Ammonia has been used by doctors, farmers, chemists, alchemists, weightlifters, and our families since Roman times. Doctors revive unconscious patients, farmers use it in fertilizer, alchemists tried to use it to make gold, weightlifters sniff it into their lungs to invigorate their respiratory system and clear their heads prior to lifting tremendous loads. At home, ammonia is used to clean up the ketchup you spilled on the floor and never cleaned up.
The ammonia molecule (NH3) is a colorless gas with a strong odor – it’s the smell of freshly cleaned floors and windows. Mom is not cleaning with straight ammonia (it’s gas at room temperature because it boils at -28oF, so the stuff she cleans with is actually ammonium hydroxide, a solution of ammonia and water). Ammonia is found when plants and animals decompose, and it’s also in rainwater, volcanoes, your kidneys (to neutralize excess acid), in the ocean, some fertilizers, in Jupiter’s lower cloud decks, and trace amounts are found in our own atmosphere (it’s lighter than air).
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The manufacturer changed the contents of their kit after this video was made. You’ll want the C2000 kit in order to complete the experiments on this page: homesciencetools.com/product/thames-kosmos-chem-c2000-kit/
HI there,
I watched the video to try to figure out where to get the chemicals..but you mentioned that it was in the kit and I am still unsure of where to get them. I do see your link to homesciencetools , is that where i should go? and how do I know what quantity I should be getting? thank you! i am new to this!
Hi there! Sorry for the delay. Yes in general if you watch the video first, near the start I will show you what each material looks like, and then walk through how to use it in the experiment. CHemicals are usually directly linked with the least expensive place to get them in the right quantity.
Help! I’m brand new to this program and trying to set up materials for my son. I thought I just saw in the “getting started” video that there would be links to the more difficult to find materials. Of course I had to start with this Ammonia experiment. Anyway, the chemicals listed above that seem to have a link beside them don’t take me to a page where it seems like I can purchase them. I looked at the comments below and saw the homesciencetools link. So it looks like I can purchase at least some of these items here, but what quantities do I need to purchase, 30 g or 100 g of sodium carbonate, etc?
Thanks for your help! I’m so glad to know that I can just ask these questions.
It sounds like you may not have enough water. Be sure to use a test tube that is similar in size to the one shown in the video. Be sure to fill the test tube with 5cm of water.
when I mix the sodium carbonate and ammonium chloride in the test tube, it turns into white slush, so I was wondering what I did wrong.
Yes, for our purposes these are one in the same.
I’m sorry to bother you again, but I just realized you said below that I could use sodium bisulfate instead of sodium hydrogen sulfate, but you linked me to Sodium bisulfite. Was that purposeful? I just don’t want to use the wrong chemical. Thank you!
Thank you so much! I thought I looked on that site but must have misspelled it or something. I appreciate you answering me!
Yes, and thank you for being so cautious! You can use Sodium Bisulfate for Sodium Hydrogen Sulfate and it’s pretty inexpensive here: https://www.homesciencetools.com/product/sodium-bisulfite-30-g/
I cannot find sodium hydrogen sulfate (NaHSO4) anywhere (except ebay and bulk on amazon). Do you know of a place I could find it? I will not buy chemicals off of ebay. =).
You’re right – the new video didn’t make it in the list. So sorry about that! We’re right int he middle of uploading over 100 videos to this section, so if you can hold on for a few more weeks, everything should be in the right order and updated. In the meantime, I’ll send you a private email.
I see in this worksheet for this experiment, the kids are asked to balance an equation. Were they taught to do that somewhere else? In a different lesson?