Make Concentrated Ammonia

In this video we make ammonia gas and dissolve it water from various chemicals easily accessible to the amateur.
The first method is merely boiling household ammonia solution that's domestically available from the local supermarket. The ammonia boiled out is lead into cold water where it can be dissolved. While this did work the yield was quite low at around 2.5g per 100mL of household ammonia solution. From the 600mL of ammonia solution used only about 15g was obtained.
The second method was to revisit the classic method to produce sodium nitrate from ammonium nitrate and sodium hydroxide by dissolving them both separately in water and then mixing them together and trying to boil out the ammonia. This worked terribly and i got almost no yield at all.
The third method that seemed to work the best was to react urea and sodium hydroxide in water. This reaction was well-behaved, steady and easily performed with domestically available chemicals. Starting from 200mL water, 90g urea and 120g sodium hydroxide, about 38.6g of ammonia was obtained.
I intend to use the ammonia in a future project to make nitric acid.
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[@NurdRage]

I still don't have a lab. So my next video will likely be something simple like the classic chemical garden reaction.

[@rttr5777]

Your videos are always amazing! Keep going!

[@piranha031091]

What? How did you lose your lab?

[@thedankside2552]

Ah yes I also tend to lose my lab, have you tried checking between the couch cushions?

[@GRBtutorials]

piranha031091 Yeah, I’m also wondering that. Looked in Twitter and found nothing.

[@Tyresio12]

Or maybe a road dust plus iodine/iodide solution to extract platinum group metals? (similar to Cody)

[@piranha031091]

I once purified 37% ammonia by adding it dropwise (I even used a syringe pump!) to some sodium hydroxide granules, to convert it to the gaseous ammonia, and bubbling the output in pure water. (I wanted it to be free of carbonates). It worked great. So something similar with household ammonia could work too. ^^

[@kevino6416]

piranha031091 - you should make a video of it.

[@piranha031091]

@@kevino6416 That was in my old lab, I don't work there anymore, and I don't have a use for that stuff in the foreseeable future. But I _do_ plan to make more chemistry videos! ^^

[@sevenproxies4255]

I'll admit: I only understand about 10% of the content. But I still find chemistry fascinating. And the videos are still interesting to watch. Like ASMR for a nerd/enthusiast.

[@asensniper]

That was exactly me 7 years ago when I first stumbled onto this channel.. I just got done completing my graduate degree in organic chemistry!

[@davemwangi05]

@@asensniper where do you apply it?

[@davemwangi05]

@@cvspvr I'll apply it to my other balls, 'cause they already are acclimatized to the smelly ammonia in the urine. Plus it makes women turned on.

[@everythinghate666]

@@davemwangi05 where do these ladies hangout?

[@grantpickens2704]

You are the best chemist channel on KZbin, period

[@-Kerstin]

I'm so addicted to your videos. I really hope you can release videos more often at some point

[@kkslove]

Ostwald process! Yeaah!!! I would love to see a video series about the Ostwald process, like you did with sodium production. OTC nitric acid production for amateur chemists is the next level. Astral Chemistry proved, that it´s possible. And i think you can bring this to perfection!

[@reactivechem7408]

Thank you for this video, you just cut down my research for searching how to make really concentrated ammonia easily to no time at all. 👍

[@Andrew-my1cp]

Lmao I find you everywhere 😂

[@johnh7631]

We appreciate all your continued work operating without a lab. hope you find yourself in a new one soon!

[@ninil.9287]

Thank you! The urea route was stuck in my head since Doug's Lab stated that it would foam a lot when he tried it.

[@kennedy67951]

Almost ready to design and make the old styli cooling units of the 40 and 50's. Good video.

[@hugo3913]

I Did Amoniumsulfate and sodium hydroxide but I struggled to with lots of water due to suckback . Keep it up my friend love your videos

[@TJTinerella]

I am not a trained Chemist however, I worked in the QC lab at a Ink Manufacture where we used Aqueous Ammonia in solution to liquify Acrylic Resin chip. When added to solution it never created suds. All Ammonia sold in the Grocery stores have surfactants. If your Ammonia forms suds when added into H2o then it's not pure....Your Urea process created Ammonia solution at the concentration we used for liquifying resin so congrats on that. ..Oh and for some reason I miss the smell of Ammonia, To this day 25 years later I can directly smell a bottle of store Amm. and not even flinch.

