[metalriffzz]

Just wondering, whats the best way to make ammonium sulfide from solid sulfur?

[Alberto_Kravina]

I don't think that's so easy, what I think icould work is to make the sulfur react with hydrogen. After the H₂S is produced put it in ammonia solution.

2 NH₄OH + H₂S -----> (NH₄)₂S + 2 H₂O

[metalriffzz]

H2S is a little hard to produce. I did hear that letting match heads sit in ammonia for a while produced the (NH4)2S I'm looking for, and I'm assuming that it's the sulfur in matches that causes this.

[science2000]

Notice that match heads are red, Red Phosphorus is used.
I've heard on this site, because I asked a question about oxidizing pyrite, and some H2S can be made that way. Be careful, that stuff is more toxic that cyanide!

[limpet chicken]

Match heads usually contain phosphorus sesquisulfide, the only RP on matches is on safety match STRIKERS, not the heads.

H2S can be made by dripping acid onto a sulfide, AlS is one of the best to use, but I am pretty confidant it can be done fine with pyrites.

Be careful, it is really nasty stuff, by the time you realise, you may not be able to smell it, as it anaesthetizes the sense of smell, so you think its gone, but oops! stil there, your dead in a heap on the floor

Just be careful.

It works for making ammonium sulfide, I made the selenide the same way.

[metalriffzz]

Hm. Would burning an aluminum powder and sulfur mixture yeild the AlS I need?

[Borek]

AlS

Al₂S₃?

[science2000]

If you've ever placed a solution of aqeous ammonia next to a solution with HCl, NH4Cl forms as a smoke.  A similar circumstance would happen with H2S and ammonia, giving a poor yield unless you've considered this.

[metalriffzz]

hm well H2S may not be the way to go.. know of any other easily obtainable or makeable sulfides that can be used with ammonia?

[Alberto_Kravina]

Hm. Would burning an aluminum powder and sulfur mixture yeild the AlS I need?

If you want to know how to make aluminium sulfide check out this:

http://images.google.at/imgres?imgurl=http://www.inorg.chem.ethz.ch/group/v/304_14_14.jpg&imgrefurl=http://www.inorg.chem.ethz.ch/group/v/node6.html&h=140&w=188&sz=5&tbnid=OYXpgEkqRWEJ:&tbnh=72&tbnw=97&hl=de&start=1&prev=/images%3Fq%3DAluminiumsulfid%26svnum%3D10%26hl%3Dde%26lr%3D

It´s a very good site where you can see many useful movies.

PS: Click "Aluminiumsulfid"....this site is in german, but the sentences that explain what is going on during the movies are in English.

Alberto: use [url ] tags to format long URLs.

[metalriffzz]

Well, instead of going through all the work of producing a toxic gas I decided to trash the experiment. Right when I was going to throw away the jar of sulfur sitting in ammonia I decided to throw in a little aluminum powder just to see what would happen.  As luck may have it I'm getting a good  slow amount of bubbling coming out of the mixture of sulfur and Al powder. Probably not anything along the lines of getting the sulfur reduced but can anyone explain the reaction?

[woelen]

You probably have some hydrogen gas. Al-metal slowly dissolves in weak alkalies forming H2-gas and aluminate ions. With stronger alkalies the reaction goes faster.

Btw, what do you want to do with (NH4)2S and H2S? Making stink bombs? If that is what you want, this is not the wisest thing to do. You can put people in serious risk with that. H2S is not a toy to play with.

[metalriffzz]

Hmm nevermind I finally did it anyway. I used the Al2S3 that was mentioned in an earlier post by igniting sulfur and Al powder and then immersing an excess of it in an ammonia solution, waited for it to all settle, decanted off the liquid from the solids and Al(OH)3 gel and voila! (NH4)2S!

The whole purpose of making this was to get a souluble sulfide for my ions collection, and since NaOH has dissappeared off of shelves NH3 seemed like my next best bet. If I wanted a stink bomb I woulda stopped at Al2S3. Much easier to handle, much stinkier, and much much safer when you can wiegh it all out and predict how much gas is going to be formed, but remember kids H2S can kill, so use dog excretment.