Kim !

Doyeon Kim
TA Liu
Gen Chem Lab
13 March 2017

Experiment 15 - Pre Lab

Polymer Synthesis
Addition polymerPolystyrene
1. Place 20 drops of styrene into 13x100 mm test tube.
1. Styrene is flammable! (Wear gloves)
2. Using utensil, add few grains of dibenzoyl peroxide and shake tube to mix
1. Dibenzoyl peroxide is explosive when heated
3. Label test tube with name and place in sand bath
4. Allow soln to heat for 90 min
1. Proceed with rest of experiment as it heats
5. When material in test tube turns slightly yelow, remove test tube and cool on ice
6. Try shaking polymer out of test tube
7. If it does not separate from glass, you may break test tube wrapped in cloth towel
1. Wear gloves!
8. Test solubility of polymer by grinding few chunks in mortar and pestle and place powder in
two test tubes
9. Add water to one tube and acetone to other tube.
10. Dispose acetone and polystyrene in appropriate in Laboratory Byproducts Jar

Condensation PolymerGlyptal Resin (Use fume hood!)

1. Obtain paper cup
2. Place 5 g of phthalic anhydride and 0.25g of sodium acetate in 18x150 mm test tube
3. Add 2 mL of glycerol
4. Carefully heat mixture of bunsen burner using clamp
5. Heat top of contents first and work toward bottom as mixture melts
6. Move tube in and out of flame while doing this
7. Note when mixture begins to boil and then continue to heat for 3 to 4 min while moving tube
in and out of flame
8. Soln should turn yellow (if it turns brown, stop heating)
9. Pour soln into paper cup
10. Allow soln to cool, then tear off cup to recover polymer
11. Dispose test tube in glass waste
12. Test solubility of polymer like you did above

Modification of polymers
Experiment on cross linking with glue (recommended not to work with gloves when using glue)
1. Obtain a plastic cup and pour 15 mL of glue
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2. Add 15 mL of water and stir

3. Add 10 mL of saturated borax and stir
4. Remove solid material and pull it off stirrer
5. Pour excess liquid into Laboratory Byproducts Jar
6. Rinse cup with warm water
7. Perform another cross linking experiment using 15 mL of glue and different amounts of
water and borax (5-15 mL of borax and 0-30 mL of water)
8. Compare properties of two polymers and observe two other students polymers

Polymer fabrication
Polyethylene bottle
1. Heat one end of 10-15 cm piece of polyethylene in burner flame
2. When polymer is molten, crimp end with crucible tongs to seal it and allow to cool
3. Re-heat tubing at closed end by pasting in and out of flame util 1-2 in of tubing is molten
4. Place molten tubing into a small wide-mouth jar or vial
5. Blow air into open end so it expands in jar
6. Let expanded tubing cool for 2 min

Polymer properties
Superabsorbers
1. Weigh 1 g of sodium polyacrylate and place in 150 mL beaker
2. Add 50 mL of water to beaker from graduated cylinder
3. Add another 50 mL of water to beaker
4. Add 0.5 g sodium chloride to beaker and stir
5. To recover polymer, collect it by vacuum filtration. Pour water in the filter flask down sink
and scrape collected polymer off filter paper and into appropriate Laboratory Byproducts Jar