How to pierce an aluminum can with your finger

This amazing experiment can be repeated by almost everyone. With it you can easily surprise your friends or acquaintances. Yes, and getting to know the metal that melts from the heat of human hands will be very interesting and educational.

Will need

All you need for the experience:

• Gallium - you can buy it on AliExpress without any problems (http://ali.pub/3s5u3u)
  
• Aluminum drink can.

Gallium is very interesting because it has a melting point of 29.8 degrees Celsius. This means that you can melt it right on your hand. Compared to molten lead, gallium is almost non-toxic. And short-term contact with it will not cause harm to health. Well, of course you can’t drink it, put it in your eyes, or do inappropriate actions with it.

Reaction of aluminum to gallium

Gallium reacts with aluminum, mixes and forms a new brittle alloy. Which is what we will check now.
We take a can of drink. We pierce the bottom and release the contents into the mug. You can drink it or put it aside - we won't need it.

We heat the gallium and draw it into a syringe for easy dosing.Since this element has very low surface tension and sticks to everything where it appears.

Apply a small amount to the lid of the jar and wait for the result.

After a couple of minutes, the gallium solidified, but did not bond with the aluminum.

Why didn't anything happen? The fact is that aluminum has a thick layer of oxide that prevents the reaction. Before use, the jars themselves are also coated with a special composition for protection.
Remove a little from the edge using sandpaper.

And again we apply heated, liquid gallium.

After some time, you can observe the reaction.

The lid of the jar seemed to have aged and become wrinkled. If you plan it, your finger will go right through without any extra effort.


Gallium dispersed throughout the lid and formed a fragile connection when paired with aluminum.


A very interesting experiment! I recommend everyone to repeat it.

Watch the video