Because of nitromethane's azeotropic behavior with methanol, there are nitromethane losses in the lower fractions of the distillation. SWIM's human nature says to himself that the concentration has nothing to do with the reaction, just that enough nitromethane needs to be present. Since al/hg can be done in methanol would it not make sense to just distill RC fuel to isolate the -entire- methanol to nitromethane fraction and dump your ketone in this? You'd start with 15-20% (at least around SWIM's place) and end up with 15-20% nitro, but the distillation would seperate any lubricants/oils. So can this be done?
From half a liter of 15%nitro/10%castor RC fuel here, SWIM predicts ending up with 400ml of nitro/methanol, which when dripped into the al/hg, is going to end up with the solvent at the bottom, which is like a liter of methanol anyways.
Conclusion: Distill quickly from the ranges of metho to nitro to free the extreme contaminants such as oils. Use hydrometer to check how much nitro you have. This will save time and electricity doing a fractional distillation, in which you wont get all your nitro back anyways.
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