It's time to make the methyl ester of cubane. But can we reach the finish line with any product left at all? Merch: explosionsandfire.shop/ Subreddit: / explosionsandfire Join the Discord!! / discord Patreon: / explosionsandfire
@@huszaratraktor Because it rotates at very high speeds and if it is not balanced and in good condition it can self destruct with explosively result.... (also a civilian but did spend some time assisting my brother in the lab and he explained the many dangers...)
@@huszaratraktorit turns out that things spinning at very high speed produces very high forces which, if suddenly unbalanced in some way, can tear the machine apart
As a synthetic organic chemist who's been doing thermal-promoted cycloadditions, I have learned the ways of tar. Seeing you scrape the tar at the bottom to try get some more yield out is such a mood.
hope this doesn’t come off as a backhanded complement - i wanted to say that part of the reason i really like watching your chemistry videos is because they feel so much more relatable than other youtube chemistry channels where everything goes right the first time and such. it makes chemistry feel like something i could actually do if i put my mind to it and put a lot of work in like you do. channels like nile red feel almost too much like magic and i can’t even see myself really ever being able to do the things he does, but your whole setup feel so much more natural to me. thanks for making chemistry feel more accessible! you’re the best
This is the most realistic presentation of what it’s like to do chemistry at the graduate student level. It’s just all fucked but you keep going for a really long time and hope you’ll get something decent at the end of it.
All during this series I aged: my life situation is different, I have a lab now, started college, i still make negative money, and i’ve had a girlfriend for two years. I’m gonna miss this series. Don’t cry because it’s over, cry because it happened.
Other youtubers may have been the first to obtaine cubane technically, but your cubane is first and foremost in our hearts. The dedication, the sheer force of will displayed over the many years is unmatched and it is nice to see the chemistry gods finally allow you to reach the level of ultimate at home chemist : Cubane Creator This was a beautiful journey to witness, keep up the important work mate
I'm kinda sad we're at the end of this series. I've enjoyed watching each new iteration as they'd come out. I've learned a lot. Looking forward to the wrap up video. Thanks for all the great content. :)
I’ve enjoyed making a long series like this a lot! Especially one with such a clear goal, which we finally achieved after 3 years, in pretty much exactly the way we planned from the beginning. Good fun!
🎉🎉🎉 congrats on extracting the cube. Here's an idea: why don't you try some of the extracts from your old attempts (pre-benzophenone) and see if they have cubane in them. Perhaps you had Chemiolis beat the whole time, just didn't realize it. @ExtractionsAndIre
FYI Tom, centrifuges almost always have a manual lid release so you can open them if the power goes out or the centrifuge malfunctions. It's often a string on the bottom you pull to open the latch, but I've seen other types e.g. for our eppendorf microfuge you have to remove a plastic cover and turn the latch with a hex key. It would be worth finding out how it works on yours...
Step 1: clear out the animals from the shed, step 2: begin purification, step 3: clear out the spiders from the shed, step 4: begin reflux, step 5: check on the baby birds in the shed…
I got two metals more expensive than gold recently! Will do some chemistry with them soon. But unsure if they will have good value in the post-apocalypse? As they don't look as cool as gold?
One thing that impresses me about this whole cubane synthesis series is that you stuck with it. Literal years of attempts finally came together. Congratulations!
Ideally your vacuum source is near your cold water inlet so the vapors have to travel up next to the cold finger. Probably contributed to a loss of yield
Tip! I recommend using an electric engraver, with its tungsten tip, you hold it like a pencil and it cuts borosilicate glassware like a laser, no chipping, and no shattering! 123 and modification a go!
Australians having to celebrate Christmas in the middle of summer sounds like a raw deal if you ask me. I move that the southern hemisphere gets to celebrate Christmas in June.
Christmas in the middle of summer is so good. A super long day, sunshine for all of it, you just sit around outside in the shade and eat food.. fantastic
@@ExtractionsAndIre ever since I moved to the Midwest from the perpetual oven that is Texas, I get a little sad when there's no snow on Christmas morning. I needs it
@@beefgoat80 Last year we had 6ft of snow and it was like -30C (-22F) this year it almost felt like spring. In the positives with no snow, it was really quite nice. (I live in Canada)
I can't believe we've finally made it to the end. It feels like we've always had cubane on the brain and now it's going to be over. What will we even do now?
