Talk:Aluminium amalgam

Waste
It's interesting. Whenever I'd run amalgams, I've often found elemental mercury at the base of the flask or beaker. This, unlike the salts, is rather easily recovered. Comments? — Preceding unsigned comment added by 109.156.91.147 (talk) 04:18, 2 December 2011 (UTC)
 * Or just fish out the amalgam-coated pieces of aluminium with forceps or a frit. I rewrote to focus on the simple fact that there is mercury and its intrinsic issues rather than difficulties in manipulating the specific Hg-containing materials here. DMacks (talk) 07:30, 22 February 2012 (UTC)

The aluminium amalgamation in the presence of water results in HgO and Hg. It's noted in the first paragraph. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 124.183.98.85 (talk) 12:50, 7 July 2013‎ (UTC)
 * HgO? How comes as reducing the environment is? 89.204.137.43 (talk) 17:44, 20 March 2018 (UTC)

is it real?
I want test it in my chemistry class in front of my teacher, is it real ? if yes, what can I do to make it better ? Arsenic man (talk) 14:26, 5 January 2020 (UTC)

First equation is wrong, please fix or remove.
So the first equation in the block of 3 has dimeric mercury, which at least as far as I am aware doesn't exist, and isn't a balanced redox reaction. I'm also not sure where the 3:2 ratio comes from. If anyone knows what it should actually be, please fix, if not, and a reasonable amount of time has passed when you read this, consider deleting. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 84.114.196.198 (talk) 02:33, 26 January 2022 (UTC)
 * Good catch! It was supposed to be superscript 2 (and with a +) not subscript. Looks like a typo when User:EdGl was converting the formatting in this edit. DMacks (talk) 03:13, 26 January 2022 (UTC)
 * Whoops! Thanks for catching it and fixing it, you two. ~EdGl talk 15:09, 2 February 2022 (UTC)

Amalgam formation with Hg ion
The reaction equations and most of the prose in this article describes aluminum amalgam as forming from mercury(II) chloride, but the source that is cited for the entirety of the Reactivity section only briefly describes mercury(II) chloride and the results (and embrittlement from interactions with the mercury ion) are based on reactions with a mercury(II) acetate solution. The presence of ions is even specifically attributed to the characteristics of the acetate solution. I don't know how the mechanism should be reworded to be more accurate in this case, but I don't think it's related to the generation of the Hg2+ ion in every case. This was brought on by trying to solve the clarification tag. Recon rabbit  17:58, 22 January 2024 (UTC)