Sulphuric acid turns into a crystal ball!

[philddreamer]

Howdy!

I had used last year about 1/3rd of a gal of "LIQUID FIRE" drain opener. After done de-plating, I filtered & poured the acid into back into the container. A few weeks later, I used about the same amount and did some more de-plating and ,like the first time, after filtering I poured back into the container. That was about a year ago.

Well, yesterday I set up my cell for some more de-plating and surprise!!!
I poured into the cell about 1/4 of a galon acid & the rest was a huge crystal ball! What happened!? :shock:
I had a second un-opened galon of "LIQUID FIRE",, so I was able to finish my 5 pounds of plated material today.

Thanks for any insight!

Phil

 

[butcher]

I dont know about looking into crystal balls, I might see something I do not want to see.

Do you see any colors?

 

[acpeacemaker]

Could it be a buffer that evolved within time?

 

[philddreamer]

I'll try to cut open the plastic jug & take some pic's tomorrow; if it's not raining!
I imaging there was traces of some BM's after filtering the solids...

Phil

 

[acpeacemaker]

Haha, I worked in a hospital for a very long time and "Bm" caught me off guard. Not meaning just "base metal". :mrgreen:

Take care,
Andrew

 

[butcher]

A list of sulfate salt colors, and solubility would help, some sulfate metal salts are insoluble, most are soluble, since this was a used acid it had some of the base metals from the deplating you used it on before, and would most likely contain some of these metals as crystal salts.

I am interested in this mystery crystal.

 

[niteliteone]

Phil,
Had almost the same thing happen with my sulfuric acid 2 months ago.

I bought my acid from NAPA and concentrated it this summer. I let it set in a plastic bottle in my shed till New Years when I started my cell.
As I poured the acid most had turned into a large crystal structure that was stuck in the container. Also the container was super cold.

I added a 2 ounces of water and brought it into my pantry where it was warmer and the next day it had all turned back into liquid acid and worked perfectly for the rest of the day.

I guess it has something to do with temperature vs concentration.

Hope this helps
Tom C.

 

[philddreamer]

Tom, I heated mine to reconcentrate, too! Hummmm...
And its been out also thru this winter. I just got back home & didn't get a chance to cut it open; WOAW... and now we are getting hail the size of marbles... :shock:

This size hail is not common here, at least not in the 20 years I've lived here.

 

[butcher]

That is texas moving north seen it the size of baseballs there, some would say that is global warming, now how can it be called that if its getting colder weather.

freezing sulfuric acid (not used with metals):
http://www.resistoflex.com/sulfuric_graphs.htm

 

[philddreamer]

Well, it seems that temperature has a lot to do with it! I placed it in the garage for these past few days & I just went & got it to cut the crystal ball out and its all liquid again!

So it seems that any sulphuric acid that:
1) has been used
2) has been heat & re-concentrated
3) has traces of base metals
4) and its been exposed to cold temperature
can and will turn into crystals, but when the temperature is brought up, it will liquified agan.

At least, that has been my expirience as well as Tom's (niteliteone).

Thank you all!

Phil