One thing to note. You shouldn't melt car battery lead with any other sort of lead. This is because car battery lead often has calcium in it to improve the electrical properties. Other leads often have antimony and even arsenic in them. When melted with lead containing calcium these will form intermetallic compounds of calcium antimonide and calcium arsenide which form as a dross that floats to the surface of the melt looking like dust. These when exposed to air form the toxic, flammable and likely carcinogenic gases stibnide and arsenide respectively. Because they are heavier than air they will concentrate/pool in low areas. Which could be deadly.
lead is a very soft metal and Ca or Sb (antimony) is added to make it hard. Unless your battery is about 100 year old, there is little chance it will have arsenic. Modern batteries use only Ca and some older batteries may use Sb. The dross is usually oxidation product containing mostly lead oxide (PbO) but other metals can also be there. Remember than lead is cumulative poison. But the dross will not catch fire.
12:14 Excellent presentation! You may want to use Scotch Brite instead of steel wool. Steel wool is notorious for contaminating what is scrubbed by it.
If you don't have a power supply, a small DC to DC buck( with cc cv) converter connected to a battery with small volt/amp combo meter can be obtained for $20 or much less, add a 12 v wall plug, capable of about 2amps. Will allow you do do about anything you need to do. That is safe anyway, and a boost converter can be used also for up to around 60 volts DC! Just Incase someone didn't already know this! Have an awesome day!
Be careful when you pour hot metal over concrete, the moisture trapped in it will vapourize and explode in a barrage of little chunks of rock. You can also make more complex and better electrodes by moulding in "greensand" (damp clay and sand mixture) Or in plaster of paris (gypsum) for very fine casts.
Re: the "pouring on concrete" part, you'd be correct for high-melt-point metals, but for lead, unless you're talking about pouring (and spilling...) crazy-large amounts, it's EXTREMELY unlikely to cause any problem - the melt point for lead is just too low to be hazardous that way. Biggest threat from this project would be inhaling the lead fumes if you overheat it during the melt, and the possiblity of absorption through the skin if you don't glove up while handling it. (You dont want to inhale the filing/sanding/shaping dust, either)
I had tried to make a PbO2 electrode with similar method for perchlorate cell but it didn't work. The electrode started to dissolve even though there was coating. I would love to know how to do it better and if your electrode will survive the chlorate cell conditions.
In order to do an electrolysis with gold you would first need to dissolve the alloy in Aqua Regia. But then it is easy to recover the pure gold by precipitating it with sodium metabisulfite, then melt it. No electrolysis needed. Watch my tutorial: ruclips.net/video/NMzDeBDQUHc/видео.html
@BlueMoonshine parrafin is combustible at lead's melting temperature. Only do this outdoors. Still, it pulls impurities in the lead into the slag, and allows for alloys to form more readily. It's all dependent on temperature and you can find references. I learned about paraffin specifically because I do a lot of airgunning and black powder guns, and you need to have either pure lead or special lead alloys, depending on the type of gun. Cheers!
Sure, you can recover it. You may want to distill it, which will concentrate it to 98% at the same time, but you have to use a temperature up to 337°C.
if you use a high current density, the lead dioxide will not stick to the electrode and fall to the bottom as a powder. you need to increase the voltage till you see little bit of oxygen evolution.
never heat a teflon lined pan (if that's what it is), past 200C , or you will release fumes that will poison you PS- If you drill lots of small holes through the anode before you oxidize it, you can get much more usable surface area
10:45 When you dilute 93% sulfuric acid to 30%, I think you should not change 50ml of starting material to FIVE times the volume but rather to THREE times the volume. I think you messed yourself up and made only 18.6% solution instead of 30%. However, I don't know if such a massive error has any meaning in this lead oxidation. However, it is worth noting that you put quite a lot of weight on calculations based on tables, so this gives the impression of a dilution that requires high precision. We learned at least one thing from this: If I need at all some complex calculations and tables to do a simple thing, I NEED TO CHECK IT BEFORE start implementing process. And check it with SOME COMPLETELY DIFFERENT METHOD. Now, for example, I could make an indicative check by drawing two things on paper - btw: I'll round 93% to exactly 90 for clarity: 1) "my desired goal: 90 --> 30 = 3 --> 1" Right? 2) "I'm going to do: 50 + 200 = 1 --> 5" Right? Now I should ask myself: "Have I made a mistake if the analysis is 3 --> 1 but the synthesis is 1 --> 5" The above check can therefore be changed into a VISUALIZE check method by drawing it as clear areas (rectangles) on paper, in which case the check is based on a visual comparison instead of just doing what you have got as an idea in your head :) Try it :)
My calculation is correct. In order to lower the concentration from 93% down to 30%, I rigorously derived that the volume of water to add should be exactly 3.82 times the initial volume of acid. The exact calculation is only given for reference for people who want to understand. Then I said that I am approximating 3.82 as 4. Now if you add 4 times the volume of water to your initial volume of acid, you end up we with a volume that is 5 times the initial one (4 x 50 + 50 = 250), which is precisely what I did.
