Describe how you would separate a mixture of water, sand and iron metal filings. Which separation techniques would you use?

1 Answer
anor277
Mar 25, 2016

Water may be simply filtered off. The iron filings may be dissolved in acid, and this solution filtered from the sand.

Explanation:

#Fe(s) + 2HCl(aq) rarr FeCl_2(aq) + H_2(g)uarr#

Sand, #SiO_2# to a first approximation, is very inert, and only specialty acids (for instance #HF#) would touch it.

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