MrGreen

Making Sodium metal with alternative methods?

Added 2024-09-10 10:01:24 +0000 UTC

Hello everyone! I recently came across a video Elias Experiments recently uploaded, where he made bulk potassium metal in his backyard. I highly recommend checking it out: https://youtu.be/FPjpXiZ1rSY?si=HbpXxfyZNOmTW5Zx

It got me thinking that there must be an even cheaper way to do this reaction without needing magnesium metal as aluminium should be able to do something similar. So I've done some tests with aluminium + sodium carbonate of all things (Super not reactive lol, I've been told it shouldn't work) but it actually nearly exploded on me when heated to about 950 degrees Celsius. The reaction starts above the boiling point of sodium, so it immediately boils everything out. I'll keep trying with different variables to get it under control and see what happens!