@@BlueMoonshine First, for the sake of clarity, I will round my example from 93% to exactly 90% and there is still 50 ml of solution. ALRIGHT? Then I add twice the amount (100 ml) of water to 50 ml of acid, making a total of 150 ml of solution. That is, I dilute the original 90% to 1/3 (to 30%) by increasing the amount of liquid 3 times - not 5 times, but 3 times. Right? Which is true and which is false: A) 90%/3=30% B) 90%/5=30%
@@MR-ub6sq No, this is wrong! You need to take into account the definition of the concentration. Concentration is not a ratio of volumes, it is the ratio of masses. A sulfuric acid molecule doesn't not have the same mass as a water molecule. This is clearly explained at 8'35'', please review it!
Because at the cathode, among the possible reactions, it is the one that has the highest reduction potential that takes place, namely water is reduced into hydrogen gas and OH- ions. The copper doesn't dissolve. At the anode, among the possible reactions, it is the one that has the lowest reduction potential (highest oxidation potential) that takes place, namely the reaction where the oxygen from the SO4-- ion is oxidized, therefore turning the Pb into PbO2.
this will not stand high concentration of Cl ions. What we want is a high overpotential for oxygen evolution. That means chloride should be oxidized and oxygen should not be produced. But this electrode will be attacked by Cl ions very easily. You can use this electrode to make persulfate by electrolysis provided you do not have Cl ions at all.
Good, but it is probably impossible to use more than some minute in REAL PbO2 application like perchlorate solution because the brine will infiltrate until your Lead metal and oxidize it until it is totally non-conductor. It is just fun, but almost non-effective (or only for a short amount of time) in real anode application. Even in H2 production it will be destroyed in some hours I suppose. we are using titanium substrate for high voltage anode application.
I'm not claiming it is for industrial production, but it does a decent job at low cost for amateur experiments, such as in this application: ruclips.net/video/l9ifS3ubiBc/видео.html
.... rather disappointing, so no matter what you'll need some sulfuric acid... I started by watching the sulfuric acid from epson salt video, figured out i would need a lead dioxide electrode, but in order to make the electrode, you need sulfuric acid to start out with! blah....
Simply start by making sulfuric acid by using a standard lead electrode. It will work, it will simply decompose a little bit in the solution, adding some pollution, but you can filter it out. Then with the acid you can make a lead dioxide electrode.
Sulfuric acid will blind instantly if it gets in the eyes. Especially when concentrated. Anybody dealing with it really needs to wear chemical goggles, not just dust goggles. Isn't lead dioxide EXTREMELY poisonous? Maybe should have mentioned that. Lead vapors from heating, and lead dust In the steel wool/file aren't good for us either.
Lead is not poisonous through skin, and requires a much higher temperature (1750°C) to turn into vapor. Don't make an inhalation of the lead dust and you'll be perfectly fine.
And yet it didn't pose any problem in those times, as well as riding a bike without a helmet and without knee protections, or drinking water directly out of the faucet... The human species has become very weak lately.
@@BlueMoonshine That's objectively misinformation. You can just do a quick google search and find tons of evidence of the long-term neurological effects of consuming lead in almost all forms.
Just hold your breath. Now if you do it everyday, then wear a face mask and possibly a respirator, but if you do it only once in your life, holding your breath is enough.
