Lab Equipment: Soxhlet Extractor (Fixed)

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In this video we demonstrate the Soxhlet extractor.
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[@chaumas]

Of all the chemistry apparatuses I've seen so far, this one is my favorite. It's a frickin' solid state pump with distinct cycles. So cool.

[@BryceGillion]

"Always tea bag it". My life's motto.

[@jllmmjj]

"You've got to teabag it"

[@officermeowmeowfuzzyface4408]

... said every pre-pubescent CoD player, ever.

[@BrokenLifeCycle]

Dip dip, potata chip.

[@EddieTheH]

Golden rule for all aspects of life.

[@AsymptoteInverse]

That's one hell of an elegant piece of labware.

[@louistournas120]

4 min 59 You have to be careful with separatory funnels if the valve is made of teflon. Teflon expands too much and can break borosilicate glass if it is heated. Yours is a glass valve. Good choice!

[@NurdRage]

Ignore this video. Just a minor fix at the end where i didn't properly show one of the cycles. Nothing big.

[@pelham4au]

Haha ok

[@pelham4au]

I love your videos btw

[@rakinkazi9780]

no problem nurd

[@SafetyLucas]

Can you pull a vacuum on and/or seal a soxhlet?

[@NurdRage]

+Magneto! Actually yes, and it's not that hard either. The soxhlet is mostly sealed already so it's just a matter of applying the right vacuum hose to the top of the condenser. The only think you have to worry about is that cheaper Soxhlets not made with high quality borosilicate or not annealed properly will not be able to take the stress of the vacuum. They can implode if they fail. So if you are going to use a Soxhlet under vacuum you have to put a nice big shield between you and it or wear full safety gear and face shields on the assumption that Soxhlet could implode and send glass at you.

[@Vibe77Guy]

Paper filters and thimbles don't stand up to acids as the solvent. Glass filter thimbles are expensive, and the perforated bottom glass insert thimbles have limited filter area. Using a 55/50 extractor I've found that ceramic candle style water filter cartridges can be made into relatively inexpensive acid resistant thimbles.

[@rich1051414]

It works on the same principle as your toilet. Look at your toilet from the side, and you should see the bend in it, which will overflow when enough water is in the bowl, and will pull all the water out of the bowl, chug a bit, then air lock again, allowing it to refill

[@wolfpax181]

Nice to see I'm not the only one that recognized the similarity.

[@pietrotettamanti7239]

Richard Smith everything that has a syphon in it behaves in this way.

[@jpvoodoo5522]

Richard Smith , you expose this diabolically genius apparatus for what it is-a toilet.

[@madansharma2700]

Excellent video. There are a few chemical reaction that can be done using soxhlet set up + molecular sieves. Please show that, it will be very educational.

[@NGC1433]

My goodness, so you dissolved plastic from those vials half a year earlier, than the video with nuclear battery was ready... What a cycle! It took ages!

[@louistournas120]

You mean the tritium vials?

[@Rattlebones427]

my cousin had a big one of these custom made for making broth oddly enough

[@mysticvirgo9318]

Makes one hell uva cuppa coffee :) my high school chem lab teacher would do that daily :)

[@electric_photon4660]

I got a 500ml one on eBay for $30. worked flawlessly

[@theCodyReeder]

would something like this work for dissolving gold with mercury?

[@ElxCriiO]

hi there sir, i take advantage of finding you here to tell you that i love your channel and videos. please keep your work, you're great. greetings from Chile

[@rocketbuilder100]

i think it could. what do you want to seperate it from?

[@RobertSzasz]

Cody'sLab you would need some form of filter bed to keep the syphon from clogging yet let the mercury pass perhaps a mesh from a metal mercury wets but doesn't dissolve?

[@bryanr2885]

Cody'sLab why haven’t you made this video yet!!!! I’ve been watching a lot of extraction videos lately and wondering to myself why you haven’t done on. Being that you are a homesteader and science buff I’d really like to see some interesting extractions from the lab.

