Explosions&Fire - 2019-03-03
A famed compound that is 89% nitrogen and 100% feared. But does it live up to the hype? I take on a few years of chemistry experiments to try and find out. Subreddit: https://www.reddit.com/r/ExplosionsAndFire/ Patreon: https://www.patreon.com/ExplosionsandFire Discord: https://discord.gg/VR6Fz9g Twitter: https://twitter.com/Explosions_Fire Synthesis Video (Second Channel): https://youtu.be/uNhVK-2mh6w oh also check out my band on Spotify, we just put out a new Single a few days ago! (not a joke lol, fuccin listen to it ok): https://open.spotify.com/artist/3mpSF8RDzaTvalpWQIL1pC?si=p9YuUNCRQVCaj_z1WvQ7xw or watch on youtube: https://youtu.be/fe6fr9ydw-M References: 2011 German paper: https://doi.org/10.1002/anie.201100300 Same authors, more detail: https://doi.org/10.1002/asia.201100632 Paper showing open form doesn't exist at room temp: https://doi.org/10.1002/anie.201209170 I didn't mention it, but a lot of the tetrazole stuff was established by a Russian called Engager, published onto the Sciencemadness forums. It is truly an incredible body of work he established. Here is a huge list of names of some of the people who made this video possible. Thanks for sponsoring my trips to the hardware store: Elric Craig M. Roger -Dot- Lee John Doe Oliver Toth Daniel Coleman Dan Kaplan John Libal mirgp... Azide Fox! (I remembered your request hell yeah look at those memory skills) The Gayest Person on Patreon Isaac Paciga Gabriel J. emuwarvet Luke McGoggan Luke McGoggan Grant Trent Michael Kavulich Oz Sabina killroy225 Corrosion ChalkyChalkson Zachary Chapin Leon Schutte Thomas Abbott Mortlet Aussie Chemist Gregory Wong Nile Red Christopher Stillson Jacob Tierney AllChemystery sorry the audio is so bad. I spent money on a good mic and then talked into it from behind rather than the proper way and the audio was all clipped ehh I should write more nonsense in the description like I used to do. but maybe the nonsense (read: shitposting) is now in the video rather than being in the description?? ok nah, that's just a lame excuse. I've just got no bonus content for people to ignore this time.
This is like the shitposting of the science community and I love every second of it.
@Tm Daze Sorry for the multiple replies I'm just triggered. Then again I can't see any very very specific conditions that really need to be met here.. The synthesis is just hard because there are so many steps and loses multiply. Still there is practically nothing that a chemistry lab has that he does not have - chemistry labs are just glorified amateur labs with the exact same basic equipment (distillation, vacuum distillation, glassware, a bunch of solvents - btw 1-Diazidocarbamoyl-5-azidotetrazole is soluble in acetone & dethyl ether so you could probably purify it that way to extreme purity). The one thing that really distinguishes them is just better safety practices (e.g. fume hood in a "real" lab) and better testing (e.g. NMR). There is no reason you can't get the same product in an amateur lab as in a "real" one - the techniques are all standard chemistry techniques
like how michael reeves is the shitposter of robotics and electroboom is the shitposter of electrical engineering
Science is really stupid!
I know what you mean but he puts a lot of effort behind these videos to be considered a troll
basically Australian science
I remember my Ochem lab coordinator describing a master's student who spent two years making some coordinated metal compound (though I can barely remember what I tried to learn back then so it might have been something else, but it was based on one of the heavier elements) that was made using such unstable reagents, and was so unstable itself, that the entire synthesis needed to be performed at -40*C under nitrogen and protected from light. Any breach of any of these conditions and it instantly exploded/ He fought with this thing for years, finished it, presented it, and then quit chemistry forever.
@Nātānsaurus there's no need to be rude. He was simply telling us a story about a "teacher" who told a story about a devoted chemists' determination to see a tough project through to completion. Right? I call UAP-brain
@ghost writer your daddy probably still reads story time to you. Do you believe in the tooth fairy 🧚♀️ too?? I call dumbas
@Nātānsaurus yes I believe in the Tooth Fairy (The Tooth Fairy isn't beheading people in the Middle East). I didn't know Story Time was a book. I must procure Story Time, and have my old man read it to me. If Beavis & ButtHead were real, they would be my best friends, and we'd sit around the living room with nachos and beer, and my old man would tell us stories about the Corps, and all the butts he's seen. That's how cool my dad is. Dumbass!
@ghost writer your jokes are bad and you should feel bad
Sounds like a bad advisor
You know it's scary when it's slightly yellow.
