video tutorial Potassium cyanate and reduction to cyanide

Name: video tutorial - Potassium cyanate and reduction to cyanide
Uploaded: 2025-12-11T09:03:44.081Z
Duration: 12 min 31 s
Description: we're back from our vacation and today we'll be making potassium cyanate to do...grams of urea we're using urea here in a 2.2 molar ratio which apparently gives a good yield

Describes the synthesis of potassium cyanate from urea and potassium hydroxide in a crucible, with heating that drives urea decomposition and ammonia production to form cyanate, followed by drying to an off-white solid.
Crude product contains impurities (residual potassium hydroxide, potassium carbonate, and degraded urea) and is purified by dissolving in hot water, adjusting pH with glacial acetic acid, filtering, and precipitating the cyanate by changing solvent conditions (ethanol or acetone) before drying.
Final reported product yield is approximately 3.5 g (about 48% of starting potassium hydroxide), with literature values around 80% cited as higher yields.
An auxiliary experiment attempted to convert the cyanate to cyanide by mixing with charcoal and heating; a cyanide-containing solution was indicated by a Prussian Blue test, suggesting cyanide ions are present, but this is not presented as a reliable or safe synthesis route.