Magnesium chloride?
 

On Sat, 12 Feb 2005 23:02:01 -0600, "Tim Williams"
wrote:

I know it's used for ice melter, but the question is: can I find it alone?

The Home Depot in Fridley MN has it. YMMV.

"Don Foreman" wrote in message
...
The Home Depot in Fridley MN has it. YMMV.

Ok. Didn't know if I could find it alone in anything less than ton
quantities (or reagent grade, heh).

Tim

--
"I've got more trophies than Wayne Gretsky and the Pope combined!"
- Homer Simpson
Website @ http://webpages.charter.net/dawill/tmoranwms

On Sun, 13 Feb 2005 12:23:06 -0600, "Tim Williams"
wrote:

"Don Foreman" wrote in message
.. .
The Home Depot in Fridley MN has it. YMMV.

Ok. Didn't know if I could find it alone in anything less than ton
quantities (or reagent grade, heh).

It's called "Dust-Gard" and "Freeze-Gard" (same bag, different sides).
It's also used for soil stabilization and as an additive for cattle
feed. If your Home Depot doesn't have it, try a co-op. I think a
50 lb was about $12.

On Sun, 13 Feb 2005 16:53:01 -0600, Don Foreman
wrote:

On Sun, 13 Feb 2005 12:23:06 -0600, "Tim Williams"
wrote:

"Don Foreman" wrote in message
. ..
The Home Depot in Fridley MN has it. YMMV.

Ok. Didn't know if I could find it alone in anything less than ton
quantities (or reagent grade, heh).

It's called "Dust-Gard" and "Freeze-Gard" (same bag, different sides).
It's also used for soil stabilization and as an additive for cattle
feed. If your Home Depot doesn't have it, try a co-op. I think a
50 lb was about $12.

As a 34% solution, I had to use hastelloy or tantalum in my mag meter
electrodes, or the electrodes would dissolve. I once had a power
failure in the mag chloride drying plant I ran, went out and
inspected, and saw mag chloride pouring from a light switch. ALL of
the lighting conduits and circuits had to be replaced. Traced it to
the aforementioned dissolved electrodes in a mag flow meter.

Are you sure that **** won't dissolve your crucibles?

Pete Keillor

"Peter T. Keillor III" wrote in message
...
As a 34% solution, I had to use hastelloy or tantalum in my mag meter
electrodes, or the electrodes would dissolve. I once had a power
failure in the mag chloride drying plant I ran, went out and
inspected, and saw mag chloride pouring from a light switch. ALL of
the lighting conduits and circuits had to be replaced. Traced it to
the aforementioned dissolved electrodes in a mag flow meter.

LOL, yipe! Is that corrosion, displacement or what?

Are you sure that **** won't dissolve your crucibles?

Oh, I'm sure it will, but crucibles are disposable by their nature anyway.
So far my SiC has been withstanding ice melter well. The last metal
crucible I was working with got a bad case of aluminum brazed in it
though... salt is a wonderful flux! ;)

FWIW, an "alloy" of 25-30% (by weight) MgCl2, balance KCl, should melt
around 793°F. I'm going to see if that is a workable aluminum
brazing/welding flux...

Tim

--
"I've got more trophies than Wayne Gretsky and the Pope combined!"
- Homer Simpson
Website @ http://webpages.charter.net/dawill/tmoranwms

On Sun, 13 Feb 2005 18:13:57 -0600, "Tim Williams"
wrote:

"Peter T. Keillor III" wrote in message
.. .
As a 34% solution, I had to use hastelloy or tantalum in my mag meter
electrodes, or the electrodes would dissolve. I once had a power
failure in the mag chloride drying plant I ran, went out and
inspected, and saw mag chloride pouring from a light switch. ALL of
the lighting conduits and circuits had to be replaced. Traced it to
the aforementioned dissolved electrodes in a mag flow meter.

LOL, yipe! Is that corrosion, displacement or what?