@Zezus 001 as liquids? sort of. But as a gas, chlorine is yellow, and gaseous chlorine is the deadly one...
@TheApexSurvivor Huh, guess i've been made a fool out of
My semen
@Nicholas George please bore me with the college ochem 2 lecture please
If it's made from urea, urine for a bad time
for these cases of failing fuses you should get one of these "burning laser pointers". they work great for igniting something from a distance
@herrbrahms Imagine "lining up" a pair of binoculars to get it to work without being close to it. If you want to make the five-metre stand and calibrate it to show it's possible (and safe), go ahead.
@BTF_Flotsam It's not that difficult. Tom understands the path of the Sun across the sky. He could set the binocs up at head height and aim them to a point where the Sun will cross in a few minutes' time. In case there is concern about fine adjustment of the beam, he could put his target at the end of a long stick so that he could manipulate it from a distance.
While this method isn't as simple as a laser, it's both 1. free and 2. not subject to the sort of overbearing governmental restrictions such as one finds in Australia.
Pretty cool, right?
@BTF_Flotsam no harder than lining up the sun reflection off of your watch.
@Ommy goddamn Australia is even more cucked than I previously believed!
This guy is like a more shitposty NileRed I LOVE IT
nile red shitposted on this very video
@Trash Compactor yeah that's what I was going to say
So, basically an Australian NileRed.
@Fainthen Did you ever consider that NileRed literally only cares about chemistry and may just be a nice person
Not everyone is a dick on purpose.
Nileblue on crack
"not boiling your own piss" subtle shade at NR haha
that shade wasn't so subtle^^
@Candyman it still is. The yellow will be amplified as you boil your wee.
@Reinatr48 my piss is clear all the time, I assure you there is no yellow my good sir.
@Candyman good you're drinking a great amount of water every day
nileyellow 😭
Meme chemistry is the most entertaining genre of recent memory.
bytw why does he have a bad dragon on the bg, is he a furry?
@Dorian Villanueva most likely for the memes
@Zmyszan! what memes
@Dorian Villanueva cause if you saw his second channel (extractions and ire) he stated that his patrons can request him to draw something on the blackboard which is why it might be there
To be fair - this compound was made by an Aussie so calling it a C$%& is sometimes like saying hi - it could have happily said hi C$%& back to you and you'd have a beer together. Maybe you need to get an American sourced Azidoazide azide and then re-attempt the swearing induced reaction again just to be sure.
Sounds reasonable. You'd also have to exclude British synthesised compounds as it would depend on which part of the country they were made in. Some areas would have a beer with you, others would try to rip your face off. Also no French sourced compounds as they'd likely explode if someone simply spoke near them in English. Or go on strike so the results would also be a touch unpredictable :D
You need to insult it in german, otherwise it doesn't understand....
Specifically from an urban area of a large city.
just talk about how quickly gender counting ends
@Kazz Trismus I think I can safely say that if you handle this explosive improperly in a certain way, you'll definitely be switching genders. =D
As a chemist, I greatly thank you for clearing up the misconceptions I initially had about this compound.
You've made it big, was showing a friend this vid and had the wikipedia page open to show him it really is C2N14 and after he left I saw that this video is listed as a source! Good stuff
I love your chemistry, but I watch your videos just as much for your humor. Never stop this madness
"I used the urea and bleach to make hydrazine" oh the noise I made when he casually said this
me when he just casually talks about the overall synthesis taking in the realm of 3 years and how he just nonchalantly says “there’s a step there where i made sodium azide from scratch”
Lmfao
It was hydrazine sulfate iirc, but it also spewed everywhere while he was making it. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=d7EPTu1Srak
This guys needs more recognition man he’s hilarious
Love your work Tom, making chemistry interesting and understandable, brilliant mate excellent job keep it up ✌👍🍻
"Suppose it's a fuckinh zero then."
killed me
I came back for this line.
Nice pfp
Is this the sharpest compound in your shed ?
yeah, and TKX-50? It's relatively low in energy compared to HNIW or HMX but it still does 400 kbar - an amateur record. Or perhaps 410 kbar TENGU if you can get N2O5 in your nitric acid.
TKX-50 should be easy.
yes, RDX has 349 kbar at TMD and 290 kbar in practice when used (95/5 RDX/wax). Melt cast ETN has 300 kbar in practice and HMX has 390 kbar at TMD and 370 kbar in most advanced pressed compositions for shaped charges (anti-tank weapons).
Lol there's a compound that spells cuntz?