[@danielfernandocarballo1890]

In theory, yes you can. But the practical problems are immense. First, gold occurs in nature, even in its most concentrated minerals, as an impurity of millionths. In places where it is concentrated, such as river beds or visible mineral veins, it is less than one thousandth of the mass of the material. That means you need enough mercury to moisten (without taking into account wettability problems) a thousand to a million times the mass of gold to recover. Second. For the first reason, the Soxhlet device you should build would not be laboratory-sized, but immense, capable of handling hundreds of kilograms of material at a time. And it could not be from cheap materials like iron or aluminum, because mercury, and even more so its vapor would dissolve the material even faster than gold. Probably, to recover gold and metals from circuit boards, a Pyrex Soxhlet could be used, capable of handling 10 to 20 kilograms of material. But it should have an internal mechanism that agitates the material, so that the mercury comes in contact with all the surfaces. Very difficult to put into practice, since the same agitation can cause pieces of the material subjected to extraction to obstruct the tubes of the apparatus. The advantage of this last application, is that gold is very concentrated in circuit boards and memories, with respect to the way it appears in nature. The disadvantage is that mercury vapor is toxic, corrosive and escapes with great ease. Another, all metals would dissolve. And when the mercury evaporates finally, there would be a mixture of gold with aluminum and copper, maybe some silver and iron of some types of contacts.

[@will_der_dude]

... so relaxing to watch

[@PhilXavierSierraJones]

I want to know about the properties of DCM, since I never had any video actually showing what it can do, what it does, and/or what material it can dissolve (they just say it is an organic solvent, like benzene or toluene). Maybe a video about various staple solvents used in labs (like DCM or ethanol) in detail would be appreciated. Or, if I was looking at wrong place, please guide me to the video where any combination of above is shown. I love your videos :) Plus, is there any chemical I can use to de-pot epoxy potted things? I don't care about how it will look or if it'll be unusable after de-potting. Just being curious.

[@Kloashut]

Most physical & chemical properties of solvents can be obtained via msds sheets. For instance Sigma-Aldrich has elaborate info on them. Polar solvents will dissolve polar materials, so will apolar solvents dissolve apolar materials. About epoxy potted materials, you may be able to dissolve them as long as they are not crosslinked.

[@SyamilahStore]

My favorite apparatus

[@MuzikBike]

So, uh, what are you planning on using the tritium for?

[@EnhancedNightmare]

Mesmerising Soxhlets

[@XOIIOXOIIO]

God I wish my shitty school had had a chemistry lab.

[@alexanderx33]

Increasing the flowrate of solvent should increase the rate of extraction particularly if the extractor is closer to a plug flow reactor. Not sure which of the too cases is closer. Also this process may be run under vacuum (for temperature sensetive extracts) if that vaccume is regulated not to be less than the vapor pressure of the solvent at the temperature of the condenser interior surface and the vacuum is applied at the top of the condenser.

[@ravenhhca]

And that is where I got mine

[@emartinez2046]

If you could upload a video of this thing just working, watching it is just so...calming.

[@Pyro19903]

I'm thinking about going back to college for chemistry thanks nerd rage

[@ArtturiSalmela]

I suppose you could occasionally drain the separatory funnel fully? I will keep in mind that I could use one instead of the soxhlet extractor if I need to process more stuff at once

[@PressRecord777]

So, assuming plain water as the solvent, how many distillation cycles would it take to get to the tootsie roll center of a tootsie pop?

[@rngmstrdan]

Let's find out

[@FinlayDaG33k]

the overflowing "mechanism" look a lot like the Pythagorean cup

[@FinlayDaG33k]

it's a nice thing none the less... unfortunately, im no laborant :p

[@theprogrammer32]

Its also how toilets flush

[@generalingwer4341]

Very helpful video thanku.

[@WaffleStaffel]

F future NurdRage ever needs more tritium vials, he should know there's a little plug in the keychain casing you can just pop out with a needle 🙂

[@MahmoudSuhail]

Make sure to separate flies from your lab next time 4:19

[@unpaidcomintern]

It's a cool item but I don't get how the thimble drains completely after reaching the tip of the siphon tube. Shouldn't it drip down bit by bit instead?

[@MichaelLapore-lk9jz]

1000s of liters! Sadly, been there, done did it, done pulled whatever hair left on my skull! 🥺

[@elephystry]

Pythagoras' Greedy Cup has a similar mechanism.

[@dimethylhydantoin]

A problem I've had is the fluid not filling to the height of the top of the siphon tube before siphonation begins. I've seen this with and without cellulose thimbles.

[@stonerguitarist4690]

So if I am putting flowers in the filters I can make good dab like this

[@Blu702]

What size tubing do you use for the condenser? An aquarium pump will suffice, but what size tubing(od x id)? What kind of tubing(silicon or what)?

[@waynoswaynos]

I silicone seal the flimsy parts immediately because I know I can’t be trusted not to break glassware. Doesn’t look so pretty but keeps them complete for longer

[@kgmarcussen]

Feel like I've seen this before...