[@Nuovoswiss]

The reaction between NaOH and NH4NO3 can be run more "gently" by pre-cooling both in the freezer, then just adding an ice cube as the "catalytic" water.

[@floraamazon8]

Can we use the amonnia produced at home for fertilizers?

[@Nuovoswiss]

@@floraamazon8 Ammonium nitrate is already a good fertilizer. No reason to convert it to ammonia gas if you want to use it for fertilizer.

[@floraamazon8]

@@Nuovoswiss Thank you for the answer.

[@barry7608]

Thank you for your vids, so well understood. Do you have any compilation videos that can be purchased. It’s difficult to always search back to find what I’m looking at.

[@andywells8125]

Another great video-hope you get your lab back!!

[@lbochtler]

this is very useful for me. since i need ammonia to clean high vacuum ceramic parts

[@RaExpIn]

I usually add saturated ammonium chloride solution to solid potassium hydroxide or sodium hydroxide, which works pretty good. And the heat produced lowers the solubility.

[@garethdean6382]

Whenever I want quick ammonia gas I just slowly dampen a finely ground mixture of the two substances. I've noticed it takes a while for the reaction to go to completion, but with cheap starting materials I've had pretty good yields. Is the release really that uncontrollable? Did you try dropwise addition of water?

[@shahin8349]

Im very excited to see your Ostwald process video , please make it soon

[@joshsk8erx1]

So excited for video on the cheap high yeild method for making nitric acid. The stuff is expensive to buy.

[@sriramkompella5728]

Hey NurdRage, you could try the ammonium nitrate method by not using an NaOH solution. Instead, you could try just mixing the two ingredients dry in your reaction flask, and adding an addition funnel with a minimal amount of water. As you said, it is less controllable than the urea method, but it will produce relatively drier ammonia with minimal additional drying steps, as heat is not needed, and will not bring over any extra water. Additionally, with this method you can also produce sodium nitrate as a byproduct, with minimal contaminants, which is an added bonus.

[@chrisp190]

Can't wait to see the Oswald reaction! Are you going to make a video on making the Platinum catalyst too?

[@SteezyMcDude]

Thanks! This will be of great help for a project I'm concocting for my son when he misbehaves.

[@cherrybaderry500]

Your gassing your son with ammonia?

[@SteezyMcDude]

@@cherrybaderry500 Parent your own children.

[@MadsKjerulff]

Urea can also be bought as Diesel exhaust fluid in an aqueous solution of 32.5% urea and 67.5% deionized water. Not sure how the prices compare to coldpacks or fertilizer, though.

[@rcaazevedo5301]

Very interesting congratulations. What procedure is done to extract ammonium perchlorate

[@thedankside2552]

God the timing is perfect was just about to look this up, thanks!

[@toddkobelljr.2004]

For what can i ask?

[@fieroboom]

FYI, if you're looking for larger amounts of Urea than what you find in cold packs, Diesel Exhaust Fluid is just a fairly saturated solution of 45% Urea & 55% water. I would imagine that you can make some fairly concentrated ammonia using DEF & Crystal drain opener without really concentrating or modifying either product. The DEF would contain a little more than the preferred amount of water, and sometimes the drain opener is a mix of KOH & NaOH, but it would be super quick in a pinch... 🤷‍♂️

[@seymourpro6097]

Adblue is a retail available solution of urea at about 30% -used for reacting with NOx in a car exhaust pipe to reduce emmissions

[@BothHands1]

how did you lose your lab?? :( that's awful

[@homosapiensqp3225]

Is that the end of NR?

[@bangbangliu2146]

He made a community post about it.

[@BothHands1]

Bangbang Liu ty!

