Distillation and Gas Chromatography: Separation of Hexanes and Toluene - Lab Report Example

The results obtained related appropriately to what is recorded in literature. From the discussion, it is evident that the distillation, specifically fractional semimicroscale distillation is an appropriate method for the separation of volatile hydrocarbons such as toluene and hexane. According to Pavia et al., (56), the separation and purification of two liquids from a mixture requires the utilization of a method called distillation. The problem in the separation of two liquids is how to separate them.

Hence, in the experiment two volatile liquids, namely; toluene and hexane shall be separated using fractional semimicroscale distillation. In this experiment, the two liquids, hexane and toluene, have specific boiling point temperatures in degrees Celsius of 69 and 110.6 respectively. They have a 41.6 degrees Celsius difference (Pavia, Kriz and Lampman 56). The aim of this experiment was to separate hexane and toluene. The experiment’s scope included the utilization of the liquids’ boiling point, the refractive index, and gas chromatography (Mayo, Pike and Forbes 129).

The method used in the experiment was distillation. It involved two parts; the first distillation where the liquid mixture was divided into three split fractions. The second part involved redistillation of the fractions obtained first and last; that is the third. It is important to note that the three fractions contain different constituents; the first is affluent in the compound with a lower boiling point, while the third has the compound with a higher boiling point. The function of redistillation is to ensure the total separation of the two liquids that can be termed as pure because the Hickman still has a short column.

Hence, separation cannot be done in one step. The central question was at what temperatures would the two liquids separate? (Mayo, Pike, and Forbes 133). According to Mayo et al., (133), the procedure used comprised of two parts; initial distillation that separated the