burning metal

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From: Eric Muller (emuller@exploratorium.edu)
Date: Tue Jan 09 2001 - 10:30:28 PST 

Message-Id: <l03110700b68109230b93@[192.174.3.228]>
Date: Tue, 9 Jan 2001 11:30:28 -0700
From: Eric Muller <emuller@exploratorium.edu>
Subject: burning metal

Sally,
I've had good luck with steel wool. I usually use a very fine grade of
wool; this increases the surface area tremendously. The steel wool requires
a LOT of oxygen. I always burned it in a heat resistant container and
either spray oxygen on it or blow on it. If you blow on it, you might want
to use a glass tube. This will keep your face away from the sparks and
vapors (Most steel wool is coated with some oil to keep it from rusting.
This oil sends up a lot of smoke). If you want to do quantitative
measurements (i.e.get data that is within ballpark range), you have to make
sure to reduce the amount of sparks that fly off.

Eric Muller
Staff Teacher
Exploratorium
3601 Lyon St.
San Francisco, CA 94123
415-561-0313
email:emuller@exploratorium.edu

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