BRO IS ONE OF THE MOST ENTERTAINING PHYSICIST/ CHEMIST IVE EVER SEEN. THE VIDEOS ARE EDUCATIONAL AND ENTERTAINING. PLEASE CONTINUE THE GREAT WORK. LOVE FROM AMERICA. 👏🏻👏🏻👏🏻👏🏻👏🏻👏🏻👏🏻👏🏻🔥🔥🔥🔥🔥🔥🔥
8:57 Easiest way to get methanol: Go to the local hobby shop and buy a gallon of RC fuel. Ideally, you'll buy FAI fuel, which is 80% methanol and 20% castor oil. Distill the methanol from the fuel and there ya go. If you can't find FAI fuel, any brew of glow fuel will work, but they'll have synthetic oils, nitromethane, anti-foaming agents in them as well. FAI fuel is, by the rules of a governing body for competition with certain model aircraft, ONLY methanol and castor oil. You may also be able to bip down to a speed shop and just buy straight methanol. A lot of guys flying/driving/sailing glow powered RCs will do this alongside buying their own nitro and castor to mix up their own fuels. I know that's the case here in America, may also be viable Down Under? Not sure. The hobby shop route is the most reliable and universal route to getting methanol outside of a chemical supply house. Not a 'hardware store', per se, but it's close enough. Fits the spirit of things anyawy.
The yellow bottles of heet which are sold as water removers are 100% methanol idk if they have them in Australia but that's always my methanol source when I need a bit it's like $2-3 for 12 ounces which if you need a lot probably isn't as cheap as buying in bulk online but I only usually need like 24-36 ounces and since it's sold at Walmart and pretty much anywhere that has an auto parts section including home Depot/ace hardware I can get it and be home in like 5 minutes Edit: I just saw he mentioned it in the video already lol
That is the hardest and most expensive way to get methanol. Find your local drag strip, They'll sell you pails, drums, or even fill an approved can. I've been using water/methanol injection in my cars since 2005.
@@garrettmancuso4417 Drag strips are not as reliable as grabbing a jug of FAI fuel from a hobby shop. Not every country has the racing scene America does. And, hell, I live in Nashville and I can't even do that. Model aircraft and the hobby shops supporting them are much more ubiquitous than drag racing. I also happen to do the RC thing anyway so I literally have like 6-7 gallons of model engine fuel just lying about as it is.
From the pool to tar to less tar to even more tar to cube. What a journey! Watching the evolution of Tom as a scientist alongside the cube is very inspiring. Long live the cube!
Always awesome to see the CUBE project progress. As a microbiologist seeing someone spin a Eppendorf tube (at 4:45) not with the hinge out, just hurts my soul on a deep level
@@defenestrated23I do a lot of nuclei isolations. I use a similar centrifuge. As it is a fixed rotor (as opposed to swinging bucket), I always place the hinge facing out so I know where my nuclei pellet is. I then aspirate from the opposite side so I don’t suck up all my hard work
@@happycamper4thewin is more a question of habit; i am a molecular biologist and i don't really care where i put the hinge as long as the pellet is visible; when is not visible will add some inert stuff to see the pellet. I usually do this for microRNA extraction with glycogen (molecular biolology grade of course). We all have our OCD habits in the lab; trust me, molecular biology being something between science and magic we have many superstitions.
@@Robocop-qe7le lol, yep! I am a molecular biologist and I have mild to moderate OCD. I have my routines and do things “my way” but I think having OCD works to my benefit in the lab. I am just a sucker for routine and consistency 🤷🏻♀️
Column chromatography is the standard method of purification because it’s fast and requires little thought-good when you need to purify 3 reactions a day. Older methods of purification take careful planning and skilled execution-much cooler to see on RU-vid! Great work, impressive to do some pretty sensitive chemistry from the hardware store.
The ethyl acetate is something one can synthesize from just hard ware store chemicals. I was able to make some with just acetic acid from vinegar, baking soda, and sodium bisulfate. Then one just reacts that with high purity ethanol, which can be purchased from liquor stores as ever clear, at least in America.
