I'm trying to clean up some beakers after the students made crystal gardens using waterglass and cobalt chloride, magnesium nitrate and manganese sulfate. I managed to scrape out the bulf of it, but I've now had the beakers soaking (in just water) for a few days and I still can't shift the residue.
Any suggestions on how I could remove this?
Thanks, all.
Cleaning Glassware after Crystal Gardens
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Re: Cleaning Glassware after Crystal Gardens
Try a bit of acid.
Re: Cleaning Glassware after Crystal Gardens
Smiley, I thought of throwing them at the wall - similar concept I suppose
Re: Cleaning Glassware after Crystal Gardens
The waterglass does stain, etch or whatever the glass beakers. Sorry but haven't found the answer for getting it off yet. My 3L was permanently etched a few years ago. Still use it though.
Re: Cleaning Glassware after Crystal Gardens
I do the waterglass expt in old jars, eg medium sized Vegemite, or those tallish baby food jars. Then cleaning is not an issue!
Cheers, K
- pkij
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Re: Cleaning Glassware after Crystal Gardens
What a timely topic! I am attempting to clean up the prep room and had just got to thinking about the crystal gardens (when I decided I needed a bit of a rest , so I logged on here). Anyway like Smiley I have the gardens in old jars, so I can throw them out. What I was wondering is, can the sodium silicate be recycled if I decant it from the jar? or should I throw the whole lot out?
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Re: Cleaning Glassware after Crystal Gardens
Hi, here I do them in the taller plastic specimen jars, when finished I use a tea strainer and put the sodium silicate in a "recycled" bottle for use next time It does discolour a little but perfectly fine for a few uses and the plastic specimen jars clean up fine as well!MariaC