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Copper Reaction Lab Report

Decent Essays

AP Chemistry
12/13/11

Round-Trip Copper Reactions Lab

The purpose of this lab was to evaluate our skills of decanting a supernatant liquid without losing the solid and successful completion of a series of reactions. This was done through five chemical reactions involving copper. In this lab, elemental copper was put through five different chemical reactions in order to convert it into different compounds. By the end of the fifth reaction, the copper was back to its elemental state. In the first reaction, 0.95 g of pure copper was reacted with 4.0 mL of concentrated nitric acid under the fume hood. The solution was swirled until all of the copper had dissolved. The balanced equation for this reaction is as follows:

Cu (s) + …show more content…

The black precipitate was allowed to settle and then the supernatant, the clear liquid that lies above a precipitate, was decanted, or poured carefully off. Then, 200 mL of hot distilled water was added and the precipitate was allowed to settle to repeat the decanting process again. In the fourth reaction, 15 mL of 6.0 M sulfuric acid was added to the copper (II) oxide while stirring. The balanced equation for this reaction is as follows:

CuO (s) + H2SO4 (aq) à CuSO4 (aq) + H2O (l) + SO2 (g)

When the sulfuric acid was added to copper (II) oxide, the solution turned blue. This was due to the formation of aqueous copper (II) sulfate, which produced the copper ions to change the color of the solution. In the fifth reaction, 2.29 g of zinc was added to the copper (II) sulfate solution under the fume hood. The balanced equation for this reaction is written as followed:

Zn (s) + CuSO4 (aq) à ZnSO4 (aq) + Cu (s)

When the zinc was added to the copper (II) sulfate solution, the solution started to bubble. As the solution was stirred, it turned a cloudy blue. Small flecks of a brown solid were visible. As the solution became colorless, the brown solid settled to the bottom of the beaker. The solid formed was copper in its elemental state. The color faded from the solution as the copper ions slowly formed into solid copper. The copper was poured into a funnel with filter paper and washed three times with 25 mL

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