I grew a perfect salt cube

Mar 14, 2024 12:53 PM

crystalchase21

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Table salt usually looks like white powder, but sometimes it forms these tiny little cubes in old soy sauce bottles and play dough.

I was curious how big they could get, and I really wanted a salt lick so I decided to grow them myself XD

If you guys want to try it out, here's a guide:
https://crystalverse.com/sodium-chloride-crystals/

Fucking Ishgardian.

2 years ago | Likes 2 Dislikes 0

Pu....put it in your mouth...

2 years ago | Likes 1 Dislikes 0

Oh cool

2 years ago | Likes 2 Dislikes 1

All salt crystals are cubes, even when it’s powder. This is due to their ionic bonds

2 years ago | Likes 1 Dislikes 0

The neat part is that this is a direct visual to the geometry of actual atoms in this mineral

2 years ago | Likes 1 Dislikes 0

That is a really tiny hand

2 years ago | Likes 4 Dislikes 1

I’m not sure I believe you…taking this with a grain of salt

2 years ago | Likes 17 Dislikes 1

2 years ago | Likes 2 Dislikes 0

@OP Maximum solubility of NaCl in water at 25°C is 357 mg/ml, its solubility does not increase appreciably with temperature, since at 100°C, the solubility is 384 mg/ml. I've grown fairly large sugar crystals, as also detailed on that website.

2 years ago | Likes 1 Dislikes 0

lick it

2 years ago | Likes 2 Dislikes 0

Now do it with my tears.

2 years ago | Likes 1 Dislikes 0

My soy sauce would never last long enough to start the process.

2 years ago | Likes 2 Dislikes 0

Is…is that a tesseract?

2 years ago | Likes 1 Dislikes 0

2 years ago | Likes 3 Dislikes 0

Neat! This reminds me of old school infra-red spectrum analysis, where sodium chloride salt crystal windows were used to hold a (very dry) liquid sample. The crystals were optically clear.

2 years ago | Likes 2 Dislikes 1

Salt plates! Students love breaking them. A good cheaper option is to stretch Teflon tape and put a drop of sample on the thin window of stretched tape.

2 years ago | Likes 1 Dislikes 1

worst whisky ice cubes ever /s

2 years ago | Likes 4 Dislikes 0

Exquisite

2 years ago | Likes 2 Dislikes 1

Possibly made a pure halite crystal.

Finding them in nature with such size and clusters with different colors are rare but possible. Most salt comes from compacted salt mounds literally mined out of from the ocean and such. So actual matrixes with them are so cool. So having made one yourself I'd keep that as a collection in gems.

2 years ago | Likes 1 Dislikes 0

I'll never attain anything like this. Congratulations stranger, bask in your glory

2 years ago | Likes 4 Dislikes 1

Looks kinda an easy process if you have a shelf and a few plastic containers. Maybe you're not interested in trying but it's within your capability if you want it enough!

2 years ago | Likes 2 Dislikes 0

:o so motivational. I might try

2 years ago | Likes 2 Dislikes 0

Thats Na-turally Cl-ear.

2 years ago | Likes 16 Dislikes 0

2 years ago | Likes 3 Dislikes 0

seriously underrated comment right here folks, I regret I have but one upvote to offer +1

2 years ago | Likes 4 Dislikes 0

It's okay, I'll help.

2 years ago | Likes 3 Dislikes 0

Is this the 'Grain of Salt' everyone is taking things with?

2 years ago | Likes 1 Dislikes 0

I wanna make one and suck on it like a jawbreaker. Sodium chloride gobstopper.

2 years ago | Likes 3 Dislikes 0

Salt tesseract

2 years ago | Likes 1 Dislikes 0

So did I v

2 years ago | Likes 1 Dislikes 0

One bit won't bite moment:

2 years ago | Likes 1 Dislikes 0

I know energon when I see it Decepticon!

2 years ago | Likes 236 Dislikes 0

Look like a Wisdom Cube to me :p.

2 years ago | Likes 1 Dislikes 0

Sus Decepticon is trying to trick gullible humans into becoming energon farmers. What has this world come to?

2 years ago | Likes 44 Dislikes 0

I, for one, welcome our cybernetic overlords!

2 years ago | Likes 6 Dislikes 0

2 years ago | Likes 7 Dislikes 0

Empty energon cube.

2 years ago | Likes 1 Dislikes 0

Isn't energon pink though?

2 years ago | Likes 2 Dislikes 0

What is this? An energon cube for Headmasters?!

2 years ago | Likes 10 Dislikes 0

Or cassette bots.

2 years ago | Likes 2 Dislikes 0

Dear diary, today I witnessed beauty.

2 years ago | Likes 8 Dislikes 0

I wouldn't resist to lick it. Not that I would like to do it, but that's the kind of intrusive thoughts I have.

2 years ago | Likes 46 Dislikes 0

Like clementine in the Walking dead Telltale series.

2 years ago | Likes 1 Dislikes 0

"Of course, deer. How's the corn?" (it's a terrible joke...deer, salt lick, corn...I'll show myself the door)

2 years ago | Likes 2 Dislikes 0

2 years ago | Likes 3 Dislikes 0

I'd make a bowl of ramen just to toss it into

2 years ago | Likes 1 Dislikes 0

I hope is a BIG bowl, that's a lot more than quite few spoonful of salt.

2 years ago | Likes 2 Dislikes 0

YOU DON'T KNOW MY LIFE:)

2 years ago | Likes 2 Dislikes 0

don't get salty

2 years ago | Likes 3 Dislikes 0

Yeah. I can't stand it if things are too salty (and to my almost everything is) but I'd still lick that thing because dumb brain said so

2 years ago | Likes 2 Dislikes 0

2 years ago | Likes 2 Dislikes 0

In my intro to geology class in college, the TA said the easiest way to identify Halite, aka salt, was to lick it. Did not want to touch those rocks without gloves.

