Chemistry Lab

In order to complete this experiment, students had to provide a great amount of focus and a good understanding of the procedures, which were, along with the materials, very detailed. With this being said, because most of the materials had similar names, it was important for students to not manipulate the lab by mixing up the reagents, which would completely ruin the experiment. The important factors that influenced the success of this experiment included the following: 1) 100% transfer, 2) 100% digestion, 3) controlling the amount of bacteria and metals absorbed from the surroundings, 4) excessive boiling of the product, 5) an error with the starch indicator, and 6) 100% reaction. Students also had to understand, like with every other lab completed in this course, that the weighing process created sources of errors as well, such as: not clearing the balance before weighing the samples, not weighing the samples at a …show more content…
For example, when transferring the unknown samples from the weigh boats to the flasks, students could only use the smallest amounts of water possible. With small amounts of water used to transfer the reagent to an equipment, came the possibility of having a less than 100% transfer. And because a 100% reaction is dependent on a 100% transfer, a less than 100% reaction would be observed during this experiment as well. Other factors that can influence a less than 100% reaction included the following: forgetting to add specific reagents when required (i.e, forgetting to add the starch indicator to the product before the titration phase), using the wrong amounts of reagents (i.e. 0.0600g KIO3 instead of 0.6000g KIO3) and not adding the reagents in the specific order given (i.e. adding the starch indicator before adding the ammonium fluoride during the beaker reaction of the unknown samples; ammonium fluoride caused the release of the copper