Using Fractional Distillation for Purification of Hydrobromic acid 

While chemistry is very interesting to me, I have no applications for 99.99% of your videos. However, I always watch them to completion, and have been a huge fan for years. Your attention to detail, foresight, safety warnings, and concise explanations make your channel one of the best on RU-vid. I'm sure there are people who take away valuable information from your uploads - especially the little tips such as which opening of the adapter to put the column vs. the funnel on - and I really appreciate you taking the time to help them, and entertain me simultaneously. Don't get me wrong, you have taught me much, but unfortunately I've probably forgot most of it because I'm never using it, being a computer technician with an internet addiction. Truly though, knowledge is power, and the more people interested in STEM fields, the better we'll be as a species... and frankly, we need to start doing much better, very soon, to continue to thrive on this planet. So, thank you again, keep up the excellent work, and maybe think about creating some super-newbie videos, for people with only a year of chem in high school. :)

I'm actually doing most of this in my organic 1 lab right now, but without this amazing in-depth explanation of it all. Thanks for boosting my grade!

Love the new format. With the longer vids you have the time to go into greater detail of the "why, how" of the particular experiment. Thus giving a better understanding for us non chemist types. Thanks, keep up the great work. Looking forward to the vid about distillation under different pressures.

Man, I don't know much about chemistry or physics, but I enjoy watching your videos. I love the fact that you're very informative. Maybe I'll be as smart and kind as you in the next life.

Don't really know any chemistry(my school was garbage) yet I watch all your videos and love them, even the "boring" ones because the subject is so incredibly fascinating.

Well that was incredibly long and boring, but necessary to complete this video. I'll see if I can do something quick and fun like a pyrophoric substance or something for the next experiment.

I watched this 7 years ago, found it interesting and enjoyed it but didn't really understand much of it. Now I just rewatched it and everything is familiar. I feel like a different person since then. Thanks.

Home run, Nurdrage! Now I understand fractional distillation....

always a pleasure watching your videos, real science is not done enough on youtube(for reasons you have covered in the past)

Instruction Clear. Successfully purified hydrophobic acid at home. Thank you.

Thank you! One of the most interesting and informative videos yet.

thank you so much. I knew of azotropes before but didn't understand WHY they were. I think I got a handle on it now. once again you have explained fundamentals that for whatever reason never sunk in before. you are there best!

I really love your videos! If I only had them when I graduated!! keep uploading!

Really informative video. I learned a lot, thanks NurdRage! Earned my donation 😁

Great video and good explanation of the azeotropes. One correction, though. The Vigreux column is pronounced as bordeaux (bordo) with an accent on the last syllable. It is named after a French glassblower/flameworker with admirable moustaches who made it.

I remember learning the very issue discussed at around 4:55 "getting rid of water by just boiling it" when distilling ethanol from freshly fermented sugar. Yes, they have very different boiling points but it still took a second and then a third distillation to get really pure ethanol (for our very "dry" martini)

As always, another interesting and educational video. Thanks, NurdRage!

Distill our HBr and HI acids under reduced pressure and under yellow light. Make as needed and use immediatly, if you must store them for any time purge the bottle with nitrogen or argon and in a fridge. ❤

y'know, good Dr, you could easily make a series on this subject alone. Lab Safety is all the more important to the novice.

as a (probably fellow) chemical engineer I sOlute you! very well done!

Thank you for explaining why the hydrobromic acid turns orange, I was very confused when mine got an orange tint.

This is a great concept that you're teaching in this video about boiling points I learned this while distilling grain alcohol LOL the still drives you more than anything the.. it's really bizarre how the temperature will rise as it's needed to rise to a certain degree before you have to push it a little

Never thought of the "residue" in the boiling vessel as what was to be purified. Learned something new!

this is exactly what i needed, i'm going to use this to create glacial acetic acid for use with zirconium oxide to make my own super high temp crucibles.

"And your sanity if you still have it." Lol epic. Let's all be honest. Most of us don't have to worry about that one

As amazing as gold - every question in my mind have been answered in one video

Close loop the system. PID the heat with the input from the fractional outout. Microcontrollers are cheap and easy to use.