[@illustriouschin]

@@bangbangliu2146 A more helpful answer would be that he got laid off from his job and can't afford a lab right now.

[@homosapiensqp3225]

@@illustriouschin thank you

[@Gendo3s2k]

Next time "getting ammonia from urine!"

[@matttuck5010]

Check out NileRed's video on pee processing. He extracted urea, though.

[@jauzijau5037]

Hey man, its pretty easy. Extract the urea. Heat it up in a test tube. Collect the gas. Heatin urea forms NH3 and CO2

[@Polarcupcheck]

One thing I thought was unusual was researcher saying you don't want to let urine degrade into ammonia before applying to a crop, yet, farmers side dress corn crops with anhydrous ammonia. So, I am guessing, you can side dress crops with straight urine.

[@davemwangi05]

@@Polarcupcheck You mean dress crops, as in putting a skirt on your crops? LOL

[@sebastianborusinski351]

Hello NR, I actually done succesfully this type of acquiring ammonia. Here's a tip, don't dissolve urea in water and don't use NaOH. Simply heat up the urea. During the process the ammonia gas is formed and urea condenses to form biuret.

[@danielbrowniel]

yay, Im on a list now

[@r.b.ratieta6111]

Yay! You're still alive!

[@omsingharjit]

Plz make video on how to handle glass equipment properly for heating Bcoz i cracked my some beakers but now i have costly borosilicate glass which i afraid to test on heat .

[@Tim-Kaa]

Hi, can you please make a vid on how to make hydrazine (aq. solution) which can be used to turn silver chloride into pure silver? Thanks!

[@Lukegear]

Nice a new video!

[@SheikhN-bible-syndrome]

Could you bubble the gass into a non polar solvent like MEK or toluene so that you can later use it with sodium metals or lithium metals to produce solvated electrons without having having two deal with pure ammonia in order to complete a birch reduction? For people that cant properly have the setup needed for properly using anhydrous ammonia and lithium easily?.

[@EgnachHelton]

This video... I can smell it through the screen!

[@XxAILASxX]

Is it possible to make ammonia into the anhydrous form like that used for industrial refrigerant? Besides being dangerous are there any uses for it outside of refrigerant or death?

[@ceasargaming9041]

What about thermal decomposition of Ammonia Carbonate? I have been wanting to try it, but since it decomposes into Carbon Dioxide and Ammonia Gas, I am worried bubbling this into distilled water will just yield more Ammonia Carbonate. From research, I have also found Ammonia Carbamate and Urea may also form

[@danrivera8642]

Nurd rage I have a question. What if you put your cold trap in a ice bath? Would you get a higher concentrate since ammonia concentrates more at lower temperatures?

[@tokajileo5928]

I mixed solid NH4Cl with solid NaOH and it created extremely concentrated NH3 gas. no water was added.just strong mixing.

[@stephenjacks8196]

May I suggest Ammonium Sulfate and Calcium Oxide (aka Lime). Cheap 25 pound bags in the fertilizer section of Stores. I also used that with acetone to make 2,2,6,6 tetramethyl 4 piperidone. Calcium Hydroxide also works as CaSO4 absorbs water.

[@designworksdw1949]

Thx for the video, i was wondering awhile back you said you may be on a tv show in the future, what ever happened with that?

[@dodoipav]

for NH4NO3/NaOH method I would try to disolve onely NaOH in water and then dripping it to NH4NO3 powder in a flask. It uses a lot less water so it should give higher yield.

[@bobwerner6512]

I remember the old Pig barn I worked in as a kid would make Ammonia all on its own...lol

[@tresavage1887]

Can you extract sulfur from bones or bone marrow and separate the calcium and sulfur

[@ianrinehart3762]

At position 10 minutes is a clear shot of what I am interested in. On the receiver flask is a glass T joint which fits into another glass thingy. Can anyone tell me what that combo is called? thank you.

[@alllove1754]

What about adding a dehydrating salt to the ammonia solution? Seems hydroxide gets way to hot, unless added REALLY SLOWLY. Chlorides or aulfates? Not feeling chlorides. P205? How about pouring through charcoal? Itll capture the ammonia, perhaps. Then release by heat or place in ice water after ammonia enriched and crush to powder.. idk..

