Making NYLON in a chemistry lesson. Please help

caro_ | 17:30 Fri 28th Apr 2006 | Science

4 Answers

My old teacher used to get us to go this at the end of term. Two liquids (one lilac one clear I seem to remember) poured into a flask and then mixed with a glass mixer. Find the end, wrap onto a spindle with handle and then turn, turn, turn the handle.

Rumour had it that one could use up ALL the liquid in this fashion. One problem.....

.... what were the two liquids and in what proportion were they added. I want to tell my son and I can't remember. Please help

regarding quartz

Infrasound

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Clanad

A standard demonstration of the reaction that makes Nylon (a polyamide) uses hexamethylenediamine and sebacoyl chloride. The product is called 6-10 Nylon and consists of alternating units contributed by the hexamethylened iamine (6 carbon atoms) and the sebacoyl chloride (10 carbon atoms), according to the MadSci Network...

caro_

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Blimey - I had no idea it was that scientific - esp as I have never heard of either substance! I am certain he just used liquids off the O level (showing my age lol) syllabus.

Do those fancy chemicals have more easily-recognisable names d'you know??

shammydodger

Caro

Take a look at this site

http://gold.chem.wwu.edu/labs/Chem101/8bNylon.pdf

I remember (vaguely) doing this in GCE chemistry, then teaching it in a freshman Chem lab in the States circa 1989. I've never seen it performed to totallity, as it were, and it would be rather difficult in a lab considering the types of container available. It would have to be a very shallow dish, rather than the traditional beaker.

As for the names of the chemicals involved, I'm afraid that's about as informal as they get. With respect to Clanad's answer, I couldn't tell you if adipoyl chloride and sebacoyl chloride are one and the same because they are "trivial" names, rather than the systematic names I was taught. I would think that they are different, but the resulting nylon would be the same type (there are different structural types.) I've been out of chemistry so long that it's all a bit hazy, I'm afraid!

shammydodger

Aha!

Clanad, of course, was talking about 6,10-Nylon, so you have to use sebacoyl chloride for that prep.

The lab that I used to teach was the prep of 6,6-Nylon, which uses adipoyl chloride. This prep is the one described in the link I gave above.

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