I'll be looking forward to the breaking azeotrope video! Sounds really interesting!

Thanks for the time you put into this video.

You are amazing 👨‍🏫 lecturer

That fractional distillation column looks like a tool useful in Colorado.

I would be most interested in a series on glassware and tools used in chemistry, as well as some theory, such as explaining scavengers, etc.

That was seriously enlightening.

3:43 -- Water might also be boiling at 99 degrees C instead of 100 degrees because the altitude of your house is above sea level.

What people forget when they say to just heat it up to the boiling point of water is that the temperature of any solution is an average. Some parts will be hotter than others, and so will evaporate first. When you get solutions of compounds that are close in their boiling points, it's totally possible for some molecules of the compound with a lower b.p. to be in a hot zone while some molecules of the compound with the higher b.p. to be in a cool zone. If the b.p.'s are close enough and the difference between hot and cold zones are big enough, this could mean that the lower b.p. molecules actually evaporate before the higher b.p. ones. TL;DR temperature is an average, which mean there will be outliers that don't act as expected.

Vigreux is pronounced "Vigrew". :P

That's one sick bong dude.

One illustration to see why just boiling off water is wrong is the mixture of water and antifreeze in your car's radiator, where the water doesn't just merely boil off at the temperature of water, 100 degrees C, which car engines easily reach.

You could have talked about pressure-swing distillation specifically for breaking azeotropes that are pressure dependent. Perhaps even do a potential future video of the process by carrying it out if you have the proper equipment - that I would love to see! Great video though :)

that would be the best bong tube ever

The title blew my brains up, why am i subbed here when i have no clue what im watching :D i guess i just like to see stuff react with other stuff :D

I am glad I am a subscriber as I always learn from you and your videos.. Thank you

wheres the beer man. we come here 4 the beer.

What's the benefit of longer fractional column length ?

I think you could try to remove the trace amounts of bromine by bubbling ethylene through it. Of course you would need to make the ethylene first, but that should not be hard and would make a cool video. Or alternatively you could use vegetable oil and a lot of stirring. The fatty acids in vegetable oils are unsaturated, so they can scavenge bromine quite well.

How do you get such accurate CC-subtitles in your videos.... even with such scientific terms. It even got Vigreux right without you saying it right. Is it just the way the voice sounds works better with googles Speech detection algorithm ?

Fantastic Video!

Very well explained, thank you!

What are the benefits of shorter or longer Vigreux Distilling Column?? Thanks

what is the name of that black thing reading the temperature? is it connected to a thermometer or is it just its own thing? id really love one of those! please tell me what u can about it.

could you please make a Video in all of your glassware and other equipments? :)

What temperature should you boil the flask at? Are you boiling the flask at around the boiling point of the fraction you expect (like 100 C for water) or are you ALWAYS boiling at way above the boiling points of all the substances in the liquid?

Hello! Your Chanel is amazing! Could you tell me were buy this 2:01 equitment? Labbox,pyrex

How does phosphorus bind to the bromine? And would you filter the solution and then run distillation? Doesnt sound right to be heating up phosphorus like that

Well done.

If you were to remove copper what would your concentration be? Also is 58% as high as you can go?

I feel bad I can't support nurdrage , I love his videos but don't make enough to support him at the moment :(

Hello fellow Nerd! I'm quite curious about your thermometer! Where did you get it and what model is it? Currently I have a glass thermometer well adapter, that I've filled with mercury to better heat transfer to an temp probe that is read by an Arduino board.

What are the signs that you are "flooding the vigreux column? Thanks

Thanks for the information

In my chemistry class, we are going over things like standard deviation and significant figures. Are these things important in your work? Do you use them often? Thanks.

It would've been nice if you included the P-T diagrams to explain fractional distillation and azeatropes (extremum in diagram).

