I'm in a lazy mood myself. I really CBF getting round to doing things.
And I am wondering where in the flaming hell some expected mail is and what day I'm actually finally going to get it. I'm still waiting for a batch of graphite electrodes, and a solid nickel crucible (which I might add, was horrendously expensive. I ordered a new set of various crucibles in various different materials, a big graphite one about 8-9 inches tall by 4.5-5 inch wide and with walls a centimeter or so thick has arrived, as have two iron crucibles with close-fitting lids. But I'm still awaiting my nickel one. The price difference is insane, about $3 and a few fractions of a dollar for the pair of them, the nickel crucible on the other hand cost me about £30-something, closer to £40 IIRC.
Not cheap. Ordered quite a few other carbon crucibles, and might have ordered some nickel plated ones, but can't remember if I went through with that or if I decided to just buy those cheap iron ones and nickel plate them myself, since I have some nickel acetate, a big tub of it, 500g or 1kg, can't remember which, that I bought mainly for plating other metal objects, making nickel-based catalysts, like Raney and Urushibara nickel for hydrogenations (both quite similar, and the basic premise is to make an alloy of nickel and aluminium, then dissolve the aluminium in caustic soda solution leaving behind the nickel, unattacked by the caustic, which is, due to the way its precipitated from the solid alloy by melting out the aluminium part, is extremely finely divided, so much so that in the case of Raney nickel, its so fine that it is pyrophoric and has to be handled in an inert atmosphere until hydrogen is introduced to replace the inert, and at all times, kept wet. Although IIRC there are grades of Raney nickel and Raney cobalt that are not pyrophoric (catching fire on exposure to air and/or water. Just air/oxygen in the case of Raney metals) whilst Urushibara catalysts aren't pyrophoric, and also for making nickel-copper couple reducing agent if I want to try making it with finer, precipitated nickel, compared to the very fine nickel dust that I have on the lab shelves along with my other metal powders (currently zinc, copper, magnesium and nickel dust, as well as micronized, ultra-fine aluminium, all bagged up in big ziplock containers with as much air as possible squeezed out of them before rolling the packages up to squeeze out further air. Have to be quite careful, especially with the aluminium, magnesium and nickel, the first two because they are highly flammable, enough so that if one were to load a drinking straw with a few pinches of metal dust and then blow it through a flame, the result is quite spectacular-a big long gout of intense white sparking fire accompanied by a 'whoompmh!' sort of noise and lots of crackling. A dragons breath kind of effect, the other metals will do the same, well, I'm not sure about the copper, its less reactive than the other metals, although extremely fine. I haven't actually tried to do that although it wouldn't surprise me at all if it did cause a big long expanding jet of crackling fireball. And the nickel is certainly flammable as well, only, nickel is probably more hazardous from a toxicity point of view, its one of the more toxic transition metals generally speaking and some people are allergic to it, usually developing a focal dermatitis from nickel alloy parts of clothing (although I myself am fine with it, in the sense of I'm not allergic. Still, it isn't something one wants to ingest, especially in soluble, and thus absorbable form)
