[born2dive00]

Hello everyone I first off would like to thank every one in advance for your help. I am not a chemist in any shape or form although I do have a very basic understanding from middle school chemistry of how things work. I am an expat, teach Social Science overseas, getting many specialty chemicals is very difficult (I wish i was back in Taiwan) . But I can get the basic chemicals. Trisodium phosphate is being used as an emulsifing agent.

But what I am trying to verify or check my work on a reaction.

If I have 40 mg of sodium, I know that (if i did my math right) i should need 95.07962919 mg of Tri-sodium phosphate to account for the 4mg of elemental sodium. This i am rather certain of as the amount of sodium in Trisodiumphosphate is 0.4207 or 42.07%


Now here is where I am needing some verification  how much Phosphoric Acid and Sodium Hydroxide do i need to supply the 95.07962919mg of Tri Sodium phosphate?

If I did my math correct  since 40mg of sodium requires 95.07962919mg of TSP, now TSP accounts for 0.18893 or 18.893% phosphorus so i would have 17.96339434mg of elemental phosphorus to account for.

So if I have 17.96339434mg of elemental phosphorus, and the phosphorus amount in phosphoric acid accounts for 0.31607% phosphorus

I would need 56.83359491mg pf 100% pure phosphoric acid or 68.20031389mg of 80% pure phosphoric acid


Now for the Sodium content with the sodium Hydroxide, Knowing that need to account for 40mg of elemental sodium, and the amount of sodium in sodium hydroxide accounts for 0.57 or 57%

If i did my math correct i would need 69.5906331mg of Sodium Hydroxide

So to sum it up, I would need to react 69.5906331mg of Sodium Hydroxide with the 56.83359491mg of phosphoric to equal 95.07962919mg of Tri-Sodium-Phosphate is this correct??

Would anyone be willing to calculate this out using the equation method you use in chemistry, I have no clue as to how that is done with moles and the balancing the chemistry equations....
I thought I would leave that to the professionals hence why I have come here for your help

Thank you all for helping this lowly social studies teacher out, I bow down to all you chemistry gods out there as I could never get my head around that.

Ps Yes I know the hazards of mixing acids and bases, I have been taught the right way to do this years ago and have the protective equipment, no need to worry.

[Borek]

A bit of scratching left ear with a right hand, but the numbers look about right. Just don't write so many digits, you won't be able to measure things that accurately, three digits (significant figures) is about as much as you can hope for in practice.

You can learn the basics of balancing and stoichiometry here:

http://www.chembuddy.com/?left=balancing-stoichiometry&right=toc

I must admit I am rather surprised by the fact you were not taught these things, they are part of every basic chemistry course.

[born2dive00]

Thank you Borek for confirming this way of doing it

The thing is I am working on a excel spread sheet and dealing with several different chemicals for making soft drinks.

The last time I was taught balancing equasions and the like was over 40 years ago. I teach history and my forte is languages. Numbers and math mathmatics are not my strong suit. Hence when I need to figure out a chemical formula I have a tendency to use % of weights.

Again thank you very much.