Lab 1-3 Separating a mixture

In this experimented, the mixture I created was 30% sand, 30% iron, and 40% salt. Right away, it was easy to determine how to separate the homogeneous solution; use a magnet to remove the iron, dissolve the salt in the remaining solution in water, drain the salt water and filter the sand, and finally, boil the salt water to get the solid salt back.
When separating the mixture, there was obviously some room for error. Iron, which was the easiest to separate, had a small percent error, but I was unable to remove all of it, thus, it had 5.47% less than the amount I started with. Sand, on the other hand, was a little harder to separate from the salt water, but when I drained it, it must have still been semi-saturated, for it had more mass after being separated from the solution. As for salt, 'twas very difficult scraping it off the inside of the beaker once boiling out the water. Because of this, there was a very large percent error in the salt category.
To better the process of the separation, I could have let the sand filter out for a longer time. If I had made sure that all of the water was out of the the sand, i would have gotten a better measurement of how much sand I was able to recover.
If after doing the math, there was a non-terminating decimal, I rounded the answer to the hundredths. If the answer did not, I rounded to the tenths.
This related to what we have been doing in class, because we are learning about homogeneous and heterogeneous mixtures, and how they can be changed. We have also been learning about the balance of matter, and how it cannot be destroyed. Thus, we needed to determine what happened to the part of the substances that we did not recover, and where they could have gone.
When manufacturing and purifying a chemical, companies will take other factors into consideration, such as bacteria, foreign minerals, and the pH of the substance. If the pH is balanced to whet it should be, then that indicates that the purification is probably complete. If not, then some more purification needs to be done.

Lab 1-1 Properties of Green Stuff

I'd like to say that I have lost trust in this site because I just completed this and clicked publish and it did not publish; nor did it save.
Here it goes again...

Twice, now, this has happened.


In this lab, the procedure was the following:
-Observe the green stuff without reaction.
Add 30 mL of water to the green stuff and observe.
Place a drop of this mixture on aluminum foil and observe.
Tera up the foil into the green stuff and observe.


At first, the green stuff was green and in a solid powder form. When mixed with the water, it glowed green, and dissolved into a liquid. When it was dropped onto the foil, it fizzed and released a gas, it turned dark, and dried up into a solid. When all of the foil was in the green stuff and water mixture, all of the liquid fizzed and dried up (the same reaction as above).
I know if a change is chemical if the green stuff changes its state of matter, if it fizzes, or if it burns. An example of a chemical change was when it fizzed after being exposed to the foil. A physical reaction happens when it changes shape, but not it's chemical make up. Solids have a definite shape, and the molecules are tightly packed. Liquids and gasses, however, do not have a definite shape, and the molecules are free to move.
This relates to what we have been doing in class because we are learning about compounds, elements, and mixtures, and how they relate and react to each other.
I would like to see how copper chloride reacts when it is ignited because the wikipedia page says that is glows a bright blue, and that sounds cool.

Lab 1-2 Indirect Measurement

In this experiment, i found that i was able to calculate the thickness of the aluminum foils, as well as the diameter of the copper wire with minimal percent error. The percent errors of the test were; regular foil: -7.6%, heavy duty foil: -17.86%, and for the copper wire: -6.45%. To find the thickness of the aluminum foils, I used what ! know about aluminum, (the density), determined the mass, using the scale, and measured the length and width the best I could. From there, I just used the density formula, and did the simple math do determine themissing variable (the "height" of the aluminum foil).
The copper wire, however, was a little more difficult in coming up with a solution. Assuming that the width and height of the copper wire were the same, (because they were both the diameter, instead of having two separate variables, (X & Y), I had two of the same variable, (2X).. From there, i used the same technique as before, only with different equations and different variables.
When using a ruler, and water displacement to calculate the thickness, you can read them inaccurately. That is why there are limitations to those techniques.
When there are a large number of decimals, we cannot be confident that this is an exact measurement. if we were to use a calculator, it does not know that we are taking measurements on tangable items, and therefore, and it may give a nonterminating decimal. This of course makes no sense, because a measurement has to terminate. So, in this case, we have to round the number, thus, making it slightly inaccurate.
Some sources of error in how i conducted the experiment are: 1. The foil may not be 100% aluminum, and thus could have a different density. 2. Using a ruler, we might not measure correctly. 3. The foil may not be a perfect rectangle, so  when measuring, we would have to account for, and subtract the part of the "rectangle" that is missing.
We could use the same method of finding the diameter of the wire in a power line. The only extra steps we would need to include would be determining what materials are included in the power line (copper, Rubber, etc.) and what percentage of the power line they are. Other than those steps, we could use the same simple equations to solve that problem.

Cheesy Get To Know You Assignment

My name is Philip Sheehan. Last year I took Regents Biology. I am taking AP world history this year. I have not always lived in RH, I was born in St. Augestine, Florida. Last year i took Geometry. I am now in Algebra 2 & Trigonometry. There is no one thing in particular that i will brag about. I plan on doing something prestigious and highly important for a career and for college. I haven't visited anywhere awesome lately. I don't do any school clubs or activities, however, it is only the second day. That has the possibility to change. I had a job, washing dishes, over the summer, but no longer. I am on a gymnastics team outside of school. I have a pretty basic family; mom, dad,  and sister. My parents divorced, and my mom remarried. I do not speak any other languages, but I take ASL III. I am taking chemistry to get the last Regents Science credit. I would like to have a 100% in Chemistry. I do not have a favorite sports team, I tend not to watch sports on TV. I learn quickly when the information being given to me is well explained. I don't mind where i sit in the classroom, as long as it's not in one of the corners. It bugs me when teachers are passive, and not willing to help; also when they are unable to teach well.