Sage advice

[fivemack]

From a materials safety data sheet which I thought at first was a joke (since it was clearly referring to silicon dioxide, ie glass) - it turns out to be referring to a teflon-coated glass fibre for use in weaving linings for furnaces, which needed an MSDS since it turns into something worryingly like asbestos when strongly heated.

INCOMPATIBILITY (Materials to Avoid):

Molten alkali metals. Reacts with xenon hexafluoride to produce xenon trioxide. May react with hydrofluoric acid to produce silicon tetrafluoride gas. Avoid oxygen difluoride, chlorine trifluoride and hot phosphoric acid.

I would like to assert my heart-felt agreement with the last sentence of that paragraph.

Comments

[tombee.livejournal.com]

:) That's advice of the same quality as "avoid any Virgos or Leos with the Ebola virus", isn't it?

So exactly what do you use to store oxygen triflouride? a magnetic bottle? a ziplock bag? that hollowed out lump of rubidium over there?

[fivemack.livejournal.com]

Generally, you keep reactive compounds in vessels already thoroughly reacted-with. For example, lots of the early work on fluorine was in vessels carved out of calcium fluoride (a moderately conveniently available rock).

A Teflon ziplock bag might work, were the substance not a gas. I suspect you probably store it in stainless-steel cylinders, and it produces a layer of iron fluoride on the inside which is then attacked no further.

Found a table of handling instructions:

Avoid:
bromine
chlorine
combustible materials
hydrocarbons
hydrogen sulfide
iodine
metal oxides
moist air
platinum
water

There is something to be said for any chemical violently averse both to platinum and to water.