@kader gumus lmao
@Explosions&Fire i know the most sensitive explosive being ncl3 ni3 silver nitrde
I have a feeling, this is like the combination of maxmoefoe,idubbz,William ossman and Micheal reeves, but chemistry.........well..... And explosion
NileRed
i taught them everything they know
An individual of culture, I see.
Don’t forget StyroPro
@Dylan Hinegardner That doesn't sound right.
Awesome video! Laughed out loud at the French azidoazide azide pronunciation 🤣👍
I'm french, and I cringed so bad...
What do they say in the French bit btw? I assume it's just "this is the most sensitive explosive" but I put it in my video without even checking what the guy actually says haha
@Explosions&Fire Pretty much!
"Azidoazide azide, the most unstable of substances.
Azidoazide azide is an explosive so unstable it explodes in all circumstances. It's the craziest chemical the world has ever seen"
ahzeeedoeazeeedahzeeed
I love seeing your channel grow, you’re a really cool guy and it’s great to see chemistry become more accepted
in my first semester of studying pharmacy in munich i had 2 of the professors that discoverd this shit and it seemed to me that this klapötke guy is beyond crazy
I wonder if something was cocrystalizing with your compound, like perhaps it was a hydrate or some urea, and that was stabilizing it.
Very large crystal size is generally a good indicator of a very clean compound.
@Anders Juel Jensen I agree except that hydrates are part of the normal crystal lattice. I'm not talking about contamination I'm talking about Waters of hydration as part of the crystal lattice.
@michalchik I'm not very knowledgeable in crystallography but wouldn't you need something for the water to coordinate to for crystals like that? Like a metal center ?
@Zev Kurtzman That's a good question and I don't think so. Any intermolecular for should be able to allow a simple molecule to incorporate into the crystal lattice. You can even trap gases as in methane clatharate.
Excellente présentation de la chimie et des sciences : c'est bien la liste de toutes les substances que les chimistes en herbe evitent d'obtenir , à réserver aux chimistes avertis et expérimentés . Belle chimie mais dangereuse ! Continuez .
Him: it's time to do something moronically stupid
Me: he's gonna blowt- yep that's a blowtorch
Wait, you got sulfuric acid from bunning?
HOW, WHERE..... I must find this bunnings!
Also this is some fantastic science, good job.
you know drain opener the good cheap kind that comes in the plastic bottle that it's self is in a plastic bag is like mostly sulfuric acid, also car batteries. you can concentrate it up by distillation, make a cheap still to get all the gunk out before putting it in to your nice glassware. if it has slightly redish yellow steamy fumes you passed "it's strong enough" and now are in to "I'm not sure this was a good idea" territory. have fun and be careful, their is a war on chemistry, we don't want to give the enemy any talking points.
well it blew a pretty big hole into that soda can. pretty impressive for 20mg of a compound, imagine what several grams of it could do!
5 grams blows a 5 inch deep hole in concrete and showers the area with broken rock
Dude congratulations on the video man! Not only did your content make me laugh often, but i also learned a lot about "Mankind's most sensitive explosive!" It's great; even if took 3 years to make! I'm totally subscribing ♥️
Absolutely awesome. The ending made me piss myself laughing 😂
Thanks! Cool channel btw
My gf keeps watching your videos, she's not super into chemistry, but she laughs her ass off with delight, watching you. She says thanks for being awesome and keep it up! Don't remove the dirty or moronically stupid bits, it's her favorite <3
I have a feeling you have a biproduct of the synthesis that is not azidoazide azide but actually the more stable tautomer which links the nitrogens in the azide to the tetrazole side leading to a nitrogenous polymer called azido-polyazidazole which has been made amd tested in the 80's. Sorry to burst your bubble but if this was the pure monomer your synthesis wouldve ended 1 step before completion. Also the actual explosive is far too polar to form stable crystals in water so what youve made is the hydroxonium catalyzed polymer.
Explosions&Fire2 time to hit your library’s research dept. for some literary chemistry relics
Time to ask @ChemicalForce for some Triaminoguanidinium Chloride and try this experiment with it again :-P.
@Dan that's entirely incorrect, I know a lot of things that I've never heard of because british people keep making up fake words for them. I know what a shoehorn is despite never having heard of a 'slippy-dippy-cobbler-stick' and not knowing what a loo is doesn't preclude me fron flushing my shit down a toilet. nomenclature is a social construct (literally) we need to dismantle the scientific elites and ruling class (metaphorically (in minecraft (gone sexual)))
@Jad Azido well said!
