absolutely gorgeous look at that hey
guys welcome back today we have a fun
little experiment with kitchen chemistry
we’re taking bottles of stump remover
and converting them into crystals of
potassium nitrate and if you look up the
MSDS these things claim to be 100%
potassium nitrate so this stuff should
work really well now you might be
wondering what the purpose of doing an
experiment like this is and it’s because
a crystal is one of the most pure forms
of a substance that you can get and the
whole idea is to leach nitrates from the
soil and produce very pure potassium
nitrate crystals through very natural
and very organic process you’ll see that
in a future video now to get started
let’s talk about solubility of things in
water we know a lot of things dissolved
in water but the question is how much of
it will dissolve and what are some of
the factors that affect that well first
of all the temperature of the water
itself can make an extreme difference in
the case of potassium nitrate it’s
actually not super soluble in cold water
but once the water approaches boiling it
can suck up a whole bunch of this stuff
I’ll show you what I’m talking about in
just a minute
[Music]
[Applause]
we just filled up this little bowl with
three cups of ice water it’s very cold
you can actually see some condensation
forming on the edges here so now that
it’s cold enough let’s go ahead and use
some measuring cups to measure potassium
nitrate into the bowl stir it up and see
how much of it we can get to dissolve
let’s start off with the tablespoon see
if it will take it
[Music]
one tablespoon
[Music]
look at that one tablespoon in quite a
difficult time
so potassium nitrate doesn’t really
dissolve that well in cold water but
let’s see what happens when we turn up
the heat
[Music]
all right so I’ve just got everything
transferred into the pot here I’ve added
1/2 a cup of potassium nitrate and I’m
slowly bringing the water up to a boil
when the water hits a boil I’m going to
keep it at that temperature and slowly
keep adding potassium nitrate until it
stops dissolving and the whole time I’ll
be taking notes on the measurements we
use all right I’m gonna go with another
1/2 cup all right that’s for one full
cup of potassium nitrate look at the
splatters underneath when this
solidifies to a metal surface it
immediately crystallizes back into that
white powder
all right we’ve reached boiling hot and
spill it over the edges a little bit as
well whoops here’s something else that’s
interesting watch the spoon as I take it
out of the solution it hits the air you
can see it crystallizes over as the air
hits it that’s a good sign that means
our solution is becoming supersaturated
those are crystals of potassium nitrate
you might be wondering a potassium
nitrate is poisonous and the answer is
no at least not in small concentrations
it just gives it a really interesting
place it’s not very desirable but it’s
not gonna kill you what an interesting
phenomenon it’s actually freezing and
melting at the surface where it meets
the air currents it’s mesmerizing so
here’s the update guys we’ve had our pot
simmering on high heat boiling in fact
for the last 15 minutes and we have
added a total of 3 and 3/4 cups of
potassium nitrate now granted some of
that has spilled out around the edges so
I’m gonna call it three and a half cups
of potassium nitrate in the water that’s
in there now while that doesn’t factor
off for any other water that’s boiled
off in the meantime I think we’re good
going along with that so the next step
to making our potassium nitrate crystals
is to take a clean glass bowl like this
and transfer that solution into it now
this bowl is very cold now to expect
those crystals to form very quickly
maybe a little bit too quickly now when
making a crystal we want the solution to
cool down as slowly as possible so
before I make the transfer I’m gonna
stick some water in this bowl put it in
the microwave so that it’s brought up
the temperature before we transfer the
solution
[Music]
all right our steaming bowl of water is
ready so we can go ahead and dump that
out set on the table then take our pot
from the stove and pour our clear
solution in then let it sit for about an
hour
[Music]
not
[Music]
whoo that feels that pretty tight and
we’re just gonna let that cool for about
an hour what are the way that top makes
some interesting look at the mess I made
over here on the show that’s all the
stuff that sprayed out while we’re
cooking this could all be recovered and
used again good thing a little warm
water will clean that up in a jiffy
isn’t it because that looks like a royal
mess alright guys I want to give you a
