My friend Hank K. is working on a safety test for Pumping Station: One‘s new safety system and asked me to contribute a few fun chemistry-related questions. Here is what I came up with (you’ll find the answers after the break):
Questions:
(1) What is the result of mixing concentrated nitric and hydrochloric acids in a 1:3 ratio?
a) the active ingredients in a can of Crunk(TM) energy drink
b) aqua regia
c) nitro glycerine
d) piranha solution
e) piss off, test writer!
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(2) A mixture of ice, water, sodium chloride, and ammonium chloride results in what temperature reference?
a) 0 Celsius
b) 273 Kelvin
c) 0 Fahrenheit
d) 32 Kelvin
e) 0 Rankine
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(3) You are in a bathroom, and are in process of cleaning it. You have just cleaned the floor, toilet, and bath tub with Soft Scrub(TM) cleaner with the power of Clorox(TM). You reach for the bottle of Windex(TM) cleaner (now with the power of ammonia!) and proceed to spray it liberally onto the windows, tiles, and mirrors.
Your vision begins to swim.
As your head crashes towards the concrete countertop, towards a severe concussion, likely brain damage due to fume exposure, and your possible death, what is the thought that should be flashing through your mind?
a) holy crap, I’m about to die!
b) d’oh! I’m not supposed to mix bleach and ammonia!
c) am I likely to be eaten by a grue?
d) who cares – I’m about to die on a bathroom floor, how crappy is that?
A quick update on where the ChemHacker STM project stands: I’ve completed assembling the electronic components and I’m moving to programming the arduino (well, that’s actually a sanguino in the photo, but I’m moving the whole project to arduino duemilanove based hardware).