Taking AP Chems Through Customs?

[xyz]

A friend of mine is going on holiday to the UK and Europe and wants to take some things to liven up the holiday (and to show off to his relatives :)).

Anyway, would it be safe to take Acetone, H2O2, and HCl through customs? My friend and I have already thought of ways to get the acetone and the H2O2 through. We are going to empty out a bottle of Nail Polish Remover (90% acetone) and refill it with pure acetone. For the H2O2, we are going to buy a 100mL bottle of 6% H2O2 Hair Bleach, discard the 6% stuff and then refill it with 50% H2O2.

We have not yet figured out a way to get HCl through customs, any suggestions are welcome.

My friend is also planning to take several Instant Cold Packs so that he can cut them open once he has reached his destination, then use the AN for APAN.

Anyway, the point of this thread is mostly : How well do you think the above methods will work for smuggling the chems? How well are cold packs sealed and will the AN in them send the sniffer dogs crazy?

And like I said, suggestions for smuggling 10mL of conc. HCl are welcome.

[knowledgehungry]

Well i think that your plans for bringing in the H2O2 and acetone will work fine. I have never been through international customs, i am only familiar with national airport security measures. My guess is that if you put all those chemicals in your non-carry on bag you will be fine. Put the HCl in something like a almond extract jar. One more thing your friend might want to mail the H2O2 to your relatives, that is the only chem that i think you would get in real trouble for.

[frogfot]

What about the old way.. fill a 0,5l plastic bottle from mineral water with HCl and have it in your hands/hand bag all the time. Though i wouldnt be you when they force you to drink it :)
Btw, there are some cleaners that contain 10% HCl.. they're not considered to be that evul. Maby you can replace it with 30%.

[Stoic]

I may be missing the point here - but why not just buy the chemicals in the UK? They are all ready available.

[Monkey_Poo69]

I was thinking the same thing. The hydrogen peroxide and acetone will be fine. Try filling a bottle meant for corrosive things with some HCL and write Hydrogen Peroxide on it. I don't think you will be asked questions about this. If the HCL is causing that much of problem, I don't see why you wouldn't be able to buy it in the UK

[Anthony]

It would be a lot easier just to buy the reactants in Europe. You won't be restricted in amount either.

Cleaners are prohited on aircraft IIRC. The acid definitely would be, since acid spilt on an airframe could mean having to decomission the entire plane...

I would b e weary of packing 50% H2O2. The baggage throwers/stampers could casuse the container to split/break/rupture, possibly causing ignition of otehr items in your baggage. Being responsible for a midair fire in the cargo hold isn't going to go down well.

The chances of such disasters isn't that great, but sod's law isn't on your side and the consequences would be *nasty*.

[Monkey_Poo69]

yeah, Anthony is right. Just don't take the chemicals on the plane. It is too big of a risk for something that small. You can buy the items there anyways. Threre is no point in taking the chemicals. Plus, I'm pretty sure that your friend will be nervous about getting caught on the plane so he can save himself from that by just buying the stuff there. Another reason why this isn't a good idea is that if he does get caught, they will find out that he is trying to build explosives. All the chemicals for building acetone peroxide on a plane isn't a good idea at all.

[EP]

Other people said it, but just to reinforce: It's not worth the risk, buy the stuff when you/they/whoever gets there.

[xyz]

My friend didn't want to have to go to the trouble of tracking down all the chems once he arrived in Europe. I will suggest to him that he dilutes the H2O2 down to 25% if he is going to take it so that it is no longer a fire risk (H2O2 below 30% conc. is not classed as hazmat) .

Are cold packs easily available from chemists in Europe (more specifically England and Germany)? Can Anthony or anyone else suggest a place to get the HCl from in England?

Edit: I'm sure I once saw a thread about using lemon juice in the place of HCl for AP synthesis. Does anyone have an AP synth that uses lemon juice or citric acid as the catalyst? Citric Acid would be easy enough to take with you. The thread about his was in the archives but according to Anthony, "a knob goblin has stolen the archives".

[Monkey_Poo69]

Cold packs won't be a problem to take on the plane so he can take that..... Like I said before, the H2O2 and the acetone will be fine but he can find the HCL in Europe. I'm searching on google for any large stores that are in England that sell that kind of stuff but I can't find anything right now. If I find something, I'll post it. To make it a little bit more easier for me to search, which part of England will he be staying in (a city or town)?

[xyz]

I would rather not go into detail about the city or town. I am not looking for a particular place that would sell HCl, I just want to know what shops to look in e.g. Hardware Shops. I just want to know what shops would sell HCl in England, that's all.

I am still thinking that taking citric acid would be easiest, can anyone tell me how many grams of citric acid would be equal to 10mL of 37% HCl?.

[chicomalo]

Diluting the H2O2 -- personally, I would dilute it to 10-15% -- would be a good idea, but it'll get past fine in a hair bleach bottle or even a bottle of standard 3% disinfectant solution. This might be a bit of a hassle when 3% can be easily bought at your destination and concentrated.

Cold packs will get past fine, just put them in a first-aid kit. I would personally put the AN in my carry-on bag -- say you didn't have enough room in your checked bags -- as you will avoid the bomb-sniffing dogs/machines. It's easier to explain to a human doing a random search than to a dog or machine that searches every bag. Plus, your checked baggage will likely get yanked from your flight if the AN is detected. The acetone will have no troubles.

