.

As for refining silver, I find it cumbersome. It is a lot of work and there is always a loss. I find refining silver more difficult than refining gold. Most of the time, I do not use aqua regia. I inquartate the gold with copper, then use nitric acid. It gives 995 gold. When I alloy, I add 5 parts more gold than normal (755 for 18K for example). I find this much more easy than to take the extra step with aqua regia.

Thanks for reading.

Dordi Westerlund
 
This may be a little late, but here is a good way to get rid of lead, then continue using your acid until it is no longer and acid.

Take whatever it is you are trying to dissolve the lead off of and put in in a reaction vessel/flask. Pour in around 500ml full strength HCl (31%) and let it simmer (bubbling but not a full boil) for 30 to 60 minutes. You will notice the acid will stay clear and a grey powder forming on the bottom. You won't see any dissolved lead, or lead salts yet.

Next, turn off the heat and immediately pour in a liter of H2O. Immediately the solution turns completely white and it resembles the cottage cheese appearance you get from precipitating silver chloride, but it settles very very quickly. That is your lead salt. It will be slightly grayish due to minute amounts of elemental lead, silver, and other base metals, but it is not even enough to worry about; it is waste material. Swirl it around and pour it into a separate container. Even after you decant the water, you can add more water and you will get more white precipitate, until all the grey powder material is just about gone (don't add your second wash to the first... it will dilute the first solution you poured out and can immediately reclaim).
Now because the lead chloride settles so quickly, it takes about 60 seconds until you can add the (now diluted) weak acid solution (from the first time you poured out the solution) back into the vessel to continue working. Now you can turn up the heat a little and maybe eve get rid of more lead.

And as a quick afterthought, make sure to dispose of your waste materials correctly, especially if it contains lead. I recommend converting any chloride metal salts to oxides for safe disposal.
It is actually very cool to watch!!!
 

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