The vapour pressure of molten lead is ridiculously low. My father cast bullets all the time. Born in the late 40s, lead soldiers, lead paint, leaded gasoline, lead pipes, the works. He even used to as a young boy regularly help his grandfather by mixing boiled linseed oil with powdered red lead to make paint. With his arm! Regularly had blood tests for lead in later life. They always came back as extremely low. The way lead metal or insoluble oxides get into you system is eating it or inhaling a dust or fume. Just melting lead like that in a pot ain't gunna do it. An air blast in say cuppelation might. Smelting might. But that's why chimneys exist. Sure if you live next to a cuppelation furnace or smelter there's probably going to be enough dust blowing around to make you deathly ill. But you don't. You can definitely eat it on accident though if you don't wash your hands afterwards. Even just handling the metal. You can actually see it on your hands it's so sort...
When I was young, in the early 1980's, it was common for kids to play pellet riffles. As everybody did, I used to hold the lead pellets in my mouth in order to avoid losing some in pockets with holes. As probably everybody, I accidentally chewed some of them and probably swallowed a few... We all survived!
One thing to note. You shouldn't melt car battery lead with any other sort of lead. This is because car battery lead often has calcium in it to improve the electrical properties.
Other leads often have antimony and even arsenic in them. When melted with lead containing calcium these will form intermetallic compounds of calcium antimonide and calcium arsenide which form as a dross that floats to the surface of the melt looking like dust.
These when exposed to air form the toxic, flammable and likely carcinogenic gases stibnide and arsenide respectively. Because they are heavier than air they will concentrate/pool in low areas. Which could be deadly.
lead is a very soft metal and Ca or Sb (antimony) is added to make it hard. Unless your battery is about 100 year old, there is little chance it will have arsenic. Modern batteries use only Ca and some older batteries may use Sb.
The dross is usually oxidation product containing mostly lead oxide (PbO) but other metals can also be there. Remember than lead is cumulative poison. But the dross will not catch fire.
12:14 Excellent presentation! You may want to use Scotch Brite instead of steel wool. Steel wool is notorious for contaminating what is scrubbed by it.
Thanks for the suggestion!
Keep up the content! We love it
Thank you! Please, share the video!
If you don't have a power supply, a small DC to DC buck( with cc cv) converter connected to a battery with small volt/amp combo meter can be obtained for $20 or much less, add a 12 v wall plug, capable of about 2amps. Will allow you do do about anything you need to do. That is safe anyway, and a boost converter can be used also for up to around 60 volts DC! Just Incase someone didn't already know this! Have an awesome day!
Be careful when you pour hot metal over concrete, the moisture trapped in it will vapourize and explode in a barrage of little chunks of rock.
You can also make more complex and better electrodes by moulding in "greensand" (damp clay and sand mixture)
Or in plaster of paris (gypsum) for very fine casts.
Re: the "pouring on concrete" part, you'd be correct for high-melt-point metals, but for lead, unless you're talking about pouring (and spilling...) crazy-large amounts, it's EXTREMELY unlikely to cause any problem - the melt point for lead is just too low to be hazardous that way. Biggest threat from this project would be inhaling the lead fumes if you overheat it during the melt, and the possiblity of absorption through the skin if you don't glove up while handling it. (You dont want to inhale the filing/sanding/shaping dust, either)
thanks for the informative video. One can use these in Acid batteries I suppose
Yes, here is a tutorial for a lead-acid battery in which I used that electrode: ruclips.net/video/0zQYJJz89Wo/видео.html
كيفيه وضع ثاني اكسيد الرصاص بالقطب الموجب للبطاريه
Just watch the tutorial!
How well does this stand up in something like a perchlorate cell?
I really don't know, I've never tried a perchlorate cell.
I had tried to make a PbO2 electrode with similar method for perchlorate cell but it didn't work. The electrode started to dissolve even though there was coating. I would love to know how to do it better and if your electrode will survive the chlorate cell conditions.
@@olimp231 the best ones I've seen are on the Mysteriusbhoice channel
Graphite electrode?
I bought an electrode on eBay and it worked very well ;).
Can you use this electrode to separate gold from alloy
In order to do an electrolysis with gold you would first need to dissolve the alloy in Aqua Regia. But then it is easy to recover the pure gold by precipitating it with sodium metabisulfite, then melt it. No electrolysis needed. Watch my tutorial: ruclips.net/video/NMzDeBDQUHc/видео.html
Ideally, you might consider spinning the lead electrode to ensure even deposition
Yes, I should have mentioned this!
