Metal finishing Q&As since 1989

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Recovering Zinc from Zinc Chloride for Science Project

I am trying to design an experiment for my last Chem lab. Up to this point my professor and myself have come up with trying to dissolve bound metals (i.e. a penny) and then recovering the metals separately. I am stuck trying to efficiently ( and in the reaches of freshman Chemistry) recover Zn from ZnCl2 without using electrolysis of molten ZnCl2.
I had hopes of completely dissolving this thing, and then extracting a relatively successful percent yield of both the Cu and Zn without producing a very cheap brass.

Brendan Wentworth
student - Asheville, North Carolina
2006

did you ever get an answer to this? I am working on something similar now.

Chris Molta
- Buffalo, New York
March 31, 2009

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Hi. After you have dissolved the penny into whatever you dissolve it, you need to neutralize any oxidizing agents if you used any. Then you should be able to electroplate the copper out at relatively high purity simply by keeping the voltage very low.

Take a look at the Nernst equation. Actually, electroplating brass is not easy because the copper plates out extremely preferentially :-)

Good luck and Regards,

Ted Mooney, P.E.
Striving to live Aloha
finishing.com - Pine Beach, New Jersey
April 2, 2009