Polyazido High‐Nitrogen Compounds: Hydrazo‐ and Azo‐1,3,5‐triazine†
My‐Hang V. Huynh Dr. Michael A. Hiskey Dr. … See all authors
First published: 16 September 2004
https://doi.org/10.1002/anie.200460366
Citations: 207
This might have something to do with it but I'm not very chemically literate so who knows.
I remember seing a computer simulation of the molecule, seeing that it folds itself and will eventually randomly fold in such a way that it reacts with itself. However, that computer simulation may have been wrong.
soo reactive... it can't even touch itself before exploding.
@DatOneCommie IronGEAR I'm familiar with that problem...
Thanks man, once again, your video put a big smile on my face while being in a depression. Great to hear the extreme mic sound clipping, I miss that in the newer videos 😁 keep up the great work, but don't feel any pressure to release videos, do it in your own tempo
Just discovered this channel thanks to a random recommendation, it's like Things I Won't Work With: Shed Edition and I fucking love it. Top effort mate, keep up the fine work.
Yes! I love that blog! And this compound looks like it's straight from there.
If I were to see that much nitrogen in one molecule, I'd start running.
super interesting video, I kind of wish you compared it directly to something like gunpowder to give a kind of baseline of what to expect from that quantity of an explosive though
This video is a beautiful blend of everything I love: Science, and punchy memes. Thank you for this. I crave more.
I went to the TU Berlin when Dr Klapötke was there…..their research and lab technique was always impeccable! You can’t work with highly reactive nitrogen without amazing technique!
"on a scale I can't even measure because my scale doesn't work well."
slight exhale from chuckle
Wow, it's so explosive that it barely even moved the can well destroying it. It's like the aluminum was just ripped so quickly it couldn't impart that Force onto the rest of the mass!
Hey, triaminoguanidine could be made by reacting nitroguanidine with excess hydrazine, then reducing the nitro group.
It's indeed much more complicated than extraction of Iodine or a bang of Fulminate. Really like compound like this.
Could it possible be that they meant that the open form that barely exists when they said it was beyond their measurements? It would make sense. As it does basically decompose(?) into the closed form.
Good to know that there are still some real chemists out there (even in remote places) and good humour as well. I still need to understand that garage lab bit, I mean WHY ???
Now I kind of want to see a comparison with other explosives at 20mg. Would 20mg of flash powder do the same amount of damage as that stuff? 20mg of C4?
for C4 you need a detonator.. would be pretty hard to compare it like this hah
I have a passing knowledge of chemistry and a fascination with explosives and what I have learned is when you see lots of nitrogen connected to something, you’re going to have a bad time
I have to say, I really enjoy your videos, you know far more chemistry than I did in my days of "explosions and fires", but I did do lots, and had much fun, and I'm still alive at 63, so don't let anyone tell you to stop or you'll die, it's only "might die", and sometimes "it got better, ..." A very fun compound much detonation in tiny spits, and subsequent holes.
This is one of my favorite chemicals and I’m glad I get to see the synthesis
Kind of a random question about molecular physics is if they react in non symmetrical ways do they have less of an explosive effect?
Azidoazide azide: I'm the best explosive!
Octanitrocubane: hold my nitrates!!!!
That's surprising that you could make a powerful explosive out of something that's obtainable on the cheap from the hardware stores. Nitrogen-based explosives are known for being pretty potent, yet you didn't need anything else, just Carbon and Nitrogen. Explosive Cyanide compounds are always pretty interesting too, especially the crystal they form when dropping out of the solution.
NileRed - 2019-03-03
Nice video, man! I find that the "fear" you described is somewhat common across chemistry. All it takes is a few people to claim a somewhat niche chemical is "super dangerous" and everyone else just kind of believes it. And since nobody has a reason to use or try it, the fear just keeps propagating. But it only takes one (maybe slightly crazy) person to try it and show otherwise.
EdgedPixie - 2021-12-08
Happened with Rubidium too. First university to try it had heavy safety gear on, behind a blast shield. Dropped it into water, and... Some gas came off. One of them took off their helmet and exclaimed "That's it?"
Kevin To - 2021-12-20
I dunno, kinda seems reasonable to fear anything with that much nitrogen chains
Duder Guy - 2021-12-22
I feel you could apply that logic to current news cycles.
Johannes West - 2022-01-16
That’s how I feel about my PhD pet chemical, dimethylmercury. Extremely toxic and volatile, sure. But no need for concentrated solutions if you know what you are doing, and actual means for protecting yourself exist.
Gelsoft Aussie - 2022-01-29
I actually dont find it scary. I actually see it as a challenge. Like What is the biggest explosion i can make with this. I actually want to understand what it’s capable of