Recently in silence class, we were tasked to do a lab that involved making copper using only a few things. We made the copper by pouring some copper chloride into a beaker and then placing a rolled up piece of aluminum foil into the beaker. We let it sit for some time until it broke down into brown flakes of what I assume is rust. We then dumped out the copper chloride and cleaned the foil flakes with water until they were generally clean. We also put hydrochloride acid into the cleaning mix. Once that was done, we finally took out some of the now clean flakes, which were, at that point, copper, and put them over the flame of a bunsen burner. To prove it was copper, we took a look at the colour of the flame when the copper flakes were being burned and the flames were green, which is the colour that copper makes when it is burned.

Here’s a video of us making the copper. IMG_0165-2gptd2u

Here’s the video of the copper being burned. IMG_0164-2d57t4d