[@NurdRage]

Ignore this video. Just a minor fix at the end where i didn't properly show one of the cycles. Nothing big.

[@bruceatkins2189]

Are you serious. Wow. That much for that little. I know now I don't know enough. Thank you. Back to the books

[@brandnewayurveda1835]

What if the extract is heat unstable , can we remove the extract without going into boiling pot ? Is there any modified instrument available ? Name ?

[@chrisharvie-smith486]

Run it under vacuum to lower the boiling point for heat sensitive solutes.

[@klaxalk]

The ending is tense, but still, no socks.

[@pacorenta]

Can you make a video on extraction of colonidene from the Pin Wheel flower plant ?

[@pacorenta]

The colonidine is a very effective pain killer without secondary effects and the extraction is done with ethyl alcohol for 72 hours. This colonidine is 100 times more potent pain killer than codeine or morphine and is a lot cheaper.

[@treymixon3618]

cool video

[@malsonrules]

but can you use it as a bong?

[@pozotos1918]

the farm shops would be good choise to buy chemicals ???

[@allcopseatpasta6976]

I recently found Soxhlet extractors on bangGood for 30$ or less. That does seem inexpensive enough. Opinions on that?

[@NurdRage]

I'd be worried they were made of weaker glass and thus could break easily. fortunately, most soxhlet extractors are not used directly on hotplates like beakers and flasks and thus the thermal shock issues are mitigated. You can give them a try. Just plan for the possibility of them breaking and spilling hot (and usually highly flammable) solvent everywhere.

[@allcopseatpasta6976]

Thank you for the fast answer. The last time I tried a distillation, I broke a borosilicate flask. I'm not going to try it.

[@pietrotettamanti7239]

Fatalcreator did you put it directly on the flame?

[@RedDogForge]

nice :) not terrible expensive not cheap mind you, but not too bad

[@shaanbhattacharya8306]

atomic symbol for confusion: " Um"

[@hamoudi_d]

I like your Videos better than those of NileRed.

[@Psi105]

i suppose if you clog your soxhlet extractor you cant really dissolve out whats clogging it because its mostly insoluble, that's why you're using the soxhlet extractor :)

[@IDoNotLikeHandlesOnYT]

This stuff might help: en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Piranha_solution

[@juzeralirangwala3539]

Exactly Piranha Solution which is basically Caro's Acid can dissolve any organic matter I tried it personally on my Soxhlet Extractor and it worked really well.......

[@isabelhillman8529]

how do you perform the final distillation after the solvent is concentrated?

[@nickkinnan7485]

Helping someone with an IEC Fusor?

[@LordMayorOfDairyBell]

Could you use a coffee percolator instead?

[@richs65treebucketservice24]

Can this be used to make Dimethylglyoxime.....? Or DMG for Pd metals ....

[@TyronTention]

Reminds me a little bit of a Pythagorean cup.

[@MichaelLapore-lk9jz]

What are tritium key fobs????

[@robpayne1956]

So your end result was the glass tubes that contain the Tritium, Your making a Nuke Right ?? :-D

[@TheObsidianAsh]

Why doesn't the solute just precipitate out if the solute isn't very soluble?

[@NurdRage]

it does.

[@TheObsidianAsh]

Ah right okay, so the conical flask (during the timelapse at the end is actually filled with the white waxy stuff + saturated DCM?) Then the pure DCM distills back into the extractor?

[@NurdRage]

yep

[@ReevansElectro]

Why are there so many flies in your videos? Do you have a household garbage issue or is it just an Ontario issue? 😁

[@designworksdw1949]

where do you acquire your tritium key fobs?

[@rich1051414]

Probably next to the register at a random gas station lol. Seriously, I see those things everywhere.

[@designworksdw1949]

dont see them anywhere here up in canada

[@joristimm8220]

google "mixglo tritium" the sell all kinds of colours and sizes

[@louistournas120]

@@designworksdw1949 I have never seen them in Canada. It is illegal to sell them here as the government has enacted a law so that tritium doesn't get wasted.

[@95rav]

99% won't say it, but they are thinking THC extraction.

[@Arrowdodger]

this thing is a piece of junk, I watched the whole way through and this extracted no socks at all!

[@elephystry]

Arrowdodger Mate are you blind? You really didn't see it?

[@mikechambers9129]

Arrowdodger The socks are very small. Thats why they call it a 'soxhlet' extraxtractor. 😂

[@KowboyUSA]

They're out of stock.

[@user-ud7mx4sb5t]

I am 100% hanging onto my conspiracy theory that you ARE indeed Nile Red.