Aluminum versus Mercury
Aluminum versus Mercury
(OP)
Is the presence of oxygen required for mercury to dissolve aluminum?
INTELLIGENT WORK FORUMS
FOR ENGINEERING PROFESSIONALS Come Join Us!Are you an
Engineering professional? Join Eng-Tips Forums!
*Eng-Tips's functionality depends on members receiving e-mail. By joining you are opting in to receive e-mail. Posting GuidelinesJobs |
|
RE: Aluminum versus Mercury
The first process - oxygen is required This is a common classroom demonstration and the explanation is always that one is seeing oxidation of the aluminum facilitated by mercury's disruption of its oxide layer.
The second process - oxygen is not required
Liquid Metal Embrittlement. Hg wets the the grain boundaries, causing the grains to unzip.
Earlier this year in Moomba at a Natural gas processing facility a fire and explosion occurred due this phenomenon. http://www.ferret.com.au/articles/97/0c01e497.asp
When Hg from entrained in the natural gas found it was into an aluminum coldbox (heat exchanger) causing a catastrophic event to occur.
Other LME pairs
Base Metal - Liquid Metal Environment
Aluminum - Gallium
Aluminum - Mercury
Brass - Mercury
C-276 (Hastalloy) - Silver Solders
Copper - Mercury
Copper Beryllium - Mercury
Cupronickel - Lead
8-9% Cr Martensitic Steel - Lithium
Steel - Lithium
Steel - Tin
ASTM A723 Steel - Indium
ASTM A723 Steel - Gallium
Austentic Stainless Steel - Zinc
RE: Aluminum versus Mercury
What experiment/application is to be done with these two metals "outside" of the classroom?
RE: Aluminum versus Mercury
RE: Aluminum versus Mercury