Acid Experiment

Question: How do different metals react with acid rain?

Rationale: To help life on mars, and if stainless steel gets eaten then that

might be a problem.

What we know from our research: Acid rain can ruin buildings by

stripping away the material

and metal that makes up the buildings. So that the Buildings don’t get

stripped away they build them with limestone, marble, steel and brass. They

acid rain will dissolve the structures like hot water does to a sugar cube.

Acid rain is a result to air pollution when fuel is burnt a ton of chemicals are

produced . The smoke doesn’t just contain the grey particles you see. It also

contains invisible gases that you can’t see. These gases are very harmful.

Sites we used for research:

 https://www.epa.gov/acidrain/what-acid-rain

 https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1PDjVDIrFec
  http://projects.ncsu.edu/project/bio183de/Black/chemreview/chemrevie

w_reading/acid_rain.html

 https://sciencing.com/acid-rain-affect-buildings-statues-22062.html

Our Hypothesis: We think that acid rain will make the metals dissolve, and

some metals will stay as solids because the metals will be exposed to the

weather especially rain and fog.

Materials:

1. Aluminum

2. Bronze

3. s/steel

4. m/steel

5. Zinc

6. Brass

7. Copper

8. n/silver

9. container and cap x3

 10. Acid (Water, Sulfuric Acid)

Steps of our experiment: (Numbered steps)

1. Clean the jars

2. Make acid rain

3. Poor the rain into one of the clean jars and the metal

4. Wait

5. See results

6. Write the results

Our Results:(pictures and graphs)

# Name Before After
1. M/steel 1.5 pH 4.4pH
2. N/silver 1.5 pH 2.1pH
3. Zinc 1.5pH 6.2 pH
4. Copper 1.5pH 2.7 pH
5. Aluminum 1.5pH 2.3 pH
6. S/Steel 1.5pH 2.9 pH
7. Bronze 1.5pH 1.8 pH
8. Brass 1.5pH 2.1 pH
Names of experts we contacted: (researchers in your field of study)

Dr. Rick. E. Norman

Conclusion

Looking at our results, our original hypothesis was that acid rain will make

the metals dissolve and some will stay as solids because the metals exposed

to the weather especially rain and fog. One way we know the hypothesis is

wrong is that no metals dissolved. We think this happened because we only

left the metals in the jar for about 15 days. Another interesting thing that

happened was that stainless steel was eaten on the bottom of the jar. We

think this was because the stainless steel was one of the metals that would

have gotten eaten if we left in the jar longer. In conclusion, it turns out that

brass became more silver, Zinc became less shiny, m/steel turned from silver

to rust, Bronze had gray splotches, N/silver turned more silver, copper turned

more copper, S/steel got eaten on the bottom of the jar, and Aluminum

became a nether shade of silver. We used the pH measurer to test the acid

rain before the metals were in and after. If I were to do this again, one thing I

would change would be to leave the metals in the jar longer.

Metal Strips Set, Laboratory Grade

Lemon Juice: 2.4 pH

Vinegar: 3.2 pH
Ammonia: 10.6 pH
Acid Rain: 1.5 pH