[@spiderdude2099]

I suspect the dilute ammonia solution from Walmart would have given better yield if some NaOH was added.

[@djscholastic]

How can you pass a steam of nitrogen gas through a flask ? As well as performing titration on the ammonia gas that's created from the nitrogen gas ?

[@aetius31]

I think using ammonium carbonate (which is sold as baking powder) could be also an option. Either by decomposing it at 50°c or by reacting it with calcium hydroxide.

[@hanelyp1]

With thermal decomposition I expect you'd need to remove the CO2 for most uses, such as by passing over a hydroxide.

[@Cristi0986]

Can be use (NH4)2CO3 in water? The co2 should release in air and remain NH4Oh solution no?

[@vidhyajagdale3433]

How you greased the joints as you can't grease it with sulphuric acid

[@spookycola18]

So glad I found this!! Just need to find out how to make Bleach.

[@bakonfreek]

I'm here for the chemistry, but I can't help notice the name Mettler Toledo on one of the scales. They make a few QA instruments used at the place I work (now, I don't work on them as I'm a mechanic and not an electrician.. yet, but I've seen that name quite a lot where I work).

[@XenXenOfficial]

Funny, I was just googling how to remove ammonia from my fish tank the other day

[@Mr.LaughingDuck]

Neat. Though when you mentioned urea, I thought you did it the same way NileRed got his urea...

[@trollmcclure1884]

can you dry the ammonia water with CaO or molecular sieve?

[@lovehawks2814]

Another potential useful source of urea is pet safe sidewalk salt. $10-$12 for a gallon jug of the stuff. The downside is that it is often colored (usually blue).

[@alexredacted2123]

Extractions&Ire devised a much better suckback trap utilizing an aquarium air pump to provide positive pressure on the whole system. Also, I've found that for many purposes (such as the precipitation of silver metal from AgClxNH3 complex) I can simply mix ammonium sulfate fertilizer and alkali together in solution without the need for percolation at all.

[@brad885]

Where in the country are you located? Office complexes are pretty cheap if you're looking for a smaller size lab.

[@mcore1435]

The only time I’ve ever gotten a strong ammonia solution (around 24%) by heating household ammonia was using ace hardware janitorial ammonia solution as my starter, Walmart ammonia sucks it’s barely even good for cleaning lol although I agree urea and sodium hydroxide is the best route

[@cherrybaderry500]

Yea Walmart around me is usually 3% not 10%

[@SolarSeeker45]

Ammonium chloride and sodium hydroxide works very well for me.

[@stephenjacks8196]

Can get 25# bags of lime and ammonium sulfate at the garden/hardware store. React in glycol, Calcium Sulfate byproduct dehydrates. Bakery supply has Ammonium Carbonate sold as residue free baking powder. It sublimes at STP as Ammonia and CO2.

[@mxzhang8836]

maybe you can try heat up Ca(OH)2 and NH4Cl solid mixture (A method from Chinese chemistry textbook)

[@darianballard2074]

I used ammonium chloride and sodium hydroxide.

[@TheHuntermj]

The second method is viable for steady output if you add concentrated Ammonium salt solution to dry sodium hydroxide or vise versa.

[@marshfield01]

Bulk diesel exhaust fluid may be a cheaper feed stock for the last reaction.

[@waltersobchak7275]

Feedstock I remember saying feedstock along time ago.🤔🤔 What you know bout that huh??🌻🐝

[@dtrotteryt]

Ammonia + iodine crystals = touchy fun

[@danielrouw2593]

Once you have a lab again could you show a simple method of producing anhydrous aluminum chloride?

[@user-py9cy1sy9u]

ANHYDROUS ALUMINIUM CHLORIDE www.bitchute.com/video/OUAQvSq2YLU2/

[@flyingmojo5]

Would potassium hydroxide work as well?