quick update on some things that I’ve
been observing as we’ve been doing these
reactions number one for the first batch
that we mix in we actually put in so
much potassium nitrate it was absolutely
insane
when we transferred it to the dish
immediately we started seeing potassium
nitrate settling out of solution on the
bottom I’m not sure whether or not
they’re making crystals yet but I’ve put
that in the fridge to help it cool down
a little bit quicker now while that was
cooling just for fun I put together
another batch where we did another 3
cups of water but this time only two
cups of potassium nitrate and that is
this batch we’re looking at right here I
preheated the dish the same way so it
could cool down slower but the thing
that was really interesting to me was
something that I noticed in the pot the
pot cooled down quicker than the dish
did and now if we look down inside you
can see long sharp strands of potassium
nitrate crystals and that is what we’re
going for this dish over here has a
little bit more thermal mass you can see
crystals starting to form on the top and
eventually they will form on the inside
as well so we’re putting that to the
test and seeing what kind of results it
produces
[Music]
quick update guys I ran two different
batches the first one we did with three
and a half cups of nitrate and three
cups of water and we ended up with
something that looks like this I almost
look like a bowl full of cream of wheat
or something I’m not sure if that’s
crust over on the top and if we break
that away what we’ll find on the inside
but I also made another batch right here
the same three cups of water but this
time two cups of potassium nitrate so
almost half as much nitrate well you’ll
notice is the solution came through a
lot more clear and as a cool-down it
made these long strands of potassium
nitrate crystals which look very very
cool so let’s take our first bowl here
let’s break off that top crust look down
see we got inside and transfer off the
liquids so we can see kind of crystals
and down the bottom well blows me away
and this has been sitting in the fridge
for half an hour and it’s still warm
relatively speaking all right let’s see
how thick this layer is almost like a
creme brulee I’m just that top layer
really and you want to be delicate
because you don’t know what’s inside yet
it’s actually covered with so much water
let’s go ahead and dump this off and see
what we got there we go waters off oh
wow oh that’s her now better than
expected on the inside there look at all
those layers of crystals with shards
it’s almost like shards of broken glass
but a lot finer the walls here
it’s like half an inch to an inch thick
of nitrate but then you get all these
crystals in the middle it’s kind of like
a geode actually that’s spectacular
is there any more water to come off that
is pretty you can be relatively sure
that that is pure potassium nitrate
it blows me away is how thick these
walls are I mean dig into those later
but those crystals are beautiful aren’t
they
let’s take a second to appreciate that
these are so sharp and pointy it looks
kind of like the fortress that Superman
building give me hope Superman movies
fantastic lil bit pointy look at that
little potassium nitrate crystal so I’m
curious to see our second bowl here this
one was a very clear solution and as it
cooled down you can see already there
are nice beautiful shards at the bottom
let’s pour this liquid off next
[Music]
Oh already on the bottom you can see a
really cool crystalline structure did
that lattice thing and the reveal oh
that is beautiful absolutely gorgeous
look at that I think we nailed it I
think we figured it out two cups of
potassium nitrate – three cups of water
look at that one that’s just sticking
straight out like a long spike you know
what else is cool is the stuff we had
leftover in our pot made crystals at the
bottom as well so even our leftovers you
can just leave them in the pot and some
of these crystals look how long and
beautiful those are theoretically we
clean this up with ice-cold water and
clean up any impurities but crystals by
nature are about as perform that
substance as you can get so guys the
results are in and based on this set of
experiments if you want beautiful long
strong crystals
I would suggest three cups of water to
two cups of potassium nitrate or any
variation of that recipe the walls on
this dish are absolutely coated with
nitrate so I’m just gonna take a fork
and dig into it and see it looks like
it’s coming from the side here this it’s
kind of got a weird texture it’s kind of
squishy but kind of hard to get through
at the same time almost like wet salt
