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Reaction of Sodium and Chlorine

Procedure

  1. Behind a small safety shield, fill a 100ml beaker with sand, put a small watchglass on top of the sand.

  2. Place the 100ml beaker inside a 600ml beaker containing about 100ml of bleach, cover with a large watchglass.

  3. With tweezers, place a 0.5cm3 piece of sodium with a clean side on top of the small watchglass.

  4. Squirt a few pipetfulls of concentrated HCl into the bleach to generate chlorine gas. The color of the bleach/HCl solution should be green and have lots of bubbles. If it isn't green more HCl should be added.

  5. Add 2-3 drops of water to the sodium, cover the beaker with the large watchglass. The heat from the reaction of water with sodium gets the sodium hot enough to react with the chlorine.

  6. The hot sodium reacts with the chlorine gas, burning with a bright yellow flame.

Reactions

2Na (s) + Cl2 (g) --> NaCl (s)

dH (def = -411 kJ/mole

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Last Updated: 5/23/02