[@Jayenh]

So, the urea + propylene glycol + catalyst (I use zinc oxide) => propylene carbonate reaction generates lots and lots of ammonia. Feed it through a gas washer or your other preferred bubbler ... you get a twofer. Also note that the solution becomes less dense as the concentration of ammonia increases, so more room than you might expect is needed.... There might be (probably is) some non-ammonia passing through the bubbler, but I think a lot of it winds up as ammonium carbamate (almost certain) deposited in the reflux condenser and vacuum tubing etc. I'm assuming that something in the mixture is decomposing into something that includes CO2....

[@Pibblesncatsnreptilesngats72]

@NurdRage is it possible to further concentrate a solution of ammonium hydroxide 50% v/v?

[@michaelsteinberg205]

Doesn't sodium hydroxide mixed with urea give you sodium cyanide? You mentioned that in a previous video as a possibility instead of using cyanuric acid.

[@rainwater397]

I was able to get a better yield by saturating a solution of household ammonia with an excessive amount nacl and applying low heat @ 50c. After the reaction quit bubbling and most of the salt was dissolve the solution had almost no ammonia smell and a ph of 7

[@oneofthechannelsofalltime]

Baking soda + Ammonium Sulphate works too. But I don't know how to separate the Na2SO4 and water.

[@okay8632]

Anyone tried ammonia synthesis by thermal decomposition of ammonium bicarbonate?

[@Fandikusnadi1979]

can you give how to make hydrazine , more effiecient.

[@enricocaponnetto3488]

I have a request for you can you make carbon tetrabromide?

[@filipandrei841]

What about ammonium carbonate decomposition? It should produce 2 moles of ammonia/1 mole of water.

[@r0cketplumber]

Once upon a time office supply stores carried very strong ammonia for diazo (blueprint) printers.

[@tiamaria7424]

The video is very good, but it is incomplete, you do not say the data of the experiment with the NH4CL

[@SafetyLucas]

Could household ammonia solution be concentrated by partial freezing?

[@mwilson14]

I captured my ammonia in a round bottom flask receiver soaking in a bath of dry ice cooled acetone. It worked very well until I accidently let some water distill over. It was still strong enough to burn my skin on contact as I fumbled to remove the flask. Not a proud moment for me.

[@spiritofage8235]

Household ammonia path: what if saturate it with some salt to knock down solubility of NH3. Preferably NaOH/KOH, they also should bring ton of -OH ions and shift the equilibria towards free ammonia (same as nitrate path, but w/o nitrate, depends what is cheaper to use).

[@jordanmeier5883]

So is this producing NH3? Anhydrous?

[@robloggia]

Would bubbling ammonia into an aqueous solution of sodium hydroxide cause the sodium hydroxide to precipitate out?

[@obst3085]

Sodium hydroxide dissolves unbelievably good in water (over 25M; over 1kg/L water). This makes up for a high hydroxide concentration in the solution, hindering the dissolving of the ammonia gas (NH3) which is driven by is dissociation into ions. As there are so many OH- ions, it can't dissociate into NH4+ / OH- and thereby not dissolve well. In contrary, adding sodium hydroxide to a ammonium salt (as shown) releases ammonia gas. In an alkaline solution (extra NaOH or concentrated NH4OH), the ammonia is actually mostly undissociated (NH4OH), which causes the strong smell as this decomposes more easily to "free" gaseous NH3 and water. In conclusion: No, precipitating NaOH is almost impossible, especially not in that way. Hope this helps!

[@awesomefacepalm]

Can you make anhydrous water?

[@adrianruggero]

Have you ever tried to do it with both dry chemicals, not using 2ater, due to them both drawing moister from the air

[@adrianruggero]

Water

[@matttuck5010]

Awesome video! One question, and one suggestion. Question: Can the solution in a used instant cold pack really be used as fertilizer as is? Can I literally dump ammonium nitrate onto my kale plants? Suggestion: Please, please, please be more specific when talking about heat. You always say you are heating some random solution, but hardly ever say at what temperature! I have a heat plate, but it only reaches 100C, so I need to know which projects I am capable of doing. Other than that, your videos are amazing, I always feel smarter after watching them!