[Music]
okay so nothing really happening there
I mean it’s crystals on the inside but
it really is just this potassium nitrate
mush on the outside very nice stuff we
could dry that out it’s very usable but
it’s not nearly the crystalline effect
we’re going for it
but this here is my pride and joy look
at the difference there that is
absolutely perfect it’s gonna reach down
in there you can pull some of those out
those are cool looking fish
and these are just our leftovers and
they’re some of our nicest crystals and
look at that so we have done it guys we
have made crystals of potassium nitrate
and here’s how we made it happen we
started off by filling up a dish with
water and adding one tablespoon of
potassium nitrate to ice-cold water and
found that it didn’t really dissolve
very well in fact we couldn’t dissolve
more than about one and a half
tablespoons so he transferred the
solution to a pot put it on the stove
and let the whole thing come to a boil
where we found the hot water accepts
potassium nitrate a lot more readily
than cold water because we were able to
add over three and a half cups of our
potassium nitrate stump remover we
poured that solution into a preheated
Bowl to help it cool down a little more
slowly but it was so saturate with
potassium nitrate that the crystals
started coming out of solution almost
immediately so we whipped up the second
batch the same way but rather than using
three and a half cups we use two cups of
potassium nitrate and got a really cool
reaction that looks like this long thin
strands of sharp potassium nitrate
crystals that look absolutely gorgeous
what do they mean time guys thanks for
joining me for this experiment today
this is fairly safe it’s something that
you can try at home go grow yourself
some potassium nitrate crystals and let
me know in the comments how it worked
out for you thanks for joining you for
this video I’ll be looking for you the
next one talk to you then
like making snowballs nitrate crystal
snowball hi everyone my name is Nate and
there’s a good chance I’ll be joining
the king of random team that’s right
guys I’m bringing Nate on to help with
some of the projects and the videos here
on the king of random so he’s probably
gonna become a familiar face I just
wanted to pop in and introduce myself
see you around
[Music]
guys welcome back today we have a fun
little experiment with kitchen chemistry
we’re taking bottles of stump remover
and converting them into crystals of
potassium nitrate and if you look up the
MSDS these things claim to be 100%
potassium nitrate so this stuff should
work really well now you might be
wondering what the purpose of doing an
experiment like this is and it’s because
a crystal is one of the most pure forms
of a substance that you can get and the
whole idea is to leach nitrates from the
soil and produce very pure potassium
nitrate crystals through very natural
and very organic process you’ll see that
in a future video now to get started
let’s talk about solubility of things in
water we know a lot of things dissolved
in water but the question is how much of
it will dissolve and what are some of
the factors that affect that well first
of all the temperature of the water
itself can make an extreme difference in
the case of potassium nitrate it’s
actually not super soluble in cold water
but once the water approaches boiling it
can suck up a whole bunch of this stuff
I’ll show you what I’m talking about in
just a minute
[Music]
[Applause]
we just filled up this little bowl with
three cups of ice water it’s very cold
you can actually see some condensation
forming on the edges here so now that
it’s cold enough let’s go ahead and use
some measuring cups to measure potassium
nitrate into the bowl stir it up and see
how much of it we can get to dissolve
let’s start off with the tablespoon see
if it will take it
[Music]
one tablespoon
[Music]
look at that one tablespoon in quite a
difficult time
so potassium nitrate doesn’t really
dissolve that well in cold water but
let’s see what happens when we turn up
the heat
[Music]
all right so I’ve just got everything
transferred into the pot here I’ve added
1/2 a cup of potassium nitrate and I’m
slowly bringing the water up to a boil
when the water hits a boil I’m going to
keep it at that temperature and slowly
keep adding potassium nitrate until it
stops dissolving and the whole time I’ll
be taking notes on the measurements we
use all right I’m gonna go with another
1/2 cup all right that’s for one full
cup of potassium nitrate look at the
splatters underneath when this
solidifies to a metal surface it
immediately crystallizes back into that
white powder
