Hey, guys! Despite what you've been told in school,
fire is not the only thing that can cause hydrogen to explode.
This black powder in my hands is platinum
Platinum-group metals possess high catalytic activity within a whole range of reactions,
such as hydrogen oxidation reaction that I'm going to talk about in this video.
If we direct hydrogen flow at platinum powder,
platinum becomes red-hot,
while hydrogen ignites
A few seconds after hydrogen contacts with platinum,
my thermal imager shows the temperature increase to above 400°C
So, I’ll put a little bit of platinum powder in the test tube
and sink two tubes in there.
Oxygen will flow through the left tube,
and hydrogen will flow through the right one.
Now, hydrogen is already flowing
and we can see water vapor covering the inner walls of the test tube
due to slow and steady oxidation of hydrogen by atmospheric oxygen.
And now I’m releasing oxygen flow, which will cause the explosion of the gas mixture
To make the demonstration more visual
I took a three-necked flask.
I released oxygen flow through the left neck, and hydrogen will flow through the right one
I’ll also add some platinum powder in the middle neck,
which will again cause the explosion of the gas mixture,
followed by a peculiar sound that resembles humming in water pipes
The closer hydrogen and oxygen concentration ratio to 2 to 1 is,
which con-forms to the stoichiometry of the water formation reaction,
the more powerful the explosion of the gas mixture will be
I began to wonder whether
I’ll be able to get an even more powerful explosion if I use ozonated oxygen instead of oxygen
So, the first time I tried it,
I got the mixture low in hydrogen,
and we can hear that humming noise again.
In slow-mo, you can actually see platinum powder vibrate as it passes through the middle neck
In this shot I increased the concentration of hydrogen in the mixture,
thus achieving a very powerful explosion that, in the end, destroyed my three-necked flask I used for this experiment
Thanks for watching, guys, and special thanks to my dear patrons!
You can also say Super Thanks to me or join my Patreon,
which will help me to get some new glass equipment for my upcoming experiments!
Seeya in the next video.