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Engineering
Che 420
Air bags contain a mixture of NaN3, KNO3, SiO2. When ignited, the following
reactions take place:
Reactions 2 and 3 are necessary to handle the toxic sodium reaction product
from detonation. Set up a stoichiometric table solely in terms of NaN3 (A), KNO3
(B), etc., and the number of moles initially. If 150 grams of sodium azide are
present in each airbag, how many grams of KNO3 and SiO2 must be added to
make the reaction products safe in the form of alkaline silicate glass after the
bag has inflated?
The sodium azide is in itself toxic. How would you propose to handle
undetonated airbags in cars piling up in the junkyards?
Solution
1. 2NaN3 2Na + 3N2
2. 10Na + 2KNO3 K2O + 5Na2O + N2
3. K2O + Na2O + SiO2 alkaline silicate glass
NaN310NaN3
+ 0.2KNO3
+ 2KNO3
+ 0.1SiO2
+ SiO2 0.4Na2O
4Na2O + 16N2
1.6N2++alkaline
0.1 (alkaline
silicate
silicate
glass glass)
A B C D E
Stoichiometric Table
N2 E 0 1.6NAX 1.6NAX
● weight of NaN3 = 150 g
nNaN3 = 2.3077 moles
● MWNaN3 = 65 g/mol
From Equation 4, 1 mol of NaN3 (A) requires 0.2 mol of KNO3 (B).