70% nitric and 36% hcl storage

Hi everyone

I have finally received my acids and after reading some threads on acid storage I'm still concerned about the bottles mine came in they are brown glass with plastic lids .

So my questions are how long is it safe to store in these bottles until I should replace?

Will these bottles vent or should I do that manually once every few weeks ?

Finally how would you store them ? I'm doing this as a hobby but want a good setup from the start so I have been piecing together a lab in my shed so some ideas on how you store your own chems or how you would do it I'm trying to keep my hole lab set up under $2000 this is not including glassware,chems or disposable items such as filters and so on.

I was thinking about a hdp cupboard that could vent in to my fume hood and have a spill catch tray at the bottom


Edit to add some stuff

Kind regards
Mitch

Please get them out of your home.

Dave

FrugalRefiner said:

Please get them out of your home.

Dave

Click to expand...

Thank you for your reply dave

they are on my kitchen bench because the parcel just arrived and I thought I would take a quick photo before I put them in the shed

Kind regards
Mitch

I am no expert on nitric, not having used it. I know White Fuming Nitric Acid (98%+) needs to be vented periodically. But as 70% is just above its azeotrope (68), I wouldn't think it at all necessary.

Hydrochloric acid is just HCl gas dissolved in water. Because it prefers to be at 20%, venting it at 36% would only cause losses. My 32% in soft plastic bottles don't bloat in the slightest. So don't panic that 36% is about to burst out of your glass any more than lemonade would. Handled properly, glass is fine.

You are wise to keep your bottles in catch trays big enough to hold the entire contents. This is good practise for plastic also; I have had a 2 litre bleach bottle leak and make a total shambles of my new laundry cupboards.

Store them in a cool place away from light sources. Store acids away from bases. Store oxidisers away from reducers.

http://www.flinnsci.com/media/396140/acidsafety.pdf

As you already know, like in anything we do, the more we educate ourselves the safer we will be.
Our safety thread is helpful but your research should continue farther than a reading a few articles or getting a couple of question answered.
The more research you do on a subject the more education, the more skill or understanding you have.
Note: I have seen the caps deteriorate crack and crumble on nitric acid bottles, especially the hard black plastic type (usually with Teflon liners. Even sealed bottles can escape some gases.

The glass bottles are excellent for long term storage. Each acid has a different colored cap, at least here in the USA, Nitric has Red and Hydrochloric has Blue. These caps are made of an appropriate material for storage of each acid.

I notice you bought reagent grade, you may not have an option for Nitric but Hydrochloric is usually available much much cheaper in stores where you can buy masonry supplies as Hydrochloric is used for cleaning and etching concrete. Seeing as you will use 3 or 4 times as much HCl as Nitric, it may pay to look for it in a lesser grade.

As far as storage the caps can be left tight. The bottles should be kept in a location where it isn't too hot, so out of the sun and in a vented cabinet, your idea of HDP plastic sounds good and a catch tray always helps.

All of your chemicals should be kept low and in a plastic spill tray large enough to contain whatever you store in them. Separate spill trays for acids and bases and oxidizers are a good idea as well.

On the red (nitric) plastic lids that 4metals mentioned, I have seen the plastic crack after a year or so. Probably not kept in a cool place. Even though it's in a dark jug, I would also keep it in the dark when you're not using it.

Another thing I found out the hard way. After using those hand pumped plastic siphon pumps to pump new acid or caustic from drums, always rinse the pump inside (pump some water through it) and out with water after use. Nitric, especially, if left in the pump, can permanently screw up the valves in as little as 2 days. You'll be able to pump but it will no longer hold a siphon. This is worse if the pump is allowed to remain flat, laying on its side. Some people leave the pump sticking in the acid drum. Although the pump is vertical and will drain, somewhat, I think it's bad practice and will shorten it's life.

4metals said:

The glass bottles are excellent for long term storage. Each acid has a different colored cap, at least here in the USA, Nitric has Red and Hydrochloric has Blue. These caps are made of an appropriate material for storage of each acid.