What brand of temperature probe do you use and where can I buy one?

hi guys, i have an easy question, how did you connect a type K probe to your 3-way destillation adapter? what did you use? i want to use high accuracy temperature electronic thingy (you can get it on ebay...with arduino (it's 1-wire protocol) i don't need high accuracy but i like good and cheap setup if you used testtube or so, how you made sure the thermal-contact was correct? i'm from germany so any idea where to get it? i know you germans are reading this :)

[insert generic moronic comment here]

hey great vid NurdRage, could you provide some examples of the literature you reference? I'm an orgo student but my textbook gives little reference to known measures. Google is great for a quick question but I would like to pour over some experimentally verified material. keep up the great work!

What book/books should I get that give properties of chemicals?

yeah..it is quite right what you said about boiling points and the attempt to separate liquid mixtures, and this is what I find quite irritating about people around here, they try and use REASON to set up an experiment like a fractional distillation based on what they THINK is right....rather than actually taking a sincere interest and reading up about it...and most everyone should know this, it is after all taught in school, and with that little bit of fore knowledge, it should be enough to make these fools realize that they are going to NEED to check up rather than relying on their intuition which almost always turns out to be utterly and hopelessly WRONG.

Next project (heh, heh!): Upgrade this process to an industrial scale. Add taps on the column to exract various constituents. Of course, calculate all flow rates, and the required energy input. This is the topic of a class I took, "Stagewise Equilibrium Processes" ......the chemical engineering class from HELL!!

you are the coolest nerd, rage on.

120 celcius, 20cm wire iron 28 guage, 1 volt.

is this similar to the function of a tower still used to make vodka?

Would a soxhlet extractor work for this experiment?

Awesome video. I want to use distillation to purify organic liquids from plant extract. I just want to remove the impurities that can't be filtered off rather than separating the liquids from each other. I think i should use regular distillation, but my main concern is the thick oils condensing in the condenser and blocking it up rather than condensing in the actual condensation flask. Is this an actual concern? Last time i actually used these apparatus was 1st year chemistry at uni, and was using a simple solution. Edit: Another concern is the temperature to use, the least volatile fractions evap at around 270 celcius, and the most volatile at around 70. If i do it all at once, will the high temperature damage the more volatile substances? Or will they just condense first? Thanks for any help.

i have no idea what you're saying BUT i stay intrested lol xD

if learning mass information is boring than yes that was very boring. ..thanks always

Nice vid.Thumbs up!

The appeal of your videos has a lot to do with home chemist trying to learn something. The glassware is impressive, but some kind of homemade rig made of commonly available materials would be nice also.

But NurdRage, Didn't you already purify hydrobromic acid in your Make Hydrobromic Acid video?

So that's what 'azeotrope' means. Cool!

How long is that fractionating column?

Is a fractionating column the same as a reflux column?

Can you use this to obtain higher percentages of hydrogen peroxide from store bought stuff? I think its generally around 3 to 5 percent.

So with boiling mixes it is simular to freezing mixes: You can't just put a Water/Ethanol mix in the freezer so the water freezes solit and you can take it out of the liquid ethanol. What actually happens is that the freezing point as a whole goes down.

Now I know how to get toluene from paint thinner.

Very nice

I know some of these words !Like 'for' and 'of' !

where does the 'bowl' go?

Loved the vid, but it could be a bit more user friendly. I'd love to see the names/formulas and numbers on screen because I don't always understand what you're saying and I definitely can't remember large numbers.

Nurdrage/// You know, actually, I really should send you some money on patreon, paypal. simply because I have watched you for years, and I havnt paid anything, and I benifit. so yes, in the next couple days I will send you something . Thank you, I like what are posting, ... Joseph Henry , Boise , Idaho

looks like a huge bong

What size column do you use?

how long is your column?

That's a K-type thermocouple. It's only going to be accurate to +/-2C anyway.

can you show us how to disolve a human in an acid substance?

This is very similar to how crude oil is distilled.

iirc Vigreux was a French dude, so it should be pronounced "vee-grow" or something like that.

His speech pattern and accent sound like Norm from the Tested RU-vid channel.

Can't you try to separe azeotropic mixture by freezing it? Just curiosu to know wheter this is possible

Can you see what happens if you put sodium acetate into liquid nitrogen? I would want to see that!