dzamie:tombrewster421:ultrafacts: Follow @ultrafacts for more facts!{source} Now that’s neat.
dzamie:tombrewster421:ultrafacts: Follow @ultrafacts for more facts!{source} Now that’s neat. The basics of it seem to be: its fuel is Sodium Chlorate (NaClO3), which you might recognize as looking like salt with oxygen jammed in there. And that’s essentially what it does! The other component is some iron powder (Fe + O2) which, when burned, burns hot as fuck, which is enough to break up Sodium Chlorate into Sodium Chloride and oxygen (NaCl + O2).Then there’s enough Sodium Chlorate to outpace the oxygen consumed to keep the reaction going, so the released oxygen disperses into the room. It’s very difficult and inadvisable to stop it, however, so it’s generally a last resort used when oxygen has already reached dangerous levels, to avoid having the air be full of too much oxygen (also dangerous). -- source link