Australia's Science Forum

How have you got your working solutions catagorised?

We have ours in (mostly) 1L reagent bottles (the ones with the blue screw top lids), in drip trays, on open shelving. They are loosly in alphabetical order with the acids and major bases separate.

So how do you do it?

I'm in the process of doing a big tidy up and need some ideas please!

Well, mine are in 500ml bottles mainly, and in a cupboard. That is for the made up 0.1M chemical solutions, they are in alphabetical order. Different strengths are behind the main bottle. EXCEPT: I have Hydrochloric acid solutions and sulfuric acid solutions in a cupboard of their own. I also keep NaOH solutions, actually with my distilled water stock, in another cupboard. Ammonia solutions are in yet another cupboard, as is limewater. This is all in my preproom.
My flammables (in alphabetical order) cupboard is in the Chemstore room as is my stocks of conc HCl and other acids - in an acid bay.
Hope this helps.

Thanks Dime. What is the reason that you store lime water separate? or is it just space issue? I have my pot. permanganates and pot. iodides in a cupboard, mainly to keep them out of the light and space/mess issues.

I'm actually not sure about the limewater, whereas there were issues with the others. Nothing seems to pop into the old brain, so I'm pretty sure it was just a space issue.
Cheers

I keep my diluted solutions in their classification storage zones. A: I have no room and B: if there's a spill there's less drama as I dont have to worry about adverse chemical reactions. So, for example, the 5.1's are on the top shelf in alphabetical order (in the 5.1 cupboard) and the dilute soln's are on the bottom shelf of that cupboard. But the 6.1's have their diluted soln's just in front of the solid (or conc liquid), except for theCuSo4 which has its own spot as there's heaps of it made up, but dilute acids are in a sep storage to bulk conc. acids. But as I said no room- I have only 1 Prep/storage room. (Pending new build....fingers crossed!!!)

How do you store your Sodium Metal??? and 4.1 I have just got sodium metal in and about to put it into a secondary container half full of sand, and cover in oil. Does anyone store this in a seperate cabinet??? I am running out of space, no seperate cabinet.At the moment due to lack of space it is on a seperate open shelf!!! running out of room for my 4.1 as all need to be seperate???? does any one have any better idea's or future idea's???:banghead:

I have my Sodium inside a container covered with oil, which is in a dessicator which contains sand and in the Flammable Solids cabinet.
Ditto for Potassium. It also contains magnesium, calcium, sulfur and iron and aluminium powder.
I have two corrosive liquids cabinets. In one I have Hydrochloric, Butyric, sulfuric. In another I have nitric all by itself and then I have a metal container with the acetic in it.. all because you are not supposed to store nitric with anything else, and acetic with anything else I have now run out of space..
In my flammable liquids cabinet I have all these various containers, because there are many things that should not be stored together, and I have no option but to put them into the cabinet, so I figure the best I can do is separate them into different storage containers .
For the Silver, lead and barium nitrate, I have them stored in old metal card filing boxes...
It is impossible to follow the correct storage guidelines when you have only one smal chemical store room.

Mine is on the top shelf of the flammable cabinet along with the other group 4 chemicals.

It is just in its bottle it came in.

My sodium is in a jar (in oil) and on a shelf with the other flammable solids. ie nothing special really.

My sodium is stored the same as Dime's, in it's original jar.

Lack of space makes it very hard to seperate! Glad I am not the only one with the space issue!!! next years budget a flammable solid cabinet. 4.1 and 4.3 will have to be stored in that!!!! even though they say segregate....ahhhhhh!!

I thought Sodium was on the "banned in schools" list?

Sodium definitely OK in SA schools

SOdium is not banned, it only for use by a techer. No student at all. Taken from the CSIS.

Hi All,

Working solution I have here are stored in screw cap bottles 250mL or 500mL depending of the working use of each solution. Ten in a plastic tote tray for ease of carting and sorting on shelves.

Depending on the space you have will determine your method of storage also....

Sodium well.......... I will leave it there for discussion amongst yourselves as you all have methods of storage and that's fine, because you all have this undercontrol and within the limits of proper segregation. And as long as it is safe and kept under oil, well it's not Rocket Science... heee...

Cheers,

Robb.....

Hi Everyone,
Does anyone know whether diluted chemicals from 0.01 to 1M chemicals can be stored in alphabetical order or do I have to follow the the concentrated powder & liquid (bulk) storage zones?

Thanks Superbug

I store mine in alphabetical order, along with every thing else it is stored in alphabetical order. But in class groups.

does that mean the smaller solution bottles need to be in class group and alphabetical order as well or just alphabetical group will do?

I've only ever had them in alphabetical order nobody has ever said class groups as well. The auditors have never said any different. Please don't tell me I need to arrange everything again.

But do check your CSIS class groups, plus a-z.

SOme vapours react with other vapours, which is they must be in their groups or class's.

Then A_Z