all right we’ve reached boiling hot and
spill it over the edges a little bit as
well whoops here’s something else that’s
interesting watch the spoon as I take it
out of the solution it hits the air you
can see it crystallizes over as the air
hits it that’s a good sign that means
our solution is becoming supersaturated
those are crystals of potassium nitrate
you might be wondering a potassium
nitrate is poisonous and the answer is
no at least not in small concentrations
it just gives it a really interesting
place it’s not very desirable but it’s
not gonna kill you what an interesting
phenomenon it’s actually freezing and
melting at the surface where it meets
the air currents it’s mesmerizing so
here’s the update guys we’ve had our pot
simmering on high heat boiling in fact
for the last 15 minutes and we have
added a total of 3 and 3/4 cups of
potassium nitrate now granted some of
that has spilled out around the edges so
I’m gonna call it three and a half cups
of potassium nitrate in the water that’s
in there now while that doesn’t factor
off for any other water that’s boiled
off in the meantime I think we’re good
going along with that so the next step
to making our potassium nitrate crystals
is to take a clean glass bowl like this
and transfer that solution into it now
this bowl is very cold now to expect
those crystals to form very quickly
maybe a little bit too quickly now when
making a crystal we want the solution to
cool down as slowly as possible so
before I make the transfer I’m gonna
stick some water in this bowl put it in
the microwave so that it’s brought up
the temperature before we transfer the
solution
[Music]
all right our steaming bowl of water is
ready so we can go ahead and dump that
out set on the table then take our pot
from the stove and pour our clear
solution in then let it sit for about an
hour
[Music]
not
[Music]
whoo that feels that pretty tight and
we’re just gonna let that cool for about
an hour what are the way that top makes
some interesting look at the mess I made
over here on the show that’s all the
stuff that sprayed out while we’re
cooking this could all be recovered and
used again good thing a little warm
water will clean that up in a jiffy
isn’t it because that looks like a royal
mess alright guys I want to give you a
quick update on some things that I’ve
been observing as we’ve been doing these
reactions number one for the first batch
that we mix in we actually put in so
much potassium nitrate it was absolutely
insane
when we transferred it to the dish
immediately we started seeing potassium
nitrate settling out of solution on the
bottom I’m not sure whether or not
they’re making crystals yet but I’ve put
that in the fridge to help it cool down
a little bit quicker now while that was
cooling just for fun I put together
another batch where we did another 3
cups of water but this time only two
cups of potassium nitrate and that is
this batch we’re looking at right here I
preheated the dish the same way so it
could cool down slower but the thing
that was really interesting to me was
something that I noticed in the pot the
pot cooled down quicker than the dish
did and now if we look down inside you
can see long sharp strands of potassium
nitrate crystals and that is what we’re
going for this dish over here has a
little bit more thermal mass you can see
crystals starting to form on the top and
eventually they will form on the inside
as well so we’re putting that to the
test and seeing what kind of results it
produces
[Music]
quick update guys I ran two different
batches the first one we did with three
and a half cups of nitrate and three
cups of water and we ended up with
something that looks like this I almost
look like a bowl full of cream of wheat
or something I’m not sure if that’s
crust over on the top and if we break
that away what we’ll find on the inside
but I also made another batch right here
the same three cups of water but this
time two cups of potassium nitrate so
almost half as much nitrate well you’ll
notice is the solution came through a
lot more clear and as a cool-down it
made these long strands of potassium
nitrate crystals which look very very
cool so let’s take our first bowl here
let’s break off that top crust look down
see we got inside and transfer off the
liquids so we can see kind of crystals
and down the bottom well blows me away
and this has been sitting in the fridge
for half an hour and it’s still warm
relatively speaking all right let’s see
how thick this layer is almost like a
creme brulee I’m just that top layer
really and you want to be delicate
because you don’t know what’s inside yet
it’s actually covered with so much water
