Not decided yet if I'll do it tomorrow, or tonight, although its getting dark now. Then again I usually work at night, I'm a night owl by nature.
But I've a large bottle of white fuming nitric acid to make and distill, starting, probably, due to the concentration of sulfuric acid I'll be using (98-99% H2SO4) it'll probably start out as red fuming nitric, a much more dangerous beast than WFNA. Red fuming nitric acid is HNO3 that contains considerable amounts of nitrogen dioxide dissolved in it, sort of the HNO3 version of oleum (oleum is the name for anhydrous sulfuric acid with the anhydride of sulfuric acid, sulfur trioxide, SO3, dissolved in the anhydrous sulfuric acid, it fumes virulently corrosive, noxious fumes, and it eats organic matter like a starving man suddenly dropped into an all-you-can-eat buffet stuffs his face and pockets and hands when the place closes. To say nothing of the way if it gets on skin it'll eat its way in, then out through the other side of you if there is a sufficient quantity, turning flesh into graphite as it viciously rips the water molecules from the structures of carbohydrate, and protein molecules; anything with a hydroxyl group present, it'll rip it off, and leave inorganic carbon behind. And it hydrates with a violently exothermic manner, hissing and spitting, getting REALLY hot, spewing a mist of fuming sulfuric acid.
Even non-oleum strong sulfuric acid, if poured on say, sugar, will rip the 'water' present as -OH groups in the molecule of sucrose away to hydrate itself, and leave nothing behind but a solid foam cast, expanded greatly in volume, soaked in strong sulfuric acid and a sulfurous. acidic stinky tang in the air. Oleum is worse, it fumes like a bitch (99% sulfuric acid doesn't fume, its pretty safe stuff to handle, oleum billows off clouds of sulfur trioxide fumes that will rip the fucking shit out of anything organic they get ahold of, including people-bits), its corrosive as hell, and presents pressure issues, that if it gets too warm, the SO3 can be driven out, increasing the pressure in a closed bottle, means it could rupture, potentially throwing oleum all over the place. Which is something I'd really, REALLY not want to be in the vicinity of when it happened. I've seen what REGULAR concentrated sulfuric (96%-99%) will to organic matter...I spilled some once after tripping up whilst going to the bog to get some water for making a solution, dropped the open bottle of concentrated H2SO4, 2 liter bottle, quite a lot of it splashed out, and I had to pick it up, sulfuric acid on it or no sulfuric acid on it, and set it upright, before washing my hands FAST, and the floor, the toilet seat are both still charred, where the acid hit, it turned the lino flooring and the wooden bog seat to ashes where it hit, and the area that was sanded down, its still stained brown from where the sulfuric hit, the stains on the lino and the shitter-seat will be there for as long as the floor and shitter are there.
Red fuming HNO3 is similar, it fumes like crazy, nasty, highly toxic, brown NO2 fumes, corrosive as all fuck, and one of the worst things about it, is that it keeps evolving more NOx gases, which build up pressure and require regular venting of the bottle, otherwise the pressure will build up until the bottle explodes, showering everything in the vicinity with the nitric acid version of oleum. I only make red fuming nitric if I NEED red fuming nitric, and I make what I need, when I need it and no more. Unless I am immediately going to remove the NOx gases dissolved in it, to make white fuming nitric acid.
