Home-Grown Science: How to Make Crystals

Table of Content

• Growing big sodium chloride crystals
• Easy Christmas Tree Brownies
• Preparing the salt solution
• Ingredients You’ll Need
• Making Sugar Crystals
• Love to cook, bake, craft, create?

The next largest single crystal and the crystal cluster both weigh 50 g. Move this setup to a sheltered location with minimum air movement. Places like the inside of a cupboard, the basement or a storeroom work nicely. Also, partially cover the top of the jar with a lid, or some plastic wrap to slow further down evaporation.

It seems like very little, but the difference in growth rate is big. You don’t want to go beyond that, or needles will form instead of nice single crystals. If you’re looking for a cool hobby, or something fun to do with your kids, I highly recommend giving it a try. The crystals that you grow might dissolve in water, but the memories you make will last a lifetime. Epsom salt crystals have water trapped inside their crystal structure.

Growing big sodium chloride crystals

After we have our saturated solution, we still need to grow a seed crystal. A seed crystal is a tiny, perfect sodium chloride crystal that we can then use to grow a bigger crystal. Once water evaporates, the extra salt has to come out of solution, forming salt crystals.

So, to achieve the former, I first dissolved 750 g of Epsom salt in 500 mL of water (the 500 mL is actually random and doesn’t matter so much). This solution will probably be around 900 mL in volume. After heating in the pot, some of it will have evaporated, leaving me with about 800 mL of solution. I then pour it into the jar, and add water until the level reaches exactly 1000 mL. Do everything in the exact same way, except make solution A more concentrated by 1%.

Easy Christmas Tree Brownies

Add about a half cup of Epsom salt with equal parts hot water.This will create a saturated solution. A solution is considered saturated when no more solids can be dissolved into the liquid. If you don't have many crystals growing after a couple days, you can pour off the first solution and add a new supersaturated solution to the tray. Add a cup of salt to the warm water and stir it continuously until the salt is completely dissolved.

The crystals dissolve in water, so it’s not a good idea to make jewelry with them. Some people have suggested casting it in resin to protect it – this might work. Note that the food coloring won’t color the crystal completely, it will just give it a slight tinge of color. They prevent the crystals from forming in their usual way. This makes the crystals less transparent and encourages them to grow in clumps instead of cubes.

Preparing the salt solution

I first transferred some solution there, and then moved a small seed crystal from the dish, placing it right in the center of the makeup jar lid. Keep heating until you see small, white salt flakes start to form on the surface of the solution. Let the solution cool, close the lid and leave it for a day. Sodium chloride has a solubility of 36 g/100 ml of water at room temperature.

Solutions that are left for very long might form bits of mold. This is a slight problem and can be quickly solved by filtering the solution. If the grain grows slightly, the solution is slightly supersaturated.

About This Article

You can also choose to add dried herbs or flower buds for extra scent; grind these in a food processor to a powder before mixing it with your salts. Boil 2 cups of water and transfer it into a container. About 2 minutes after the water begins to boil, remove it from the heat. Let it cool for 2 minutes, then pour it into a plastic container.

Add 3 tbsp (77.8 g) of borax to the jar, stirring until most of the borax dissolves. When you add it to the jar, let the borax settle at the bottom. Then, use a spoon or a glass stirrer to combine the water and borax.

Ingredients You’ll Need

But that kind of salt is produced industrially, with special equipment and mineral rich seawater. Regular salt looks like a fine white powder. Sure, it tastes good, but it’s not very interesting to look at. Once the solution dries, the surface of the crystal will be covered with crust. I just thought making homemade diamond sort of pendent or ring from crystals would be an interesting project to undertake.

I found that the batch with sea salt gave big heads and rock salt gave small heads. The so-called “head” is actually a large salt cube. When it starts forming, it looks like a tiny square on the surface of the solution.

I am currently working on copper sulfate crystals and my biggest that is still growing is 24 grams. If the needles form around the grain/throughout the solution, the solution is very supersaturated. The Epsom salt crystals should be 7-9 cm long now, and weigh about 50 grams. If you don’t have enough solution, prepare more, using the recipe for solution A. Make sure that the solution cools down to room temperature before immersing the crystals.

Here are some interesting specimens, and how you can achieve them. Indeed, table salt is often used in kids’ experiments to demonstrate crystallization. It’s a simple activity, but the results are disappointing. Many tutorials online make it look far easier than it actually is. Then pour the solution into a separate container through the funnel.

Sciencing_Icons_Fundamentals-Geometry Fundamentals

You can even form crystals just on the plate without any papers. To make different colors of crystals, add a drop of food coloring to each sponge. Women who are pregnant, especially in their 3rd trimester, should not use bath salts, nor should people with high blood pressure or edema . You might not wish to include the glycerin if you are experiencing problems with clumping.