Sodium acetate - instant ice!
So, I’ve jumped on the hot/instant ice bandwagon. This is the stuff that’s found in those instant heat packs - you know, the ones where you click the metal disc inside, and the liquid pad turns solid and heats up. The actual chemical involved is sodium acetate, which apparently is completely non toxic (and is actually used as a food additive!)
The gist is that you can dissolve more of the powder in hot water than in cold (just like dissolving sugar or salt - try dissolving as much as you can in a cup of cold water, then add some more, microwave and stir. It’ll all go in!) Then when it cools down, that extra dissolved powder wants to come out and solidify. But this requires a trigger to get things started - a crystal, a sharp knock, something. That lets you do all sorts of fun things (like the video shown above!) You can see the tower I made in my photo here. (You can also see - a mixture of corn flour and water (which makes a slime like mixture), some out of date eggs which I was trying to crush in my fist (you can’t with one hand), and some cream (which was for cocktails while I worked 
) )
Unfortunately, I can’t quite get it right - either I haven’t dissolved enough powder, and the mixture won’t solidify when cooled and triggered. Or, I’ve added too much and it solidifies prematurely. But if at first you don’t succeed, try, try and try again! I’ll post my final recipe when I’m done!
Ahoink Says:
What is Sodium acetate how to i make it like in this video
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=h-TBtIUAeOk
yyy Says:
does this trick works only when u worm it than cool it?
why cant i trow some powder in a class of water? (would it freeze???)
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Anonymous Says:
where do u get the sodium acetate? What website? can u get it out of hand warmers?
erdahl Says:
Don´t know how it works for you guys (US?), but in Norway you can find it at your local pharmacy (they usually need to order it in - takes a couple of days).
the world of chemestry is as rich as the Putin!
Ian Says:
http://www.unitednuclear.com/acetate.htm this is a web site that has it but ive never used flakes it is usally a crystal like form like fine salt
here is what you did wrong not really wrong but the wrong way sick a pan on the stove poor water in it then make it hot but do not let it boil just under boiling point.now poor in the sodium acetate untill nomore will desolve now poor it into a glass DO NOT LET THE POWDER FROM THE UNDESOLVED SODIUM ACETATE GET IN THE GLASS!now put the glass in the frige let it cool then poot some dry sodium acetate on like something you dont need then poor some of the mixture on and have fun sculpting
where do you get sodium acetste from? please help….
Make sure you let it cool completely. It took us a good 20 min in the freezer. We also supersaturated the solution before we heated it, so we knew it would be supersaturated at room temperature. We then added a bit more which double ensured it. Then we heated it. We put ours in a test tube (with a kid) and boiled it in a pan of boiling water. We used anhydrous sodium acetate, but looking at some websites, we saw that other people used trihydrate and also were successful, they just used less water per sodium acetate ratio.
lid, not kid. sorry