In search of clear ice 2


 The idea is slow and directional freezing. 

The bread tray is wrapped in several layers of towel. It is not completely frozen. The upside down blue tray is unprotected. It freezes first and from top down to bottom. Unprotected the top blue froze too quickly and the cubes are all occluded. Clear ice formed in most but not all of the metal tray.

Conclusion: Fail

Recommendation: better insulated container, slower freezing from top. Possibly switch from cubes to chipped clear ice formed in large insulated trays. 












Fail.

1 comment:

chickelit said...

Chip: Try using distilled water. That might remove some of the residual cloudiness. Getting rid of air bubbles is harder, if you had an evacuated freezing chamber as in a lab, it would be a snap. You could freeze under vacuum.

Things you might try at home: Gases dissolve better in cold water than in hot water. But you can't "degas" water by starting hot because enough time passes for the air to re-equilibrate with the cooling water on the way to freezing. What you need is an airtight ice cube tray -- one that you could put hot water in and stick in the freezer. No air could enter as it cooled. This should eliminate bubbles.

Heh, I use tricks like this to introduce or eliminate bubbles from my plastic work.

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