How to Separate Sugar & Sand Without Melting the Sugar
Separating sugar and sugar offers students a challenge based on understanding the different properties of these two substances. One way to separate the two is to heat the mixture over a wire mesh, since sugar will melt before sand and drip through the mesh. However, there is an easier alternative. Since sugar is highly soluble in water (about 180 g will dissolve in 100 mL water at room temperature) it will rapidly dissolve when you add it to water. Sand, however, is made of insoluble quartz. Simply mixing the combination with water and filtering off the undissolved sand will separate the two.
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Instructions
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Add a quantity of the mixture of sugar and sand to a beaker. Fill the beaker no more than one-quarter full, so there is plenty of room to add water.
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Add water to the beaker at a ratio of approximately 100 milliliters (mL) of water for every 100 grams (g) of mixture. Stir the mixture to help dissolve the sugar. Keep stirring until all the sugar is dissolved and can no longer be seen. The mixture will not become clear because the undissolved sand will still be visible.
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Clamp a funnel in place using the ring stand, so its spout faces downwards, and position it over an empty beaker. Place a conical piece of filter paper in the funnel. You can wet the filter paper with some pure water if you like, to better hold it in place against the walls of the funnel.
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Pour the water containing the sugar and sand through the funnel, making sure that the water does not slip between the filter paper and the funnel walls. The undissolved sand will be caught on the filter paper and the sugar, dissolved in the water, will pass through into the receiving beaker. You have now separated the two substances.
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Tips & Warnings
You can recover the sugar if you want to by letting the filtered water sit long enough to evaporate the water, leaving the sugar behind in the beaker.
