Separation Lab Procedure

(1) The purpose of the separation lab procedure was to help my group members and I successfully formulate our own plan before completing the experiment, handling multiple materials and substances, etc. It acted as a step-by-step plan that guided us throughout the experiment and ensured that we were well prepared ahead of time (ie. knowing what kind of materials were necessary and gathering the correct measurements of each substance); this made the experiment day much less hectic for all of us. It made reaching our goals (achieving > 85% recovery for each substance) more realistic and convenient. (2)We predicted that we would be able to easily separate each substance from the mixture through the use of our designed procedure. By using a bar magnet, we predicted that all the iron (and only the iron) would attract and quickly maneuver its way through the beaker and into the

This was mostly likely due the fact that the distillation method occurred last in the procedure, while the filtration occurred first. The water and sodium chloride had time to sit with one another while the rest of the experiment was being conducted, meaning that some of the sodium chloride had time to completely dissolved within the water. By the time it was placed into the evaporating dish and over the bunsen burner, it was too dissolved to be recovered. If the water was added to the mixture/filtration occurred right before distillation occurred, the sodium chloride would have been able to be removed from the water due to the fact that less of it would have been dissolved in that shorter period of time. Additionally, the sodium chloride stuck to the sides of the evaporating dish and made it more difficult to scrape it off using a scoopula. If more time was devoted to using the scoopula to remove the sodium chloride from the corners and sides of the dish, more of it would have been