Just had one of my separatory funnels shatter on me last night. But luckily I could carry on doing what I was doing, and immediately hopped on ebay and got another, bigger one (1l) for around £15-20.
Got absolutely no warning whatsoever, thing just..almost crumbled to pieces. Not through anything I was doing with it, or had put in it either I don't think, just went to turn the stopcock and it shattered. Not right pleased about that, but thankfully there wasn't anything either truly priceless in there, or that I can't make again, it was a late-in-process extraction, after already extracting with solvent several times, so if my product successfully migrated into the solvent to begin with, I'll already have gotten most of it. A little will have gone down the drain, but a few tens of ml of solvent at most, nothing that can't be rectified. And the funnel was easily enough replaced. Still, a bit of a shit, when I could have used the money for something I need and didn't already have. Next time I get paid, I'll get a couple more spares of different sizes too.
Did get doused in naphtha and caustic soda, but aqueous sodium hydroxide doesn't seem to bother me much. I wouldn't bathe in it, but it has never actually hurt if I've gotten it on my skin. Aside from an accident where I copped that, and worse besides, right in the eyes, but that is another kettle of fish entirely. Of course, I wash if off if I get it over me, but its never really even stung me, the only irritation that came of that, was because I had a cut on my finger, which did sting pretty badly. Molten caustic is another matter, that is nasty stuff, and even a speck of it landing on gloves if it melts through (and considering its MP is 300 degrees plus it does so pretty readily) burns like fury, got a little round scar on my arm almost exactly the size of a grain of NaOH from doing electrolysis for production of sodium metal where it chewed through the glove and carried on going. Getting it up the nose is even worse. (its just not something that immediately comes to mind..everybody knows to wear goggles and/or a blast shield , but I've never once seen a warning saying something to the effect of 'stuff bog roll up your nose' (electrolysis again, sodium formed, a globule of it went 'bang' in the air, sending a flaming, molten caustic soda-coated globule of water-reactive sodium metal right up one of my nostrils, where it promptly blew a small crater out of my nasal septum. Healed eventually but it didn't half make me jump at the time and make me lose my balance with holding the electrodes. Damn sodium itself actually blasted a hole in the bridge of my nose, not right through, but deep enough to feel, and to cap it off, when sodium meets moisture, what does one get? more caustic soda.
A lot of fun THAT was
(well the rest of it actually was just not that particular event.)