I wouldn't take HCl on the plane, acids and cleaners are forbidden and they'd definately be confiscated if found. I'm sure some can be bought in London (assuming you're flying in there), it's a big city.

Often, customs relies somewhat on the honor system -- it's usually not incredibly thorough. I wouldn't expect English customs to be too extreme on a flight from the US.

[xyz]

I'm not from the US and I no longer intend to take HCl with me. Thanks for the idea about the first aid kit though, that could come in very useful.

Edit: I just realised that a small bottle of H2O2 would not look out of place in a fist aid kit either.

[Macgyver]

Originally posted by xyz
I'm not from the US and I no longer intend to take HCl with me. Thanks for the idea about the first aid kit though, that could come in very useful.

Edit: I just realised that a small bottle of H2O2 would not look out of place in a fist aid kit either.

Once upon a time when I was small, long before messing with explosives I brought a litre of nitromethane on a domestic flight, not realizing that it was something bad. But at that time the only thing I used it for was as a fuel additive for a model airplane engine.

This was 15 years ago, so probably they didn't care that much way back then.

As for now I'd be a bit more worried about bringing anything suspicious on a plane, it's far too easy for the security people to get the wrong idea about you if you even think about it.

Just my $0.02...

[Stoic]

www.MachineMart.co.uk -hcl. Also have shops all over the country.

[Anthony]

I'd bring the coldpacks with you. All the ones I've seen here have been urea based, although I haven't looked *that* hard.

I've had a quick look on Machine Mart's page, but couldn't find HCl. I presume it's as a brick cleaner? Most HCl sources here are in that form. A product name would be make things easier for xyz. "B&Q" are a large DIY chain here, and stock brick cleaners, and 91% H2SO4 drain unblockers (might be a useful alternative if you can't find HCl).

I get my HCl as a high strength cleaner by the name of "Spirit of Salts", 32% conc from privately owned (Mom and Pop) DIY shops, they tend to sell more obscure household cleaners.

BTW, 6 and 9% H2O2 can be bought from any highstreet chemist.

[Mr Cool]

And hexamine can be obtained from all camping shops I've been in. HMTD works fine with 9% H2O2, whereas my limited experience with making AP suggests that using 9% really doesn't work too well.
Putting a load of coldpacks in your luggage wouldn't be any risk at all. AN has no odour, and they're well sealed anyway. Dogs sniff for sensitisers (NM, nitrate esters etc), [nitro]aromatics, stuff like that. To sensitise it, you could use AP/HMTD or acetone, petrol etc for larger/main charges.

[xyz]

I don't plan on setting off anything too large when I'm there, so I won't be using ANFO.

Once again, can anyone tell me how many grams of Citric Acid is approximately equal in strength to 10mL of 37% HCl? Bringing some Citric Acid will be less of a hassle than having to track down some HCl when I am over there.

[Mic]

I'm not very good in chemistry but I think that you should find how many moles there is in 10ml of 37% HCl and to take the same number of moles of citric acid. I'm very uncertain though..

[zaibatsu]

HCl is available at most large DIY stores in the UK - Focus Do It All, B&Q etc.

Citric CAN be gotten from pharmacists, Wilkos.

AN, you'd be best ordering from a supplier before you got here so it doesn't take too long to come.

[Anthony]

I'm not sure that citric acid can be used to catalyse AP:confused:

[Stoic]

IIRC, nbk did a test and AP failed to work with Citric Acid.

[Monkey_Poo69]

Citric acid isn't strong enough to catalyse AP. I think boric acid can work for it, though. It can be bought from a pharmacy (I found it being sold right beside citric acid) or as roach killer.

[zaibatsu]

Sorry, I was in a rush, I meant it to complete Mr Cool's list of HMTD precursors.

[xyz]

Are there any other "safe" acids like citric acid that can be used to catalyse AP? Preferably ones that are easy enough to get.

Otherwise it looks like my friend will be buying his HCl once he gets there. If he ends up going that is, Australia is getting more and more paranoid about SARS.

Edit: All the times that I have said "I" in this thread, I have been referring to my friend, I do that by accident sometimes:) .

[Macgyver]

Originally posted by Mr Cool
And hexamine can be obtained from all camping shops I've been in. HMTD works fine with 9% H2O2, whereas my limited experience with making AP suggests that using 9% really doesn't work too well.
Putting a load of coldpacks in your luggage wouldn't be any risk at all. AN has no odour, and they're well sealed anyway. Dogs sniff for sensitisers (NM, nitrate esters etc), [nitro]aromatics, stuff like that. To sensitise it, you could use AP/HMTD or acetone, petrol etc for larger/main charges.

While speaking of HMTD, I might add that acetic acid (60% or higher) works better than citric acid, and you will not have to worry as much about cooling the mix as when you use citric acid. A good place to find acetic acid is where they sell chemicals to develop your own photographs, as acetic acid is used in that process and they often carry the 98-99% acetic acid.

[Monkey_Poo69]

xyz, as I said before, boric acid is safe and is used for things other than roach killer. It is bought at the pharmacy. Just ask the person where boric acid is in the store and they'll show you. It's safe and I dont think it'll be a problem.

[xyz]

OK then, do you have any idea how strong it is compared to HCl?