I notice you bought reagent grade, you may not have an option for Nitric but Hydrochloric is usually available much much cheaper in stores where you can buy masonry supplies as Hydrochloric is used for cleaning and etching concrete. Seeing as you will use 3 or 4 times as much HCl as Nitric, it may pay to look for it in a lesser grade.
As far as storage the caps can be left tight. The bottles should be kept in a location where it isn't too hot, so out of the sun and in a vented cabinet, your idea of HDP plastic sounds good and a catch tray always helps.

Click to expand...

As a newbi my thinking was keep 36% hcl for the refining process as it is cleaner and I also got a 20l of hardware store concrete etch hcl to use as ap when recovering process.

I have been looking at buying a secondhand Chemical cupboard

Like this one it is only 60l but souls be more then enough for what I need

Is that plastic? It looks expensive. Metal would be inadvisable with HCl.
I would think a cheap flatpak cupboard (particle board + melamine) from Bunnings should do the job. (I have one from my laundry going cheap :lol: )

No lock, though you could bolt one on the outside if you were so inclined. [Edit: I mean on a cheap flatpak cupboard.]

jason_recliner said:

No lock, though you could bolt one on the outside if you were so inclined.

Click to expand...

It looks like the white slide handles actually have tabs for a lock. Since it's outside (of course), I definitely keep a lock on mine.

Mine, incidentally, is just a plastic storage cabinet from a big-box store (Walmart IIRC).

One of the best places to store single jugs of acid that you're presently using is a 5 gallon bucket with a lid. Remember that it's nearly impossible to make a few pours from a jug and not get at least a little on the outside of the jug.

I use old 1 gallon paint cans to hold individual bottles of acid in case they leak. A few years ago, while we were rehabbing houses and going through a LOT of paint, I noticed that they were switching from metal cans to plastic for most paints. The ones I see are made from heavy [stt]HDPE[/stt]. Most of them do have a metal rim to seal to the lid, but I've seen a few where the rim was also plastic. While they're not tall enough to be able to put the lid on once the acid bottle is on them, they serve very well to contain the acid if the bottle fails.

Dave

Edit: Please note that I was wrong! The 1 gallon paint cans I've been using are PP, not HDPE. They still serve the purpose well, but they are not HDPE.

Hi Jason

Yes it is plastic and very expensive $1200 AUD but I wouldn't buy from new I have been looking around for second hand ones .
If I lived in the good old USA I could pick up a really good fume hood and cupboard for about $445 . The mark up over here is just ridiculous anyway moving on the reason I want to stay away from wood of any kind is because I was reading a post that when nitric and wood mix over time the wood can become explosive .

I am unsure about buckets because in summer we have temps of 40c and in my shed that would be amplified so with some kind of cupboard i could use a small portable ac the ones with the flexible hoses feed that in to the cupboard and run it on hot days .

Thank you guys for the responses it is so much easier spitballing ideas with you guys keep them coming

Kind regards
Mitch

I use a small non-working refrigerator to store my nitric. I store nitric by itself. I have a larger refrigerator for chemical storage, and two stainless steel cabinets with latching doors which are recycled from a restaurant. Locks on any refrigerator for safety,where a child can become trapped, I do not have small children around to get trapped in one, but a lock is a good idea just in case.

Many chemicals can be dangerous to store together in the same cabinet or next to each other. It is a good Idea to read up on storage of chemicals safely.

I use an old deep freeze that i coated with "flex seal", it works well.

The bottles i am using at the moment go inside my workspace, basically in the cupboard section underneath my shelving.

Eventually i want to build a melamine cabinet and use the deep freeze for other things, ...not storing food obviously, but, probably some of my mass amounts of corning

thank you guys for some really great info I think I'm going to use these plastic cabinets they look really strong and they are very cheap also they are lockable.

I will also be using 3.5 gallon plastic buckets that have the snap on lids . So the glass bottles go in the buckets then in the cabinet that will be locked in my shed.

I know this must seem like over kill but I have 3 children and if anything ever happened to them I don't think I could forgive my self so safety,safety,safety

Butcher
Thanks mate I will be storing them in two Separate cabinets

Mitch

Sorry I forgot to add a photo

Kind regards
Mitch