That tip at 11:27 with the hygroscopic nature of potassium carbonate is SO SO useful to know to make anhydrous ethanol! Thank you so much for your research!
How is this done, everyone leaves comments to point things out but do not explain in detail probably because they don't wanna type half a book idk or they don't know they actually process
I've been really enjoying your videos. To me you are every bit as entertaining and informative as Nile Red and Nurd Rage. I've been playing with wood ash for over a week now. I've obtained phosphates from the first batch which I found pretty cool. I've got tons of calcium carbonate and I've got potassium carbonate and just a little bit of potassium hydroxide. What I like about you is that you are like me going through the wood ash and won't call it potash/potassium hydroxide until you've purified it as much as possible and know it is genuine. I see too many others that just boil down/evaporate their ash water and call it KOH and done, once they get a solid.
Matthew Wilson thanks a lot! I really appreciate it! That's awesome that u separated all those compounds from wood ash, great job! I kind of just ignored the other compounds in the ash, lol
Paul Junglaus I re-examined that stuff a while back. I came to realize the wood ash had also been contaminated with ash from one of those Duraflame type of logs. I also learned I made too many assumptions with some of the other things like phosphates. I really want to revisit the wood ash experiments now that I've had more time to better understand the chemistry.
You even sound like a scientist great video easy to understand. I dont know if you have one or not but, its not all about the degrees. I love when people just research and experiment on their own, you are a true scientist with great observations that most might over look. Not that a degree isn't helpful in the job world but research and experimentation are the keys to true science.
FYI, I've found that using a centrifuge works like magic for removing those fine particulates. If you can't afford a real one, the next best thing is to get an old juicer from the second hand store. Get one that doesn't kick out the pulp (no conical rotor). Then wet your filter paper and line the internal basket. Filters impossible to filter solutions in a jiffy!
My guess for the grey color is due to the aluminium pressure cooker pot used with the lye which is corrosive to many metals. Try using stainless steel.
At the start of the video I was a bit confused why you kept talking about potassium hydroxide, but then I was happily surprised when you realized through experimentation that ashes are mostly potassium carbonate. That stuff was used for lots of stuff in the past and I was pretty sure people weren't putting potassium hydroxide on plants, which, being pure, would probably destroy most plants.
There is ansolutely potassium hydroxide. Pot ash is literally potassium based lye. You absolutely get it when you soak ashes. Its NOT pure, like you suggested though. Youre concebtrating it as you boil.
Hi, Nice video and explanations. Just to explain a bit your "low" yield of KOH... 1) While burning the wood most of the organic compounds turn into CO2 and H2O (as aside gases a little CO, SO2, N2, NH3, NxOy (mostly reduced by C into N2))... 2) The CO2 is converted by any basic salts into carbonates. Strong bases catches CO2 from the air at an incredible rate and this is used into space shuttles (discretly by LiOH under the form of Li2O2 what catches H2O from the vicious air expelled by astronauts and that finally sets O2 free and catches the noxious CO2 for an optimum clean air recycling): Li2O2 + 2 H2O --> 2 LiOH + H2O2 H2O2 --> H2O + 1/2 O2 (g) 2 LiOH + CO2 (g) --> Li2CO3 + H2O It works of course on Earth with more common chemicals like NaOH or KOH, LiOH is used in space for its weight (for an equivalent CO2, H2O savenging and O2 liberation ability LiOH will (on a weight basis) do a better job than NaOH (itself better than KOH) (read Li2O2, Na2O2 and K2O2). In your case study / example, KOH will turn spontaneously into KHCO3 and K2CO3 upon exposure to air... this is a main problem for chemists in the lab when working with strong hydroxides bases like NaOH (you usually need to verify the effective base content of your solution when performing titrations because any NaOH solution will invariably decay into NaHCO3 and/or Na2CO3 solutions and derived trimming (buffer) solution so the pH change value by color indicators may be biaised a little. I hope this will help a bit. PHZ (PHILOU Zrealone from the Science madness forum)
@@poopsiepop4179 It doesn't, it cools down the liquid so that the potassium nitrate crystallizes out. The solubility decreases as the temperature decreases thus the potassium nitrate goes out of solution.