[@brocktechnology]

The temperature is up to the solution. The hotplate has very little to say about it. I'm guessing you think your hotplate only goes to 100 C because you tried it with water. Try it with a can of sand and you'll see what it can really do.

[@htomerif]

You can also get almost pure urea cheap(ish) as pet-safe ice melt. I've got a ton of ammonium sulfate. I wonder if it would be effective to boil ammonia off a mixture of that and sodium or potassium hydroxide, or if it would end up with the same uncontrolled reaction as with ammonium nitrate?

[@htomerif]

@Desmond Bagley Makes sense. Honestly I just have this 50 lb bag of ammonium sulfate and am trying to think of uses for it.

[@htomerif]

@Desmond Bagley It would be interesting to try to do it on my own but I've dealt with ammonia cycle propane powered freezers before. They're pretty common in off-grid hunting and hiking cabins. Unfortunately most of the things I do don't go beyond the proof of concept stage. I tend to lose interest when I know I can do a thing. I did make some (very) weak ammonia solution with electrolysis of the ammonium sulfate using graphite electrodes.

[@Andrew-my1cp]

Sweet. Knowing that boiling household ammonia works is good! I just need a purer form of ammonia instead of the household ammonia with detergents.

[@davemwangi05]

also boiling pee works excellently, especially the yellow one. Just don't drink a lot of water, and eat a kilo of meat.

[@cherrybaderry500]

If you have a ace hardware near you they have 10% ammonia that’s very pure so you can boil it into another flask of ace ammonia so your starting with 10% instead of water. You can easily make 30% like this

[@Felixkeeg]

You lost your lab? What do you mean by that, exactley?

[@UnprofessionalProfessor]

**KABOOM**

[@lonewalker5446]

I think he lost his job :(

[@toddgillespie8165]

Household ammonia with muriatic, then drying out the salt, then recovering the gas with a base always worked fine for me.

[@SheikhN-bible-syndrome]

Do what now? Please go into more details I'm very interested

[@karolus28]

might as well buy ammonim chloride

[@cherrybaderry500]

@@SheikhN-bible-syndrome he said basically make ammonium chloride with ammonia and HCl then use the ammonium chloride with a base and make ammonia but it would be much easier and skip the first step and just buy ammonium chloride

[@caffeinatedinsanity2324]

Doesn't ammonia form ammonium hydroxide when dissolved in water?

[@Fandikusnadi1979]

is "water" means of pure H20 ?

[@timothyegoroff8333]

90 grams urea, + 120 grams NaOH, then slowly drip water into the solution while heating, ammonia gas is released without foaming, also water can be added all at once, but to stop foaming, add anti-foaming agent (2-octanol, polysiloxane or dimethylpolysiloxane) or I use a teaspoon of silicone or mineral oil which can reduce foaming quite a bit.

[@ronoxengineering]

I did a little reading and i noticed a flaw in the reaction. apparently some amounts of CO2 would be generated by this, potentially tainting the end product with ammonium carbonate, when hydrolizing urea with sodium hydroxide. were you aware of this? or is the contamination negligible?

[@cherrybaderry500]

Ammonium carbonate is extremely soluble in liquid. I’ve made ammonia like this many times and it’s never given me an issue when using the ammonia in other reactions

[@ronoxengineering]

​@@cherrybaderry500 but you cant distill it out. certainly sure, you can use it as an ammonia source for making ammonia salts no problem, but what if you are going with a more efficient approach, meaning you produce a large amount of ammonium hydroxide solution to then distill to a higher concentration. the carbonate wont distill out and represents loss

[@RobertSzasz]

would a dry ice and acetone bath be cold enough to liquefy the ammonia directly?

[@lonewalker5446]

Yes, dry ice has a temperature of about -78 C and ammonia will condense at around -33 Celsius.

[@ryanmalin]

I've accidentally mixed urea and sodium hydroxide by pissing into a toilet after it was cleaned and the cleaner was still in the bowl. Caught me off guard when I got hit by a strong whiff of ammonia.