Parrafin wax works better than borax for lead flux. Not that you wouldn't know that, just thought I'd mention it.
I didn't know, actually. Thanks for the info, I will try.
Good advice!
@BlueMoonshine parrafin is combustible at lead's melting temperature. Only do this outdoors.
Still, it pulls impurities in the lead into the slag, and allows for alloys to form more readily. It's all dependent on temperature and you can find references.
I learned about paraffin specifically because I do a lot of airgunning and black powder guns, and you need to have either pure lead or special lead alloys, depending on the type of gun.
Cheers!
If you are recovering lead from an old car battery, why not recover the sulphuric acid at the same time? I have 8l of it from 2 old batteries.
Sure, you can recover it. You may want to distill it, which will concentrate it to 98% at the same time, but you have to use a temperature up to 337°C.
Please show how to make lead dioxide powder
I will have to think about it.
if you use a high current density, the lead dioxide will not stick to the electrode and fall to the bottom as a powder. you need to increase the voltage till you see little bit of oxygen evolution.
@@janami-dharmam
I'll try that!
@@BlueMoonshine also you need to tap the electrode periodically otherwise the PbO2 will hang around the electrode like a slime.
never heat a teflon lined pan (if that's what it is), past 200C , or you will release fumes that will poison you PS- If you drill lots of small holes through the anode before you oxidize it, you can get much more usable surface area
Or simply shape the electrode into a flat plate.
10:45 When you dilute 93% sulfuric acid to 30%, I think you should not change 50ml of starting material to FIVE times the volume but rather to THREE times the volume. I think you messed yourself up and made only 18.6% solution instead of 30%.
However, I don't know if such a massive error has any meaning in this lead oxidation. However, it is worth noting that you put quite a lot of weight on calculations based on tables, so this gives the impression of a dilution that requires high precision.
We learned at least one thing from this:
If I need at all some complex calculations and tables to do a simple thing, I NEED TO CHECK IT BEFORE start implementing process. And check it with SOME COMPLETELY DIFFERENT METHOD. Now, for example, I could make an indicative check by drawing two things on paper - btw: I'll round 93% to exactly 90 for clarity:
1) "my desired goal: 90 --> 30 = 3 --> 1" Right?
2) "I'm going to do: 50 + 200 = 1 --> 5" Right?
Now I should ask myself:
"Have I made a mistake if the analysis is 3 --> 1 but the synthesis is 1 --> 5"
The above check can therefore be changed into a VISUALIZE check method by drawing it as clear areas (rectangles) on paper, in which case the check is based on a visual comparison instead of just doing what you have got as an idea in your head :)
Try it :)
My calculation is correct. In order to lower the concentration from 93% down to 30%, I rigorously derived that the volume of water to add should be exactly 3.82 times the initial volume of acid. The exact calculation is only given for reference for people who want to understand. Then I said that I am approximating 3.82 as 4. Now if you add 4 times the volume of water to your initial volume of acid, you end up we with a volume that is 5 times the initial one (4 x 50 + 50 = 250), which is precisely what I did.
@@BlueMoonshine First, for the sake of clarity, I will round my example from 93% to exactly 90% and there is still 50 ml of solution. ALRIGHT?
Then I add twice the amount (100 ml) of water to 50 ml of acid, making a total of 150 ml of solution. That is, I dilute the original 90% to 1/3 (to 30%) by increasing the amount of liquid 3 times - not 5 times, but 3 times. Right?
Which is true and which is false:
A) 90%/3=30%
B) 90%/5=30%
@@MR-ub6sq
No, this is wrong! You need to take into account the definition of the concentration. Concentration is not a ratio of volumes, it is the ratio of masses. A sulfuric acid molecule doesn't not have the same mass as a water molecule. This is clearly explained at 8'35'', please review it!
@@BlueMoonshine Alright. I finally figured it out. Sorry to cause you extra trouble!
@@MR-ub6sq
No problem! 👍
Why didn't it coat the lead with the copper? Copper plating the lead.
Because at the cathode, among the possible reactions, it is the one that has the highest reduction potential that takes place, namely water is reduced into hydrogen gas and OH- ions. The copper doesn't dissolve. At the anode, among the possible reactions, it is the one that has the lowest reduction potential (highest oxidation potential) that takes place, namely the reaction where the oxygen from the SO4-- ion is oxidized, therefore turning the Pb into PbO2.
