| MadSci Network: Chemistry |
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I want to be able to produce my own oxygen for welding and other uses. If
you could just point me to the right book(s)or websites it would be very
helpful. Sadly the local Librarian hasn,t been able to help. Thank you,
Gary
Sadly, I doubt you could easily get the equipment to obtain oxygen from air. Oxygen is produced from liquified air by fractional distillation, which requires not only a high-quality refrigerator (liquid air is about -205° C or -465° F) but a large, well-insulated distillation column such as you might find in a large chemical plant. The process is simple in concept: you allow the temperature of liquid air to rise very slowly, so that the oxygen and nitrogen -- which have different boiling points -- boil off separately. But it's not practical to do it in your garage, unless you have a lot more equipment in your garage than most people. If you have a lot of capital to expend there's no reason you couldn't do it, but it might be cheaper to buy your oxygen. On the other hand, if all you want is compressed air I would recommend looking into refill compressors for scuba gear.
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Try the links in the MadSci Library for more information on Chemistry.