Formal Lab Report

Effects of Base and Acidic liquids on Pennies

Max Kraynak, Brian Halton, Michael Plummer, Kevin Jeng
Mrs. Albanese
March 1st 2014













Introduction

This experiment was performed in order too determine the corrosive effects of a base
liquid, and an acidic liquid on pennies. In this experiment, five pennies were submerged
in laundry detergent, lemon juice, and water. The lemon juice acted as the acidic liquid,
Formal Lab Report
the laundry detergent was the base liquid, and the pennies in the water were the control
group. If the pennies were submerged in each liquid then the pennies in the lemon juice
and detergent would corrode the copper layer of the penny, but the water would have
no corrosive effects.
Pennies, contrary to popular belief, are not actually copper, but rather copper-plated
zinc. They are 97.5% zinc, and only 2.5% copper. This means that its very possible for
a corrosive liquid to eat through the copper. The liquids were chosen based on their
level on the Ph scale. The Ph scale is numbered from 1-14, and is used to measure the
acidity or basicity of a solution. If a liquid is 1-6 on the scale then its acidic, but if its 8-
14 then its basic. The only neutral liquid is water, and its number 7 on the scale. Thats
why laundry detergent, lemon juice, and water were used for this experiment. Lemon
juice is a 2 on the Ph scale which makes it acidic. Laundry detergent is a 9.5 on the Ph
scale making it basic. Water is 7 on the Ph scale, making it neutral.

Methods and Materials
Materials:
1 cup lemon juice
1 cup Ajax laundry detergent
1 cup water
3 tupperware containers
15 pennies
1 measuring cup
2 strips of Ph paper
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Safety goggles

Methods:
1. Measure 1 cup of laundry detergent, lemon juice, and water, and weigh each.
2. Pour each of the liquids into separate tupperware containers.
3. Gather three groups of five pennies, and find the mass of a penny by dividing the
mass of a penny by 2.5% to find the mass of the copper, and by 97.5% to find the mass
of the present zinc.
4.Place each of the penny groups into a different liquid and let them sit for three days
5. After 3 days remove the pennies from the solutions and safely dispose of the
solutions
6. Weigh the pennies from each group to see if there was any change
7. Since there was no change the solutions had no effect on the pennies safely dispose
of the pennies.
Data:

Solutions Amount
Ajax Laundry Detergent 8 fl oz
Lemon Juice 8 fl oz
Water 8 fl oz


Pennies Mass of one penny before
being put in solution
Mass of one penny after
being put in solution
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Water group 2.5g 2.5g
Detergent group 2.5g 2.5g
Lemon juice group 2.5g 2.5g

Results:

Element Calculation Result
Zinc .975 x 2.5g 2.4375g Zn
Copper .25 x 2.5g .625g Cu

There was no need to calculate the percent of each element after the pennies were
taken from the liquid because they weighed the same amount.
Discussion:
The results of this experiment show that there was virtually no change at all in the
pennies after they were taken out of the liquid. This means that the solutions didnt have
a strong enough corrosive effect to eat through the copper layer, or the underlying zinc.
While there could have been some slight changes in the pennies, the lack of a change
in mass lead to the conclusion that no significant changes took place.

After the pennies were taken from the solutions they still had the same mass. This was
disappointing as it meant that no corrosion had taken place within the penny.
There are a few reasons why the solutions had no effect on the pennies. Its possible
that the solutions just werent strong enough. The laundry detergent used was only a
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9.5 out of 14 on the Ph scale so its not surprising that it wasnt strong enough to
corrode the penny. The lemon juice, however, was expected to do at least a little bit of
visible damage as its a 2 on the Ph scale, making it very acidic. The reason the lemon
juice didnt corrode any of the penny could have been because of the small
concentration of copper. Its possible that the lemon juice would have been strong
enough to corrode the zinc, but was unable to do because of the outer copper layer. So
had there been only zinc, the lemon juice could possibly have had a much stronger
effect on the pennies.

Lemon Juice is typically used for things such as dissolving rust, and even keeping
things fresh. When lemon juice is combined with salt it can be used to dissolve rust.
Lemon juice contains citric acid, which when combined with salt becomes slightly more
corrosive to some material. Perhaps if the pennies had been put in a container
containing a solution of salt and lemon juice there would have been a much greater
effect on them.

The water was not expected to do anything in this experiment other than to be the
control so the pennies being unaffected by it was unsurprising. Water has no corrosive
properties as it is 7 on the Ph scale. This means that its a neutral liquid and, unless
combined with something else, will produce no corrosive results.

The Ajax Laundry Detergent is only a mild basic solution so it was not expected to have
a huge corrosive effect on the pennies, but it was expected to have at least a minor
effect. Laundry detergent is typically used for cleaning clothes so it was already known
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that the detergent wouldnt be dangerous to use. There are also corrosion inhibitors
that are put into detergent to keep it from damaging clothing. This was one reason that
the detergent was expected to have some sort of corrosive effect on the pennies. It was
believed that although there were corrosion inhibitors the detergent would still retain
some of its corrosive properties. This, it seems, was not true because it had no effect
on the pennies.



Conclusion:
This experiment yielded poor results, and proved only that the solutions used werent
strong enough to corrode even the copper layer of the pennies. The solutions failed to
have any visible effect on the pennies whatsoever This disproved the theory that the
lemon juice and detergent could corrode the pennies. This experiment could definitely
be improved upon by using stronger solutions to eat away at the pennies.