Alkaline Battery Leak Cleanup

If you care to get more chemically correct ammonia is a weak acid.

?-)

I think he meant household, which is a base...

I am not talking about household ideas. I am talking technical chemistry. Ammonia, including household varieties, have the same chemistry, an acid with a KA of about -10 so it looks basic compared to other acids (even distilled water), including carbonic acid (H2CO3 (soda pop) which fizzes in the presence of strong acids.

?-)

that an acid "looks basic" compared to stronger acids makes little sense to me.

every MSDS I've ever seen for ammonium hydroxide says it's a base.

I'm looking at US patent 4696832; there are probably others, the patent refers to prior use of these materials. It's a long-chain molecule with decorations, so the 'formula' is complex (mainly lots of different chain lengths).

Semiconductors have few free charge carriers, but low electric fields cause breakdown (really, charge injection at metal contacts). So, that's the kind of behavior this liquid is engineered for. In thin sections (one micron) it's just about like a conductor, but in long tracks (one millimeter) it insulates. The nonlinearity of its conduction makes it suitable for sloshing onto insulating surfaces.

decorations,

Thanks. That makes sense. I was assuming it was some kind of directional semiconductor, such as in a liquid diode.

Looks like the contact coating is still a liquid even at the molecular plating thickness. My guess is that the liquid displaces a higher resistance oxide layer with a more conductive "liquid" layer thereby enhancing conductivity. Nice.

Thanks for the info about Tweak.

I have a tiny bottle, which I only used on my pickup lugs.

I've wondered of what use it is, when you (presumably) get quantum tunneling, whether or not Tweak is a "conductor".

decorations,

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over 20 years ago in the US, they sold some amazingly expensive liquid to slosh on your DIP, SIPP and ZIP memory chips to make them not error out in their sockets. The stuff was sold as being super magical and ultra engineered magic. Just pressing stuff back into their sockets always worked just fine for me.

Of course it did, if you didn't want a real fix. All that did was wipe off enough oxidation for temporary operation, like wiggling the knob on a dirty TV tuner when they were mechanical.

decorations,

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insulates.

Stabilant-22?

Cheers

Phil Hobbs

decorations,

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insulates.

It might have been. I'd have to drag out the old magazine to see. It's too bad they never made junky IC sockets that when vibrated and temperature cycled would worked the leads in into the socket and not away from it.

the real fix is not having dozens of chips in cheap sockets. Luckily those days are over. we've moved onto exploding capacitors instead.

I am not talking about household ideas. I am talking technical chemistry. Ammonia, including household varieties, have the same chemistry, an acid with a KA of about -10 so it looks basic compared to other acids (even distilled water), including carbonic acid (H2CO3 (soda pop) which fizzes in the presence of strong acids.

?-)

I probably missed the conversation by now.... This is a good discussion.

You are correct if you are talking about relative acidity - any compound with a hydrogen bond can be considered either acidic or basic:

One example is the Degussa process reacts NH3 and CH4, where ammonia acts as an acid....

Likewise, compared with most other acidic gases and liquids, ammonia acts as a base. Like this experiment shows when you mix gaseous HCl and NH3....

And so, there you have it! Everybody wins!

Bob

PS -- Whut dew I win?

I am not talking about household ideas. I am talking technical chemistry. Ammonia, including household varieties, have the same chemistry, an acid with a KA of about -10 so it looks basic compared to other acids (even distilled water), including carbonic acid (H2CO3 (soda pop) which fizzes in the presence of strong acids.

?-)

I probably missed the conversation by now.... This is a good discussion.

You are correct if you are talking about relative acidity - any compound with a hydrogen bond can be considered either acidic or basic:

One example is the Degussa process reacts NH3 and CH4, where ammonia acts as an acid....

Likewise, compared with most other acidic gases and liquids, ammonia acts as a base. Like this experiment shows when you mix gaseous HCl and NH3....

And so, there you have it! Everybody wins!

Bob

PS -- Whut dew I win?

===

Now I wish I hadn't posted this...... so here's the warning...

DANGER: DO NOT DO THIS HCl - NH3 experiment -- or mix ammonia with anything. The white 'smoke' in that video is actually super fine ammonium chloride powder. All 3 of these chemicals can burn your skin or cause permanent damage to lungs, etc. And if you spill any of these, your mama (or the lovely wife) will kill you -- if you live through it.