The Acetate Work


Dry distillation train


Equipment
Two 1 litre doublenecked flasks
Two B34 1 litre flasks
Glass and plastic tubing, assorted stoppers
Water-cooled longish B24 condensor
Clean sand
Steel saucepan
Basic still-head B34 to B24
Hot-plate up to 450oC
End piece B24
Ground charcoal

Place your chosen acetate salts into the one litre B34 flask to no more than half full. Place on sand bed of 2 cm. in steel saucepan and pour rest of sand around up to the neck or 2/3 of flask for insulation and thermal shock upon cooling.
Grease the joints and connect still head and condensor to end piece and double necked receiver.
The second neck is the outlet for any volatile vapors to be passed through into the second flask via a glass tube into a water trap.
After bubbling through the water any toxic fumes are passed through charcoal in the third flask. From there a plastic tube can be lead to the outside.
After the train is sealed raise the heat incrementally every half hour until the liquifaction and the dry land appears and grows like leavened bread. The first distillate is the phlegm or water of crystallisation. (After this passes the flask can be emptied or replaced). It will then give up the ghost like smoke that flows along the condensor and fills the receiver condensing into a golden water. As the heat is raised a reddish-brown oil ascends and perhaps a sublimate of volatile salt.
The distillate is either circulated or rectified by fractional distillation.


Encyclopedia Britannica 1771: Chemistry

An example with zinc acetate


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