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Odds are that you've seen a demonstration of this stuff before, most likely in your high school chemistry class. It is a highly sensitive contact explosive made from two ingredients ammonia and iodine crystals. It is so sensitive when dry it can be set off by a feather or even a fly. The last time I made this was years ago for a science project. It was the middle of winter and I had been setting off batches of this stuff in my backyard all day. When night fell it started lightly snowing, the snow flakes fell to the ground and set off minute traces of the NI3. The resulting snaps were loud enough to wake up my mom who then woke me up and told me to do something about it. I wasnt really sure what to do about it so I filled up a bucket of water and threw it out over the pavement, setting off hundreds of little snaps which each gave off tiny poofs of purple smoke.
It has got to be one of the most surreal memories I have, being out in the moonlight while snowflakes gently floated down, causing the dead silence to be broken by little purple snaps going off everywhere.
Heres the wiki for it nitrogen triiodide
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nitrogen_triiodide
Odds are that you've seen a demonstration of this stuff before, most likely in your high school chemistry class. It is a highly sensitive contact explosive made from two ingredients ammonia and iodine crystals. It is so sensitive when dry it can be set off by a feather or even a fly. The last time I made this was years ago for a science project. It was the middle of winter and I had been setting off batches of this stuff in my backyard all day. When night fell it started lightly snowing, the snow flakes fell to the ground and set off minute traces of the NI3. The resulting snaps were loud enough to wake up my mom who then woke me up and told me to do something about it. I wasnt really sure what to do about it so I filled up a bucket of water and threw it out over the pavement, setting off hundreds of little snaps which each gave off tiny poofs of purple smoke.
It has got to be one of the most surreal memories I have, being out in the moonlight while snowflakes gently floated down, causing the dead silence to be broken by little purple snaps going off everywhere.
Heres the wiki for it nitrogen triiodide
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nitrogen_triiodide
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Iodine crystals.
Can be bought on e-bay, unitednuclear.com, or http://shop.armorforensics.com/mm5/merchant.mvc?Screen=PROD&Store_Code=RedWop&Product_Code=1-2805&Category_Code=
That last one is a forensics website. Iodine crystals are used in a fingerprint lifting process called iodine fuming. As you can see on the label on the jar, the gas from the crystals has stained the paper to a dark purple color. Iodine gas is toxic, so do this experiment in a well ventilated area.
Ammonia
The purer the better. I use clear ammonia available almost anywhere. The store bought stuff is actually Ammonium hydroxide, meaning that it is ammonia dissolved in a ton of water. If for some reason you have access to highly concentrated ammonia the resulting nitrogen triiodide will be much more powerful, and therefore handled much more carefully.
A tupperware container
Coffee filters
Can be bought on e-bay, unitednuclear.com, or http://shop.armorforensics.com/mm5/merchant.mvc?Screen=PROD&Store_Code=RedWop&Product_Code=1-2805&Category_Code=
That last one is a forensics website. Iodine crystals are used in a fingerprint lifting process called iodine fuming. As you can see on the label on the jar, the gas from the crystals has stained the paper to a dark purple color. Iodine gas is toxic, so do this experiment in a well ventilated area.
Ammonia
The purer the better. I use clear ammonia available almost anywhere. The store bought stuff is actually Ammonium hydroxide, meaning that it is ammonia dissolved in a ton of water. If for some reason you have access to highly concentrated ammonia the resulting nitrogen triiodide will be much more powerful, and therefore handled much more carefully.
A tupperware container
Coffee filters
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also, it would have been handy to know that it would have worked, since i spent 2 weeks trying to figure out how ammonia works, which i know now. i made some NI3 , and i cannot for the love of god understand what all this cafuffle is about.
What i meant was could i evapourate iodine tincture and use that, but now i know the amount of iodine in tincuture is neglegeble. ide be better off extracting iodic acid from seaweed.
The best source of iodine is to simply buy potassium iodide, mix with hydrochloric acid, then add hydrogen peroxide, which results in what i beleive is roughly 70% by weight of the potassium iodide, in iodine crystals.
Ammonia is a very mysterious thing, as is hydrogen sulfides reaction with alkalis, which is more confusing, as it is an acid, yet does not follow the same rules as a typical acid-alkali neutralization .
anyone able to point me in the right direction to find out more about why ammonia behaves the way it does?
Add this:
I regularly hold "explosion chemistry" workshops for students. I take the utmost care not to ever injure anyone. However, during one of my workshops, a student held 0.5g of nitrogen triiodide on a sheet of paper, outside, in open air and was blown off his feet when a gust of wind blew the sheet of paper holding the explosive against his chest. He wore a lab coat, safety glasses and had long pants and closed shoes to aid in his protection. A sense of humour also aided in both of us coming frrom the experiment without any harm.
EMPHASIS: If you know how stuff works, be even more carefull than when you do not have a clue.
AND: Rather play with this than try to synthesize other lethal compounds of which you know nothing of.
Could be possible, I'd scale it up slowly though. Remember, the crystals must be completely dry in order to detonate. That might prove technically difficult in some sort of sealed container. You'd also want to speak to your bank manager as iodine is not exactly the cheapest material around. Nonetheless, it is a viable idea.
"It could also be used quite easily in a grenade." It is glaringly obvious that you have never synthesized even a mg of this compound. Learn to respect chemicals before you attempt making gram quantities of high explosives, or any other chemical compound not found at the corner store, for that matter.
Please, should you try anything with this, rather consult the "old man" - I'd gladly help out with instructions, even send you the stuff, if you agree to be careful.
soooooooo dangerous =D