let’s go ahead and dump this off and see
what we got there we go waters off oh
wow oh that’s her now better than
expected on the inside there look at all
those layers of crystals with shards
it’s almost like shards of broken glass
but a lot finer the walls here
it’s like half an inch to an inch thick
of nitrate but then you get all these
crystals in the middle it’s kind of like
a geode actually that’s spectacular
is there any more water to come off that
is pretty you can be relatively sure
that that is pure potassium nitrate
it blows me away is how thick these
walls are I mean dig into those later
but those crystals are beautiful aren’t
they
let’s take a second to appreciate that
these are so sharp and pointy it looks
kind of like the fortress that Superman
building give me hope Superman movies
fantastic lil bit pointy look at that
little potassium nitrate crystal so I’m
curious to see our second bowl here this
one was a very clear solution and as it
cooled down you can see already there
are nice beautiful shards at the bottom
let’s pour this liquid off next
[Music]
Oh already on the bottom you can see a
really cool crystalline structure did
that lattice thing and the reveal oh
that is beautiful absolutely gorgeous
look at that I think we nailed it I
think we figured it out two cups of
potassium nitrate – three cups of water
look at that one that’s just sticking
straight out like a long spike you know
what else is cool is the stuff we had
leftover in our pot made crystals at the
bottom as well so even our leftovers you
can just leave them in the pot and some
of these crystals look how long and
beautiful those are theoretically we
clean this up with ice-cold water and
clean up any impurities but crystals by
nature are about as perform that
substance as you can get so guys the
results are in and based on this set of
experiments if you want beautiful long
strong crystals
I would suggest three cups of water to
two cups of potassium nitrate or any
variation of that recipe the walls on
this dish are absolutely coated with
nitrate so I’m just gonna take a fork
and dig into it and see it looks like
it’s coming from the side here this it’s
kind of got a weird texture it’s kind of
squishy but kind of hard to get through
at the same time almost like wet salt
[Music]
okay so nothing really happening there
I mean it’s crystals on the inside but
it really is just this potassium nitrate
mush on the outside very nice stuff we
could dry that out it’s very usable but
it’s not nearly the crystalline effect
we’re going for it
but this here is my pride and joy look
at the difference there that is
absolutely perfect it’s gonna reach down
in there you can pull some of those out
those are cool looking fish
and these are just our leftovers and
they’re some of our nicest crystals and
look at that so we have done it guys we
have made crystals of potassium nitrate
and here’s how we made it happen we
started off by filling up a dish with
water and adding one tablespoon of
potassium nitrate to ice-cold water and
found that it didn’t really dissolve
very well in fact we couldn’t dissolve
more than about one and a half
tablespoons so he transferred the
solution to a pot put it on the stove
and let the whole thing come to a boil
where we found the hot water accepts
potassium nitrate a lot more readily
than cold water because we were able to
add over three and a half cups of our
potassium nitrate stump remover we
poured that solution into a preheated
Bowl to help it cool down a little more
slowly but it was so saturate with
potassium nitrate that the crystals
started coming out of solution almost
immediately so we whipped up the second
batch the same way but rather than using
three and a half cups we use two cups of
potassium nitrate and got a really cool
reaction that looks like this long thin
strands of sharp potassium nitrate
crystals that look absolutely gorgeous
what do they mean time guys thanks for
joining me for this experiment today
this is fairly safe it’s something that
you can try at home go grow yourself
some potassium nitrate crystals and let
me know in the comments how it worked
out for you thanks for joining you for
this video I’ll be looking for you the
next one talk to you then
like making snowballs nitrate crystal
snowball hi everyone my name is Nate and
there’s a good chance I’ll be joining
the king of random team that’s right
guys I’m bringing Nate on to help with
some of the projects and the videos here
on the king of random so he’s probably
gonna become a familiar face I just
wanted to pop in and introduce myself
see you around
[Music]
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