This guy has never heard of recrystalization. Just dissolving and evaporating doesn't really remove much in the way of impurities and as he mentioned some of the stuff doesn't dissolve in water so it would get removed in some of his first filtering steps once it reaches saturation and crystalizes. Soap is formed from lye and fat ie. the hydroxide not the carbonate.
I'm fairly sure other folks will have mentioned this before, but just in case... If you are hoping for KOH, you want to use HARDWOOD ashes, not just any old wood you have aroud. Best types to aim for are hickory, sugar maple, ash, beech and buckeye, as they are generally the goto trees for oldschool soapmaking. Just wanted to toss in my two cents and see if it helps you, in case you wanted to retry this experiment.
I can speak from experience that ash and maple are great, but have just discovered that cherry seems to have a far lower concentration of whatever these various minerals are.
Yup, and its really important to use big chunks or logs of wood. Those twigs he used had already lost their potassium to rain leaching it out. And hickory is by far the best, even can make salt from its roots. This experiment was cool but he would have gotten so so so much more had he done it right
For those who don't have a vacuum filter, there are many ways to filter of course, but there is a cheap method for finer filtering. Simply get an empty soda bottle, poke a small hole in the bottom where a small manual air pump (such as for bike tires or sports balls) can snuggly fit into, then poke a couple small holes in the top of the cap. All you then do is fill the bottle with the liquid (while covering the tiny hole in the bottom with a finger), gently stuff a very hard wad of cotton in the neck (don't push it through, you want it stuck in the neck) and then screw the cap on. After that, just tip it up right and stick the pump needle in that tiny bottom hole, and start slowly pressurizing it with the pump. The air pressure will force the liquid through the cotton (or filter) much faster than gravity fed methods. Something to improve on this is to make your own high quality filter with multiple layers inside of a small tube that could be strongly bonded to the cap or somehow inserted. I guess one way would be to cut a hole in the cap large enough for the tube but still leave a couple millimeters of inner lip, then give the tube a ring base that would fit into the cap head but not through the hole so that when the tube is dropped in, it stays in the cap. Then place a rubber washer on top of the tube base, one which would fit inside the cap. The way of filtering inside the tube would be up to yourself.
Weed sprayer works well also. fill a tiny bottle with filer material and put the cap on, drill a hole in each end slightly smaller than the diameter of the hose you're using, force the hose in each end then use that in series with the weed sprayer hose works really well, gives you about 2 minutes or near of not having to pump and only takes around 10 pumps to pressurize the vessel.
I guess is logic that the ash consists of mainly potassium carbonate, because of all the CO2 that is generated in the fire. Actually, in the past people used an additional step in the soap making process. The solution of the ash salts was mixed with a solution of calcium hydroxide. This would convert the salts into calcium carbonate (insoluble) to precipitate out and leaving a solution of potassium hydroxide. For the rest: thumbs up for your videos!
you gotta get that fire incredibly hot to convert most of it to K2O which when reacted with water will form KOH but if you leave it too long youll get mostly K2CO3 again as it reacts to the CO2 in the air. Im currently working on a similar project and when i dumped all of my wood ashes and chars into water immediately after the fire to quench and checked the pH the next day it was around 12-13 but now after having let it sit and using a fan to evaporate as much water as i could since i dont have a propane burner that will work for it currently it has dropped pH to around10-11 so i think what has happened is it has converted mostly to K2CO3 so Ill probably end up needing to dry it and heat it up in a forge furnace and crucible to convert back to K2O. From my research though you probably will have some sodium salts in there as well as some P2O5 which will have to be separated out. Im planning on using high proof ethanol as well which should pull out the hydroxides while leaving the carbonates and P2O5 and then processing any left over carbonates in the furnace. the only problem im running across is how to separate the NaOH from the KOH since they are so similar. My thought was to use something like baking soda to convert the KOH to K2CO3 and leave a bunch of NaOH and use ethanol to separate but it looks to be very low efficiency and also introduces the potential problem of Bi metal salts. Hopefully the finished product will be enough for what im trying to do. I know it will work for soap but im told it wont for biodiesel which is one of the things I am doing this as a proof of concept for. So well see since both NaOH and KOH are used for biodiesel production im hopeful it will still work as long as i can get rid of most of the other impurities.
