this is an abstract from kentish's book.
"copper oxychloride may be made by laying thin pieces of copper plate in a dish, and pouring upon them a mixture of half water, half hydrochloric acid. the next day remove them and lay them on a board in the shade to dry.
when dry brush off the green powder which will be formed on the outside with a toothbrush, into a basin of water.
after a quantity is obtained (lol) wash in a solution of potassium carbonate,water, and test with litmus paper to ascertain it free from acid".
looks straight forward enough and doable but you'll need a few dishes id say only way you'll know is by having a crack at it
That sounds a bit long winded, although it shouldn't take long to get a sample large enough for a test. I was thinking of a method that used CuCl2 as the starting material, this saves me having to get HCl.
To save you buying the hydrogen chlorinde, you could just buy the Cu oxychloride... It is a fairly common fungicide.
I believe a slightly more convenient way of converting copper metal to oxychloride is by using a mixture of HCL and H2O2. No scrubbing with tooth brushes, it all dissolves!
The monkey leaped off it's sunny perch and flew off into the night sky.
hmm,whats the name of the fungicide? the only one i could find had only 58% copper oxychloride in it
Yep you are unlikely to find pure copper oxychloride as a fungicide in the UK. One of my friends works for a company that makes the stuff and all of theirs goes into mixtures (very fussy about who they will sell a sack of the pure stuff to).
Have you got any idea what the other components in the mix are?
I used some 'yates copper oxychloride' here in New Zealand, and while I did not find it to make fantastic blues (the formula could be the issue there) but it was definitely a blue. Perhaps things are different in NZ, or perhaps in the five or so years since I got it, they now add all sorts here too.
The monkey leaped off it's sunny perch and flew off into the night sky.
Well I've had a busy week....... firstly I made another of those 3lb whistles, no catalyst - same as the ones at the meet This vid is it with a 6", 750g dummy shell, didn’t go too well (i cut the vid short due to inappropriate language ) Fail 3lb whistle
I made 2 batches of NaBenz whistle then, one with red iron oxide catalyst, one with black copper oxide catalyst. Whistle CuO Whistle Fe2O3
There seems to be very little difference really so i went onto plan b..... I ordered some brown iron oxide from ebay to use with the original tooling, ill test it and report findings when it comes and upload a vid if anyone is interested? Its listed on the Creagan site as the superior iron oxide catalyst.
Meanwhile i turned up some new tooling with a longer spindle ~ 4" long. It is designed to be used with perc/benzoate whistle with no catalyst, we shall see how it goes
Also made a new delrin tube support at the same time
I like the rockets. Of the pair using the two different catalysts the copper oxide gave a good raspy sound. What is the reasoning behind the whistle with no catalyst?
Freud. Artists, in this view, are people who may avoid neurosis and perversion by sublimating their impulses in their work.
What is the reasoning behind the whistle with no catalyst?
Well i extrapolated the spindle off the Creagan site but made some mistakes with the length - it was too short. On the site it states not to use a catalyst with the motors as the core is too long and it will CATO. This is why the new spindle was turned, this time to the correct dimensions
If you want to make copper oxychloride the easiest way it seems is to get a tall flask, put one of those aquarium bubbler jobs in the bottom, put in a load of bits of copper scrap, top up with HCl and let it bubble away for a few days (normal safety precautions apply ) - you should end up with a milky blue-green suspension which will need to be fltered to yield the oxychloride. I'm just ordering up some HCl, will let you know how it goes .
Trying to do something very beautiful but very dangerous very safely....
hooo, what a lovely brass spindle you have there sam, i enjoyed your catalyst free rockets at the meet they certainly topped out at an amazing height and if i remember correctly they had a relatively short "pusher" core? did you use the same core design to lift the large dummy shell?.
i can certainly see where your coming from with the longer spindle/ slow whistle and look forward to the results, i myself have had good results with the longer tri core spindles, but with Vaseline and a catalyst, but only just reread the creagan information on them to discover they don't need a catalyst ether!!.
do you still add Vaseline/oil to the catalyst free whistle or just batch and press?
Hi Chris, yea it was the same core design, not enough power in it. Im using that spindle now with a catalyst mix.
I tested the new longer core today, 1st with 72.5/27.5 and second with 70/30 both no catalyst. The first CATOed and second flew really well - fastest thing ive ever seen!
I also received the brown iron oxide this morning and found out it is actually a mix of red, black and yellow! I tried it anyway and it flew well, nice and fast.
Next thing to do is sort out a better test stand and compare the catalysts.
thanks for the push sambo, i havn't made a rocket in ages so i thought i would make a few with different catalyats to compliment your findings i made up the same comps as you but i used K benzoate, [ 70:30:1:3 ], oxychloride, red oxide and copper ( II) oxide, here is a close up of the 3 comps,
these are 1" x 4" tubes, 3/4" is left vacant at the business end, spindle is tapered 6--9mm and 55mm long, the delay is about 20mm and the clay plug is bentonite about 5mm thick, i'm just about to attatch some dowel and go and fire them,
Edit :- ok , this is now about 2 hours later and have fired my rockets, the diffence is quite remarkable, i was expecting alot more from the oxychloride but it performed the least, the red iron oxide performed as i expected as i have made this a few times, but the black copper oxide performed well and beyond what i was expecting, it went the longest, was the loudest and was a much raspier sound, but all in all they went ok, but in future i will use the copper (II) oxide, i still have a bit of comp left so my next will be, all 3 mixed together and all 3 pressed in sepparate stages in the same tube,
does anybody have any ideas as to how MgAl would perform as a catalyst ? or would that be a tad too dangerous ,
rockets are in the order of..... oxychloride, copper (II) and red oxide
only way you'll know is by having a crack at it
