QUANTITATIVE DETERMINATION OF SODA ASH

COMPOSITION
BY
DOUBLE
INDICATOR
TITRATION
L. WOODS

INSTITUTE OF GROUNDER STUDIES, COLLEGE OF POLARIS

UNIVERSITY OF THE PHILIPPINES, DILIMAN, QUEZON CITY 1101, PHILIPPINES
DATE SUBMITTED: 03 MARCH 2016
DATE PERFORMED: 23 FEBRUARY 2016

1. Why does the distilled water used in the experiment need to be boiled?
The distilled water was boiled to get rid of the CO 2 that might have built up. The CO 2
could become carbonic acid and could thus affect the pH.
2. Why is a mixture of NaOH and NaHCO3 incompatible?
The two compounds share a cation (Na +). HCO3 and OH are the only ones that will react.
The two will form will form H2CO3 (carbonic acid).
3. Why does the solution need to be boiled before reaching the methyl orange endpoint?
Like in number 1, CO2 could become carbonic acid and could affect the pH. HCl was used
to titrate the Soda Ash in the following reaction:
Na2CO3 (s) + 2 HCl (aq) 2NaCl (aq) + H2O (l) + CO2 (g)
The boiling gets rid of the CO2.
4. What are the basic components of the unknown soda ash sample based on the volume relationship at
the phenolphthalein and methyl orange endpoints? Report the percentage of each components and
report percent error.
The basic components of the unknown soda ash sample were sodium carbonate and
sodium bicarbonate. Based on the experiment, the unknown sample contains 21.74%
Na2CO3 and 13.50% NaHCO3. However, the theoretical values are: 50% Na 2CO3 and 20%
NaHCO3. There is a 56.5% error for Na2CO3 and a 32.5% error for NaHCO3.
5. What are the possible sources of errors and their effect on the calculated parameters? Rationalize.
An error that occurred during the experiment was that only one trial was done. Because of
that, the relevant statistical tests were not conducted due to the lack of samples. Another
possible source of error is the misreading of the burettes. The exact effects are
indeterminate since it depends on how the observer read the measurements.
References
[1] Brown, e. a. (2015). Chemistry: The Central Science (Thirteenth ed.). London: Pearson
Education Limited.

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[2] Odian, G., & Blei, I. (1994). Schaum's Outlines: General, Organic, and Biological Chemistry.
New Jersey: The McGraw-Hill Companies, Inc.
[3] Silberberg, M. (2013). Principles of General Chemistry (Third ed.). New York: McGraw-Hill.

APPENDIX A SAMPLE CALCULATIONS

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