[marebare]

OK IM TRYING TO BALACE THIS EQUATION,

Ca(HCO3)2 ------> CO2 +H2O + CaCO3


so i just put a 1 in front of CO2? also does anyone know what the parentheses mean?

[MitchTwitchita]

This equation already looks balanced to me.  The number 1 is never used in front of a species because if there is no number, the number of moles is assumed to be 1.  Also the parentheses means that that everything inside must be multiplied by (in this case) the valence of calcium.  Hope that helps some.

[azmanam]

Yes, you can put a 1 in front of them all, the equation is 1:1 throughout.  Lucky you

As for the parentheses, they indicate that a collection of atoms is bound to a central atom more than once in an identical fashion.  see attachment for a visual explanation.

Edit by Borek: picture modified so that it can be viewed, tiff was not good selection of graphic format. In general on the web use gif, png or jpg (although jpg is of no use here).

[Borek]

Group of atoms in parentheses should be taken number of times indicated by index after closing parenthesis. So Ca(HCO₃)₂ is equivalent to CaH₂C₂O₆. However, notation with parentheses is prefered, as it gives much more information about the molecule. Every chemist will immediately recognize HCO₃^- as hydrogen carbonate and Ca(HCO₃)₂ as calcium hydrogen carbonate, I doubt anybody will see this compound in CaH₂C₂O₆ without much more effort.

[azmanam]

tiff was not good selection of graphic format

Didn't know that - I thought it was better than jpg, actually.

Thanks for the heads up - I'll stop using tiffs