Nice video. A couple of ideas because I tried this my on my own many years ago and here are some things I would have done differently back then. Boil the wood ash solution instead of just filtering it with water. something I learned after that is that you can purify things with crystallization. Another thing. I think your dad doesn't really know what you can do with chemistry. Show your dad how to do soap and if he is not shy then put him in the video. I want to see his reaction and hopefully, he is proud that you know your stuff.
Is pottasium same as sodium? I find it hard to understand because it is one way on my native language, another way on latin and something completely different on US English
@@mnemonic5819 Yup, I do know science is international, already did that, got some nice KOH ceystals ( at least hope they are KOH, still have to check it )
@@mnemonic5819 I think he was confused because Lye is the same term used for sodium hydroxide and potassium hydroxide. Both of which are often used for the same reasons of making soaps and curing foods.
You probably got some aluminum oxide from the original pressure cooker and that would be gray, which then, when exposed to dry heat would convert into aluminum oxide which is going to precipitate out. There may also be some aluminum iron oxide type minerals. Might I suggest that to extract a purer product, first salt it out as potassium chloride using muriatic acid, then reduce the chloride with something like silver nitrate ru-vid.com/video/%D0%B2%D0%B8%D0%B4%D0%B5%D0%BE-ujgOpvNZIoM.html You need not use a lot of silver because you simply reduce the silver chloride back into pure silver, re-nitrate and repeat. en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Silver_chloride As long as you have enough nitrating material on hand, this process should bring about complete purification of all of your potassium. Once you have all of your potassium in a nitrated form where it will grow into high purity crystals you can either use it as is, or reduce it back to pure KOH by thermal decomposition in a well vented stainless steel container with a high purity carbon such as graphite, preferably, for safety, with a small percentage of water to slow the oxidation rate, and with the carbon in large chunks to reduce the surface area. Your ventilation system should also be steel or stainless steel, and include a small steel box, [the inner linking of an old junked microwave oven which is stainless steel would be good] where vaporous KOH can precipitate, OR a long, large diameter corrosion resistant steel pipe with 'chore boy' type stainless steel kitchen scrubbers at the end. If this is not possible where you live, you could reduce small volumes in an open topped steel tube with the chore boy scrubbers over a camp fire [check your local laws before attempting] and just feed in chunks of graphite until the burning stops and then let it cool before filtering. IF your carbon is absolutely pure, and IF you used a stainless steel container, you will not have introduced any metal impurities. If you use 'black iron' or galvanized pipe, you are certain to have metallic impurities which may or may not filter out easily, so that is just something to consider if you opt for plain steel pipe.
So im trying to make KOH, and according to google: KOH and K2CO3 are formed in ash, K2CO3 breaks down in water into 2KOH and H2CO3, H2CO3 breaks down in water to form H2O and CO2. Doesn't this mean i can just boil off my filtered potash solution and be left with mostly KOH? Or am i missing something, because this feels too easy to be right...
@@speedybear3878 indeed. After steeping my ashes i, foolishly, used a burner to evaporate the excess water. Upon exposure, KOH reacts with CO2 to form K2CO3 and water (which itself immediately evaporates). I then washed the remaining powder with pure ethanol, since KOH dissolves in it and K2CO3 doesn't, then evaporated the alcohol. My end result was 33g of K2CO3 and 1g of KOH, and minor chemical burns. I completely ruined it. Fortunately i found an arts supply website that sold 1kg of KOH for 10€. So then i felt stupid².
Well if you leave a stove on high for long enough it will indeed get hot enough to melt aluminum and glow red. Unless you have an induction stove then probably not. Definitely not a good idea though lol.