Good video but this method makes very poor coating, need a test in NaCl solution to see if it can handle current
this will not stand high concentration of Cl ions. What we want is a high overpotential for oxygen evolution. That means chloride should be oxidized and oxygen should not be produced. But this electrode will be attacked by Cl ions very easily. You can use this electrode to make persulfate by electrolysis provided you do not have Cl ions at all.
Thanks for the precise answer mate ! @@janami-dharmam
Good, but it is probably impossible to use more than some minute in REAL PbO2 application like perchlorate solution because the brine will infiltrate until your Lead metal and oxidize it until it is totally non-conductor.
It is just fun, but almost non-effective (or only for a short amount of time) in real anode application.
Even in H2 production it will be destroyed in some hours I suppose.
we are using titanium substrate for high voltage anode application.
I'm not claiming it is for industrial production, but it does a decent job at low cost for amateur experiments, such as in this application: ruclips.net/video/l9ifS3ubiBc/видео.html
@@BlueMoonshine Yes, thank, I already saw it yesterday, it is good !
Many type of anode like graphite can work for this application !
I believe you can synthesize enough H2SO4 with a cheap zinc battery's carbon electrode to oxidize this lead electrode.
Please dont use a file how you do. For and backward, not sidewards
I accidentally did it sidewards in front of the camera as I was trying to avoid hitting it, but behind the scene I did it the right way!
It's completely a legitimate metal working technique called draw filing.
.... rather disappointing, so no matter what you'll need some sulfuric acid... I started by watching the sulfuric acid from epson salt video, figured out i would need a lead dioxide electrode, but in order to make the electrode, you need sulfuric acid to start out with! blah....
Simply start by making sulfuric acid by using a standard lead electrode. It will work, it will simply decompose a little bit in the solution, adding some pollution, but you can filter it out. Then with the acid you can make a lead dioxide electrode.
You only really need an old car battery......
Sulfuric acid will blind instantly if it gets in the eyes. Especially when concentrated. Anybody dealing with it really needs to wear chemical goggles, not just dust goggles.
Isn't lead dioxide EXTREMELY poisonous? Maybe should have mentioned that.
Lead vapors from heating, and lead dust In the steel wool/file aren't good for us either.
Lead is not poisonous through skin, and requires a much higher temperature (1750°C) to turn into vapor.
Don't make an inhalation of the lead dust and you'll be perfectly fine.
Lead pipes... Crazy anyone thought that was a good idea
And yet it didn't pose any problem in those times, as well as riding a bike without a helmet and without knee protections, or drinking water directly out of the faucet... The human species has become very weak lately.
You use what you have, until you can find better.
@@BlueMoonshine That's objectively misinformation. You can just do a quick google search and find tons of evidence of the long-term neurological effects of consuming lead in almost all forms.
No face mask when melting the lead?
Just hold your breath. Now if you do it everyday, then wear a face mask and possibly a respirator, but if you do it only once in your life, holding your breath is enough.
It’s not hot enough to vaporize the lead unless you really overheat it.
The vapour pressure of molten lead is ridiculously low. My father cast bullets all the time. Born in the late 40s, lead soldiers, lead paint, leaded gasoline, lead pipes, the works. He even used to as a young boy regularly help his grandfather by mixing boiled linseed oil with powdered red lead to make paint. With his arm!
Regularly had blood tests for lead in later life. They always came back as extremely low.
The way lead metal or insoluble oxides get into you system is eating it or inhaling a dust or fume. Just melting lead like that in a pot ain't gunna do it. An air blast in say cuppelation might. Smelting might. But that's why chimneys exist.
Sure if you live next to a cuppelation furnace or smelter there's probably going to be enough dust blowing around to make you deathly ill. But you don't.
You can definitely eat it on accident though if you don't wash your hands afterwards. Even just handling the metal. You can actually see it on your hands it's so sort...
When I was young, in the early 1980's, it was common for kids to play pellet riffles. As everybody did, I used to hold the lead pellets in my mouth in order to avoid losing some in pockets with holes. As probably everybody, I accidentally chewed some of them and probably swallowed a few... We all survived!
@@BlueMoonshine we're about the same age, it's funny to see how coddled people are compared to when we were kids.