I've loved this series and it's great to see it come to a victorious conclusion! Chemistry is sort of black magic to me, and your honest, somewhat bumbling, and "behind the scenes" approach to me makes it a lot more humanized. And very entertaining! It's comforting to know, as I bang my head against my hacked-together simulations violating conservation of energy for the umpteenth time, that other professional and very smart scientists are experiencing the same thing in their own field. I love the pan up at 10:48. Really emphasizes exactly where all those toxic methanol vapors are ending up.
so proud you managed to make it to the end of this project its been amazing , iv watched every episode as it came out , yes the yield wasn't astounding , yes it was yellow and had every intention of just up n vanishing by wind but all in all was amazing to watch and learn about and thank for sticking with it dude and teaching me along the way , what a frickin cool molecule
Thank you for this entire series. I’ve never had such fun. You took over from my other life at age ten. I now do this exact same thing as you but with OS design. Which is NOT a diss ! Just keep doing what you do, and so will I :)
Watching these videos and imagining that it's actually a goblin doing the chemistry is hilarious. I see it as you having captured this little green fella, make the parts of the video where you show your face, then just put some weird flesh coloured suit on the goblin with a gopro and tell it to go ham
COLDFINGER - it's the glass with the icy touch. Also, at 21:05, someone let Tom loose with power tools again. Seriously though, good work dude, you got there!
Holy shit 3 years in the making 😮 i remember the start of this series when I was writing up my PhD, since then I've been made redundant from one job and been in another for like 18 months 🤣😅
What I've learned from this actually seems like a good lesson if it ends up being correct: When extracting and isolating, getting a thick tar is a sign you're going to be foaming at the mouth down the line at the seemingly-limitless amounts of cleanings and extractions you have done and need to continue doing. Fun series, glad you got SOME sort of crystal from it.
Hey have you ever considered making dichlorotetrazine? I think you'd like it; the process is kind of insane in a cool way (basically you need guanidine, hydrazine, acetylacetone, chlorine gas and maybe some isoamyl nitrite). The final step is a really neat sublimation where you get this pretty orange/red powder out at the end. It's nice, And the NMR is spectacular (carbon NMR anyway ;) ). I mean, red organic shit and not a proton in sight haha
Started watching this series because I had never heard of cubane, and hardware store chemistry is right up my alley. Still don't know what cubane is, but I know what it looks like now, "tar like." Thanks for the adventure mate, it's been a ride to watch
I have a question. I've been thrilled by this series from episode 1. You just kept spewing out episodes one by one with no pause inbetween and without ever letting the product of your previous episode decay or forgetting what you were doing. How did you manage to keep this neckbreaking and consistent pace?
Cubane episode 18. It's about time E&F admits his on again off again fiery relationship is from love not hate. Don't hide from your feelings for cubane. ❤
As social beings, we're all supposed to react to a situation the same way. When one doesn't, it strikes fear in the hearts of those who follow the crowd. They don't know what to expect from that person, they aren't behaving “normal”. Maybe they're a psychopath, or maybe they're so removed from the dualistic illusion that it doesn't affect them like it “should”. Since most people can't tell the difference between enlightenment and mental illness, it gets pretty scary. Uncertainty is terrifying, until it's not.
Hmm, considering the tiny size and general innocent look of that teensy-weensy spider; anywhere else in the world it's probably called something cute and harmless like a Money Spider or something like that. But knowing this is Australia, where literally EVERYTHING is trying every day to make you die horribly, it's probably called something like the Eight-Fanged Venomous Bastard Spider and if it even LOOKS at you too hard it'll immediately make your bollocks explode or something equally terrible 🤔
Did you really open with "has all been quite reasonable"? I'm concerned for your mental health if after all this you still think any of it was "quite reasonable".
Congrats, Tom! I consider the pandemic officially over now that this series is done. You've been entertaining me with this for three years. Thanks for the fun.
the "its been sitting here for a couple days" followed by the "what could i do" as i look at the most breakingbad looking lab setup proves that Tom is just anti-Nile. They both do the same level of crazy shit, but one of them gets a 99.9995% extraction rate, while the other gets a 10.9995% extraction rate ... but its still cool. The amount you get is just to flex, doing it in the first place is what people watch for.
In Canada you can buy methanol pretty easily as its sold under the name "methyl hydrate" It's sold in similar tins to what you would buy kerosene in. However a number of other chemicals that you use that are just available at your hardware store are just not available in Canada right now. So country to country hardware store chemistry vastly changes
The journey! Like a train ride from Moscow to Minsk. Long and unforgettable! As I watch more of your videos, I am picking up "lab craft" from you. I do simple distillations for essential oils (absolutely not a chemist) and I pick up little tricks you do with funnels (like laying them inside a beaker and filtering stuff). So if you are ever lost for a topic, perhaps a best of good lab craft, and worst of too....for us novices! Or do nothing. That's typically what I do when people tell me stuff. Thanks for the vids!