I have talked to a chemistry professor on this, and potassium carbonate is NOT basic enough to saponify fat. You need at least a pH of 12.5, preferably higher, for saponification and potassium carbonate maxes out at around 11.5 Also, if you are interested, in your multiple heating up of your potassium salts, you converted most of your potassium hydroxide into potassium carbonates. Heating it up as you described converts potash (a mixture of potassium salts) to pearlash (almost pure potassium carbonate). Although it would have been less pure, you should have extracted the potassium hydroxide from the first salts
The aluminum slug inside the bottom of the pot is there for better heat conduction. I think I saw that on an episode of How It's Made. The more you know! ☄🌟
Sir! Thanks for sharing your knowledge ^_^ God bless you... I am also interested in this kind of cool stuff about what the element compounds look likes and how you make chemical compounds from raw materials...? It is so amazing to watch and learn ^_^ I love to watch chemical experimentations related to chemistry and other interesting stuffs I also want to do some for agricultural purpose that will help in my grandparents farm and for living Many things are not written in the books that we have in the school when I was studying before. Good thing to see something like this ^_^ and we don't also have equipments... Thank you so much again I am writting down some of your tips On how to get some chemicals from raw materials like in the vid that I watched before about potassium carbonate , lye water, etc.
6yrs since published but 9:50 this pot was designed to be used on inductive stove. Aluminum disk in it heats up when placed in alternating magnetic field. Those pots are quite expensive so buy your mum/wife something 😅
hi. it look like you are using an aluminum pot to boil wich if i understand is very reactive with alkali forming new compounds, propably something like potasiun aluminate
If you have a mixed solution of potassium hydroxide and potassium carbonate in solution and want the carbonate, just bubble air through it for some time. The carbon dioxide in the air will convert the potassium hydroxide to the carbonate.
also I would check your KOH and make sure its not Sodium Carbonate bc that is a little soluble in Ethanol. And did you only burn hard woods? bc soft woods don't have as mush K in them its mostly Na.
Saya sangat suka belajar membuat kimia, apakah anda bisa menjadi guru saya, untuk membuat KOH sendiri di rumah, dari abu kayu tanaman, ada hal yg kurang saya mengerti apakah anda dapat membantu saya, setelah di panaskan air larutan dari abu kayu, kemudian di beri etanol, dan begaimana cara mengkristal KOH, tersebut, saya ingin belajar, saya pemula, teman. Terima kasih.
?dont you know there way more potassium in the trees leaves? Just mix those with banana peels and collect that ash. Way less ash and the amount of potassium is about 100x higher.
I can't start fires where I am at but can access ash. Instead of boiling, would placing in a fridge start a crystalization process? Could we then extract the crystals as they should only contain the solubles/salts?
Perhaps look into how traditional soap makers did the extraction of salts from ash. Filter with coffee filters. Set the polymer container with the liquid inside of a pressure cooker and pull a vacuum to dehydrate. Just a middle of the night idea, not tested.
Just some thoughts about efficiency. You could use one fire to the make the wood ash and boil off the water. You could save the water by distilling the water vapor. Integrating those three processes into a single unit could look real cool. Then you could put it on wheels and take it to he fuel source.
The process is interesting, but should be done with bigger amounts of ash. To make the process more efficient, better let the water evaporate in flat bowls by the sun. It's insane waste of energy to boil down so much water for so little product in the end.
I loved your video! I was trying to find a way to get potassium for cheap. Do you know a way to extract potassium from NPK 16-16-16 fertilizers, or is it not practical
My wood ash has black specs of what i assume is carbon. How would i remove it? I want to try keeping all the impurities. Just starting chemistry:) thx!
When making potash liquid by running water through ashes you get potassium hydroxide and potassium carbonate. My question is that when you start concentrating it, which will stay in solution and which will settle out? Also at what concentration will what ever is settling begin to contain both so that i know when to stop concentrating. So far when i did this the liquid is yellow so i assume that is the hydroxide with the crystals being the carbonate. Ive gotten the liquid up to 30% dissolved solids but dont know at what point to stop when separation is complete, any info is welcomed.
