Has anyone ever seen crude oil straight out of the ground? I haven't but I've always thought that it'd be cool to have a little sample to see what exactly it's like and just to have as a sort of a novelty item.
Well, I was at a family event the other day and learned that my cousin works in the oil field and he said that he could get me as much as I want, so he's supposed to be getting a gallon or two for me straight out of the well. :)

Since I'm getting more than I really need I thought I'd do some kind of experiments or something with it. I was thinking of maybe trying to "refine" some just to see what all I can separate out of it, but I'm not sure how I should go about it.

Any ideas of experiments I could/should do?

Well, if you want to refine it, then you will need what's called a fractional distillation column and boiler. The column has a dozen or so pipes coming off it, located at certain heights which relate to the temperature of the gasses seeping off. For example, the boiling temperature of hydrogen is around -271 Celcius, and hydrogen would be taken from the very top. Stuff like ethanol and methanol would be somewhere in the middle, with boiling temperatures of 30-35 celcius. Gasoline and petrol would be below that, and diesel would be piped off right near the bottom where it is hottest, as it has a very high boiling temperature, relative to the rest of the substances.

Like I said, you can refine hydrogen, LPG(propane), ethanol, gasoline, diesel, and even solid carbon from crude oil if you put enough work into it.

Don't forget though, fractional distillation involves taking a flammable substance, heating it to just below boiling point, and then collecting even more volatile gasses from it, which are also almost at their respective boiling points, and thus, extremely dangerous.

http://prod.campuscruiser.com/news/22/3694530/105524/no-smoking-sign-4.jpg

blow wads of bitumen tar out from a straw :)

You might be surprised with how much variation there is between different grades. I've seen some WTI blends that are actually dark tan in color. Sulfur content ("sweet" or "sour") and API gravity (essentially density) vary considerably and are the main measures used to distinguish.

If you can find out what particular oil you have you can look up an assay from StatoilHydro, BP, etc. with various information on its composition and other chemical characteristics. If you have access to an academic library, "International Crude Oil Market Handbook" from Energy Intelligence, published every few years, is also a good resource.

If you try to distill as described above you'll probably find mostly n-alkanes, may be useful as solvents. Have fun.

Oh and at the rate we're going, it'll be worth $250 a gallon in a few years, so hang onto it ;).

Sorry it's taken me so long to get back. Well, if you want to refine it, then you will need what's called a fractional distillation column and boiler. The column has a dozen or so pipes coming off it, located at certain heights which relate to the temperature of the gasses seeping off. For example, the boiling temperature of hydrogen is around -271 Celcius, and hydrogen would be taken from the very top. Stuff like ethanol and methanol would be somewhere in the middle, with boiling temperatures of 30-35 celcius. Gasoline and petrol would be below that, and diesel would be piped off right near the bottom where it is hottest, as it has a very high boiling temperature, relative to the rest of the substances.

Like I said, you can refine hydrogen, LPG(propane), ethanol, gasoline, diesel, and even solid carbon from crude oil if you put enough work into it.I was thinking about just doing a liquor (moonshine) style distillation and just see what kind/how much liquid I can come up with.

I've done one little experiment so far where I put a small amount in a bowl and then put it on a hot plate and heated it to 212, then 325, then 450*F, while being stirred, taking note of how much the volume reduced by and what the consistency of it was at room temp after each heating.
I found that the volume didn't decrease by much at all, maybe by 1/10th. (I just eyeballed it, I'll do it by weight next time so I can get some real data.)
After heating to 212* the consistency was about like pudding, you could turn the bowl over slowly and it wouldn't move. After the 450* heating it was more like bearing grease, you can make it move if you jar the bowl real hard.


You might be surprised with how much variation there is between different grades. I've seen some WTI blends that are actually dark tan in color. Sulfur content ("sweet" or "sour") and API gravity (essentially density) vary considerably and are the main measures used to distinguish.

If you can find out what particular oil you have you can look up an assay from StatoilHydro, BP, etc. with various information on its composition and other chemical characteristics. If you have access to an academic library, "International Crude Oil Market Handbook" from Energy Intelligence, published every few years, is also a good resource.I'm guessing it's Light Louisiana Sweet since that seems to be the predominant type around here, based on what I can find online. I didn't have much luck finding detailed info on it though (didn't know what to look for really), I'll have to go back and look at some of the sources you've mentioned.

The stuff I have pretty much smells like a mix of gasoline and oil, almost like used motor oil. No sulfur smell at all. Any general idea of what type it may be?

The energy intelligence handbook would have an assay, but you'd only find it in a large research or industry library.

Here's a link with hydrocarbon analysis. API gravity is 34.5 so it's definitely light, sulfur concentration is also around 0.5% so this is probably what you're looking for:

http://www.etc-cte.ec.gc.ca/databases/OilProperties/pdf/WEB_Louisiana.pdf

Dynamic viscosity and pour point measurements are there so you can compare to your experiments. To determine sulfur content you actually have to taste it (I'm not joking!) it'll be mildly sweet if there is little sulfur.