2 years ago | Likes 7 Dislikes 0

Yea, well in my biology class the big chested girl told me she'd show me her boobies if I licked one of those half clam shells in the watery solution that had been sitting there for like 20 years... she lied.

2 years ago | Likes 3 Dislikes 0

Always get payment first.

2 years ago | Likes 2 Dislikes 0

Remember licking salt is dissolving salt in your mouth, that is A SOLUTION. Geologist are up to something

2 years ago | Likes 6 Dislikes 0

It's got what babies crave!

2 years ago | Likes 1 Dislikes 0

I absolutely liked a salt lick more than once lol

2 years ago | Likes 1 Dislikes 0

LICKED, DAMNIT. LICKED!

2 years ago | Likes 2 Dislikes 0

Doctor: "Do you use lot of salt in your food?"
OP: "No, just one crystal."
Doctor: "Hmm..."

2 years ago | Likes 518 Dislikes 0

@OP why does it look like a little box?

2 years ago | Likes 6 Dislikes 0

Habit.

2 years ago | Likes 1 Dislikes 0

It follows from the crystalline structure.

2 years ago | Likes 9 Dislikes 0

It looks like there is a translucent cube shaped box with some white stuff in the middle. I know NaCL has a cubic structure.

2 years ago | Likes 4 Dislikes 0

I haven't looked at the instructions OP posted, but I would guess that the solution was evaporating, getting more concentrated and it started crystallizing faster -> more messy/irregular crystals. So the outside would scatter light more, looking white.

2 years ago | Likes 2 Dislikes 0

We shall see if they “fess up.” Yes the instructions explain how important the choice of “container” is. The walls of their container are not difficult to see and they look orthogonal to me.

2 years ago | Likes 3 Dislikes 0

@OP I think a lot of people don’t realize that this crystal was grown inside a small cube shaped plastic box and that is mostly what we are seeing. Am I incorrect? I can see the walls of it. Looks like about 2/3 of your cube is not salt by plastic box.

2 years ago | Likes 1 Dislikes 0

No, that is the entire crystal. The difference in shade is because the crystal grew at different rates throughout the growth process

2 years ago | Likes 1 Dislikes 0

Interesting. I wish you had closeups. If you grew it in a cube shaped mold, how did you get it out? Because you need saturated liquid in contact with the growing crystal, there should be a depression or void in the middle of the open part of the mold.

2 years ago | Likes 1 Dislikes 0

This video is interesting. I don’t know how they get a uniform seed layer tho. https://youtu.be/L03aMa1WtXo?si=JJTJFo_N4oC76zdg

2 years ago | Likes 1 Dislikes 0

Ok, you've got your tesseract of salt. Now grow a matching hypercube of pepper.

2 years ago | Likes 146 Dislikes 0

Also I feel that this shouldn't be something I need to say but, Don't Put Cats In A Box With Fucking Poison! Got it Schrodinger.

2 years ago | Likes 2 Dislikes 0

I thought of something terribly clever then I forgot it

2 years ago | Likes 5 Dislikes 0

A möbius strip of oregano.

2 years ago | Likes 12 Dislikes 0

That'd be sage

2 years ago | Likes 3 Dislikes 0

Thyme would fit

2 years ago | Likes 4 Dislikes 0

But if we’re talking about a peppercorn, wouldn’t it be some kind of hypersphere?

2 years ago | Likes 29 Dislikes 0

Unless maybe it's grown in a teensy little box so it comes out cubed, like those fancy cube watermelons?

2 years ago | Likes 7 Dislikes 0

or the bonsai kittens

2 years ago | Likes 3 Dislikes 0

2 years ago | Likes 2 Dislikes 0

I REALLY wanted to include a picture of a bonsai kitten for the young people who haven't heard of it before, but knowing that the mods can be stupid sometimes, I had a feeling they'd flag it as animal abuse and ban me again. -- One time I made a comment with a link to an image of the "wicked wok Chinese restaurant" meme from an imgur post that someone else posted; I didn't upload it, just linked to it, and the mods temp-banned me for a month while leaving the original post untouched. Unfair af.

2 years ago | Likes 4 Dislikes 0

Table salt usually looks like tiny cubes...

2 years ago | Likes 87 Dislikes 3

I mean, that's not incompatible with being a powder. And crystals being what crystals are, you would expect similar patterns large and small.

2 years ago | Likes 4 Dislikes 1

Yes, salt has a cubic crystal structure and habit and is always composed of cubes.

2 years ago | Likes 1 Dislikes 0

Depends how close you put your face

2 years ago | Likes 47 Dislikes 0

If you put it far enough, you won't see that it's a cube

2 years ago | Likes 7 Dislikes 0

2 years ago | Likes 2 Dislikes 0

You have excellent eyesight, young person.

2 years ago | Likes 36 Dislikes 0

I'm screenshotting this as proof I'm not actually 68

2 years ago | Likes 19 Dislikes 0

Young doesn't necessarily correlate with your age

2 years ago | Likes 4 Dislikes 1

Being 33 helps, but you are absolutely correct

2 years ago | Likes 6 Dislikes 0

Who is 33?

2 years ago | Likes 1 Dislikes 0

I'll be 33 in May. What's it like? Will my knees still function?

2 years ago | Likes 4 Dislikes 0

I'll be 33 in May. What's it like? Will my knees still function?

2 years ago | Likes 2 Dislikes 0