How would you balance the following equation: aluminum iodide and chlorine gas react to form aluminum chloride and iodine gas?
1 Answer
Aluminum has a common oxidation state of
For similar reasons, aluminum chloride is
Chlorine and iodine both exist naturally (in their elemental states) as diatomic elements, so they are
Overall we get:
#2"AlI"_3(aq) + 3"Cl"_2(g) -> 2"AlCl"_3(aq) + 3"I"_2(g)#
Knowing that there were two chlorines on the left, I just found the common multiple of 2 and 3 to be 6, and doubled the
Naturally, now we have two
We should note, though, that aluminum iodide is violently reactive in water unless it's a hexahydrate. So, it's probably the anhydrous version dissolved in water, and the amount of heat produced might explain why iodine is a gaseous product, and not a solid.