Are you sure that **** won't dissolve your crucibles?

Oh, I'm sure it will, but crucibles are disposable by their nature anyway.
So far my SiC has been withstanding ice melter well. The last metal
crucible I was working with got a bad case of aluminum brazed in it
though... salt is a wonderful flux! ;)

FWIW, an "alloy" of 25-30% (by weight) MgCl2, balance KCl, should melt
around 793°F. I'm going to see if that is a workable aluminum
brazing/welding flux...

Tim

Hmmm. Maybe you'll be o.k.

We ran the cells on a eutectic mixture of KCl, NaCl, plus a few
others, with MgCl2 as a minor component. Operating temperature was
~700 deg C. The cell internals were constructed of 99.5+% pure
alumina Coors brick, thousands upon thousands of them, at about
$25-$30 / brick (late '70's dollars). The cell had about 1' - 18"
thick internal walls, and was about 50' long x 30' wide x 7' deep.
The Coors brick held up extremely well as long as it wasn't thermally
shocked. We ran at 200VDC, 18,000 A. That was a fun project,
although damned expensive.

Pete Keillor

"Peter T. Keillor III" wrote in message
...
We ran the cells on a eutectic mixture of KCl, NaCl, plus a few
others, with MgCl2 as a minor component. Operating temperature was
~700 deg C. The cell internals were constructed of 99.5+% pure
alumina Coors brick, thousands upon thousands of them, at about
$25-$30 / brick (late '70's dollars). The cell had about 1' - 18"
thick internal walls, and was about 50' long x 30' wide x 7' deep.

Nice. What'd it make? Sodium or potassium?
That's another thing I'm looking into doing some day (and yes I'm aware of
the dangers of highly reative metals, and I've seen Theodore Gray's sodium
party webpage, not that it was a deterrent! ;))

I'm guessing silica has solubility in the salt, hence you can't use normal
acid firebrick?

The Coors brick held up extremely well as long as it wasn't thermally
shocked. We ran at 200VDC, 18,000 A. That was a fun project,
although damned expensive.

Sounds like it!

Tim

--
"I've got more trophies than Wayne Gretsky and the Pope combined!"
- Homer Simpson
Website @ http://webpages.charter.net/dawill/tmoranwms

On Sun, 13 Feb 2005 19:52:20 -0600, "Tim Williams"
wrote:

"Peter T. Keillor III" wrote in message
.. .
We ran the cells on a eutectic mixture of KCl, NaCl, plus a few
others, with MgCl2 as a minor component. Operating temperature was
~700 deg C. The cell internals were constructed of 99.5+% pure
alumina Coors brick, thousands upon thousands of them, at about
$25-$30 / brick (late '70's dollars). The cell had about 1' - 18"
thick internal walls, and was about 50' long x 30' wide x 7' deep.

Nice. What'd it make? Sodium or potassium?
That's another thing I'm looking into doing some day (and yes I'm aware of
the dangers of highly reative metals, and I've seen Theodore Gray's sodium
party webpage, not that it was a deterrent! ;))

I'm guessing silica has solubility in the salt, hence you can't use normal
acid firebrick?

The Coors brick held up extremely well as long as it wasn't thermally
shocked. We ran at 200VDC, 18,000 A. That was a fun project,
although damned expensive.

Sounds like it!

Tim

Magnesium. It was a looong time ago, but I think we fed to about ~7%.
At one point I was asked and did set up direct spray of 34% into the
feed chamber. I had some spray nozzles machined from 1" tantalum bar.
I don't know what that stuff cost, but I remember we had to put in a
safe to have it. I recall the machinist saying it was nasty to
machine, CCl4 coolant I think. It worked great (we had efficiency and
therefore heat issues) until a clod would build up and drop in. The
resulting steam explosions were rated by how many 10" blind flanges
flew into the air (2-clank, 3-clank). We finally had a 6-clank (all)
with blind flanges falling everywhere and decided to call it a day.

Pete Keillor