• Question: do you blow up things a lot?

    Asked by elaw13 to Kate, Kieren, Nicola, Rowena, Roy on 12 Mar 2014.
    • Photo: Roy Adkin

      Roy Adkin answered on 12 Mar 2014:

      Hello,
      Well…only if I meant to!! I used to work in two secondary schools where one of the things I did was present ‘Flash, Bang, Wallop’ demonstrations and lectures. As you can imagine from the title there were a lot of bangs and fizzes and lots land lots of flame!! 🙂

    • Photo: Rowena Fletcher-Wood

      Rowena Fletcher-Wood answered on 12 Mar 2014:

      Not very often, no. The times I do are memorable though! Usually I end up messing stuff up without explosions – things like accidentally sucking iron solutions up into my Schlenk line. This basically means I haveto stop the experiment to keep the equipment safe and then I have a big glass matrix filled with green sludge that I have to get out before it turns brown. We do some fun hydrogen gas rockets on open days though! 😉

    • Photo: Kieren Bradley

      Kieren Bradley answered on 12 Mar 2014:

      I’ve never blown anything up in lab. I have smashed a couple of beakers and done the “squeaky pop” test for hydrogen at school, but they were probably my most dangerous explosions in a science lab.

      I have made a combustible mixture of flower and air for a home made pyrotechnic, I obviously ensured that I was outside away from anything that could burn and only used small amounts. The effect is quite good and you can see how it is done on the BBC show QI – episode:
      “K-Folk” which I happened to watch on IPlayer last night and is available to watch until Friday 14th.

    • Photo: Kate Nicholson

      Kate Nicholson answered on 12 Mar 2014:

      Thankfully not!
      Anyone who has had an experiment blow up on them and been shoved in the freezing cold safety shower will agree – it’s not fun if things go wrong when you’re not expecting it! I’ve had a few things do this, and a few smaller size experiments that just go pop and spill a few ml over the bench (and my lab coat).
      I do like to blow things up in a controlled manner – like putting a small pop bottle of liquid nitrogen in a bin full of water (there are loads of YouTube videos of this one – my favourite is the one with the Ping pong balls, it gives a good effect) but I’ve always liked flames better than explosions.

    • Photo: Nicola Rogers

      Nicola Rogers answered on 13 Mar 2014:

      I never had to blow things up in my PhD research, but now in my new job I am mixing Xe and H2 gases together, and then I need to remove the hydrogen so I need to react it with oxygen to form water – which is then liquid and will separate from the Xe….. this has the potential to blow up as the reaction of H2 with oxygen is pretty violent!

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