I could be wrong, but when you saw that the carbon clumped together, it could have polymerized with other impurities from the wood, or from you handling the wood. When the concentration of KOH was high enough that could have triggered the carbon to polymerize with the slight bit of contaminates and clump together. Then again I could be wrong.
I think you definitely lost some hydroxide by boiling and reboiling and dissolving because the hydroxide is gonna burn into carbonate by absorbing CO2 passively from the air...and the process looked lengthy so who knows how much got converted
I was able to make a small test batch of biodiesel using the unrefined substance left over from boiling off the water after percolating through hardwood ashes. It does seem odd that there is only a small percentage of KOH. Maybe you didn't use hardwoods?
That definitely seems like a lot of work for such small yield. I burn wood but mostly just oak. Not sure that's the best for this reaction. If I was gonna do this I believe I'd reuse the same water filtering it off through a shirt or something until I thought it was saturated enough to bother with. Then I'd probably filter it multiple times through coffee filters. Then boil it down. I'd also probably just use water multiple times instead of ethenol partly because pure ethenol isn't easy to come by
8:58 Very likely calcium hydroxide and un-decomposed potassium nitrate. Calcium hydroxide is slightly soluble in water, so it makes sense that it could've dissolved in the original solution but have filtered out later. Also it's likely, just by the law of averages, the some potassium nitrate would be left over. Maybe do a burn test?
Can you describe your method for doing so? I am reading that heating the potassium carbonate to that temperature causes the potassium oxide to ignite when released. I know potassium hydroxide can be made by mixing potassium carbonate and calcium hydroxide, but would love to skip needing to make calcium hydroxide, i.e. making potassium oxide and hydrating it.
I have thought about it but instead of using wood ash I would use bananas. That is not a joke, one of my longtime projects has been to extract pure potassium metal from bananas. Though potatoes have more potassium than bananas maybe I will try that to.
One problem I have encountered with burning dried banana peels. They act like a military grade smoke bomb and they also don't turn into an ash, its more like a gunk.
I have had the idea of burning banana peels for this exact purpose at the back of my head for a long while now. It would definitely make more sense as the concentration of potassium in banana peels is much higher than in wood. The only problem is burning them. They don't combust, so to reduce them to ash, you'd have to constantly expose them to heat source. I don't want to waste a ton of propane on it.
Can KOH be crystallized out of solution? If so, you can make a super saturated solution of KOH, put a rough rock in the container, and the water will climb to the rock by capillary action, evaporate, leave some KOH crystals, and the process repeats until there is no more water in the container.
The salt that was dissolved in the original solution but not dissolved again after boiling the solution might be calcium sulfate. You know, if you form calcium sulfate in the medium, there is a chance that it might not precipitate. Although calcium sulfate is insoluble in water, you might have formed it from other calcium salts and other sulfate salts from the ash in the first step which is dissolving everything you can. After solidifying the salt, calcium sulfate can't dissolve anymore.
what is the decomp temp of K2CO3? can it be turned into K2O by roasting then into KOH by adding H2O? if it wont decomp in burning conditions (as in burning wood), how is K2O formed? wont KNO3 just decomp into KNO2 instead of all the way to K2O? also, does charcoal ash contain as much K as woodash?
K2CO3 decomposes around 900 C My understanding is the problem is K2O burns in fire at that temperature as well. I believe that is why he recovered so little potassium hydroxide. If you find out how to prevent the destruction of the potassium oxide when decarbonizing the potassium carbonate I would love to know.
I have 500g of a dietary NaCl salt substitute that is food grade and on the box it said 100% potassium chloride. With a scintillator type rate meter it is hard to detect an increase from back ground levels until the counter is placed right up to the plastic container. With a detector that is more sensitive to beta radiation it would show up better. Natural potassium has very little of the radioactive isotope 40K, about 1 in 10'000 the rest are stable isotopes.
@@KallePihlajasaari Thanks. I have a GMC 500+ Geiger Counter and have tried using on banana chips to see if I could measure above background, and got nothing. I want to try using salts you are have done, thanks for the info.
